720 



GLEAXII\'GS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Sept. 1 



fically and horizontally at equal distances 

 trom each other; lay this frame upon your 

 comb, and count the number of squares oc- 

 cupied with brood. His wires are a centi- 

 meter (.4 of an inch) apart, and everj^ fifth 

 wire is colored, so as to keep track easily. 

 We mig^ht have the wires half an inch apart, 

 and then each little square would contain 

 seven cells (six if the comb is built from 

 foundation), and each large square 25 times 

 as many. 



White clover keeps up its reputation for 

 exceptional behavior this year. Up to the 

 middle of Aug^ust it has been continually 

 on the grain, and fields are now white with 

 bloom where scarcely a blossom was to be 

 seen in June. But the bees seem to get 

 nothing from it. [What j'ou describe is ex- 

 actly true in our locality. The fields are 

 DOW bright with the bloom of white, red, 

 and alsike clover. On my rides back and 

 forth between the factory and our farm I 

 have taken pains to see whether there are 

 anj^ bees on the clover; but there is never a 

 one, and we have had the right kind of 

 honey weather too. What is the matter? 

 Can't clover }'ield out of season? But this 

 large amount of white clover certainly must 

 mean something for next 5'ear, for the plants 

 are developing strong roots. — Ed.] 



You THINK, Mr. Editor, that Dr. Gandy 

 "certainly could not mean that when a 

 swarm is actually coming out, it would stop 

 at the very moment the bees could have 

 more room." Look at what he says, p. 607: 

 "It commenced to swarm, and I immediate- 

 ly set two of them off and put on another 

 hive with empty combs, also taking out a 

 few frames of honey from one of the hives I 

 set off and put in frames of foundation, and 

 they immediately quit coming out." Now, 

 if he didn't mean what he said, suppose 

 you ask Dr. Gandy what he did mean. 

 [Yes, I admit that Dr. Gaudy's assertion 

 is pretty strong; but I have sometimes un- 

 wittingly myself made strong statements 

 when I did not believe in the practice that 

 the word conveys. That is what I meant 

 when I said I did not believe Dr. Gandy 

 meant just what his words made him say. 

 —Ed.] 



Replying to your question, Mr. Editor, 

 although it may knock my argument, if I 

 "had only one or two cases of foul brood in 

 a j'ard," I wouldn't take the chances of 

 killing the spores with formalin, yet I've 

 no right to dispute Prof. Harrison's word 

 that he did kill the spores with formalin; 

 and ij formalin kills spores, then your no- 

 tion that "a bonfire would be cheaper to 

 apply than any concoction of drugs" is an 

 erroneous notion, for the bonfire would de- 

 stroy the combs and the concoction would 

 save them. But is there no way of testing 

 whether formalin does kill spores? [I did 

 not mean to question Prof. Harrison's word. 

 But here is the point: He might be able to 

 make formalin kill the spores; and, on the 

 other hand, owing to a lack of skill or 

 scientific knowledge / might utterly fail. 



What I tried to imply was that, under the 

 circumstances, I could afford to take no 

 chances. I knew what fire would do, and 

 knew how to apply it. — Ed.] 



DooLiTTLE thinks we don't know the 

 cause of bee paralysis, p. 678, and I think 

 others have said the same in Gleanings. 

 The cause of foul brood is Bacilhis alvei, so 

 named by Cheshire, and the same authority 

 gave the name Bacillus Gaytonl to the mis- 

 creant that causes paralysis. See Che-, 

 shire's "Bees and Bee-keeping," Vol. II., 

 p. 570! [Yes, I remember reading that 

 Cheshire described a disease that bore 

 some resemblance to what we call here bee 

 paralysis; but he had only one sample for 

 examination, from a Miss Gayton, and he 

 therefore named the bacillus after her. Are 

 you sure that the Bacillus Gayioni has a 

 bacillus or microbe that stands for bee par- 

 alj'sis? When I agreed with Mr. Doolittle 

 that we did not know the cause, I meant 

 we did not know the conditions that are fa- 

 vorable to its development, and I do not 

 think we do. So far I believe there is no 

 cure that has ever been named for it. — Ed.] 



^JVeighbor^Jieldj 



?? 



Short'ning days and colder nights — 



One more season's passed ; 

 Happy they who've gathered stores 



Ere comes winter's blast. 



lib 



The trouble between the pear-men and 

 bee-keepers in California seems to be in a 

 fair way of easy solution, according to the 

 Tulare Register, which says: 



Thomas Thompson, who has a Utile place in the out- 

 skirts ot Tulare, had a pear orchard of tliirty-five 

 trees or more that was early attacked with the dread- 

 ed blight. Mr. Thompson did not know what to do to 

 defend his trees, but, unlike many others, he thought 

 that he must do something and not surrender without 

 striking a blow, so he went into the orchard and cut 

 out the infected limbs as soon as he detected the infec- 

 tion, cutting away below the blight and squirting a 

 bit of coal oil from a common oiler on the freshly cut 

 stub of limb. The result is that he has the best prom- 

 ise of a crop in the neighborhood, and not a sign of 

 the blight at this time is to be seen anywhere in the 

 orchard. 



vii 



A writer in a late French paper says one 

 of the best ways to induce a swarm to stay 

 in a new hive is to smear the inside of the 

 hive with propolis in a very thin condition — 

 much thinner than varnish. It is claimed 

 the odor of the bee-glue will do more to hold 

 the bees in a hive so treated than any thing 

 else unless it be young brood. This may 

 account for the savage way the bees acted 

 as described by Mrs. Harrison, they seem- 

 ing to resent the destruction of this sub- 

 stance. At all events, they seem to have a 



