THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW, 



209 



Experimentor Taylor is Asked to Do More 



Talking. 



I have ofteu thought that Mr. Taylor 

 might do more talking or theorizing, or 

 state more fully the coiiclusious that might 

 be drawu from the experiments that he 

 makes, but I never thought of going quite 

 so far as the editor of Gleanimjs does in his 

 issue for July 1st. He says : — 



" I am always glad to read the articles in 

 the Review, by R. L. Taylor, detailing his 

 experiments at the apicultural station, pro- 

 viding I can study out the coucul>ion. But 

 several times I liave found myself almost 

 unable to gather the lessons taught by the 

 tables. I suppose it is my own thick-head- 

 edness, but 1 have heard others speak of it 

 several times. If our friend R. L. T. would 

 help us to translate • them a little more it 

 would add greatly to the value of the report. 

 I was about giving an editorial summary of 

 the one in the Review of June 10. I may be 

 thick-headed; but for the life of me I could 

 not boil it down. I kept still, however, and 

 said to my co-worker, our proof-reader and 

 stenographer, in my usual tone, ' I wish you 

 would make an editorial summary of this. ' 

 I have sometimes asked him to do this be- 

 fore, when I have been pressed for time. 

 The next day I came around and said, ' Well, 

 have you ^ot that summary?' 



' No,' said he, ' that is a sticker. ' 



' Have you read it? ' said 1. 



' Yes, especially the reading-matter; and 

 while there are many interesting and valuable 

 facts all through the article, I can not bring 

 them all to a focus so as to state the result 

 of the problem as a whole. ' 



I know my friend Mr. Taylor will not take 

 it unkindly when I say 1 am not fault-finding; 

 but I make it as a criticism, hoping that it 

 will enable some of us to understand the 

 tables a little better. He sometimes gives 

 us a summary, or the gist of the matter in a 

 nutshell, and thus unquestionably throws 

 much light on the tables, making their mean- 

 ing more intelligible. Perhaps I ought to be 

 able to do this: but surely Mr. Taylor can in- 

 terpret his own tiguers more correctly. 



I am willing to acknowledge that I have 

 my fair share of thick- headedness; but some 

 of the brightest bee-keepers I know of ac- 

 knowledge that they have been greatly in- 

 debted to Gleanings for tho editorial summa- 

 ries of the Michigan apicultural reports, as 

 they were not able to understand the original 

 report in the Review. 1 should like to give 

 •the names ot some of these bee-keepers; but 

 for fear they would not like the mild insin- 

 uation that they are thick-headed, like my- 

 self, I forbear. 



The point is right here: There are vere few 

 readers who will take the time to study out 

 a set of figures, or read a thing through 

 several times to get its meaning. If they do 

 not ca^ch the meaning at first glance they 

 will simply skip it. " 



Mr. Taylor takes great pains to give the 

 data from which he draws his conclusions. 



but this would he of little value were it not 

 that the conclusions are " figgered " out and 

 given with the tables of figures. When Mr. 

 Taylor starts out to make an experiment or 

 a series of experiments, he knows exactly 

 what he wishes to decide, and those columns 

 of figures have a very clear meaning to him. 

 He has, perhaps, worked weeks to secure 

 those figures, and is greatly interested in the 

 truths that they are able to unfold. The 

 average reader has not had his interest 

 aroused in this way ; he will not wade 

 through columns of figures requiring close 

 attention and thinking to get any good out 

 of them. It is all right to give the data in 

 full just as Mr. Taylor does, so that any one 

 can verify the results for himself if he 

 wishes, but the explanations and conclu- 

 sions should be given very full and complete 

 in themselves as much as possible, as they 

 are about all that the average bee-keeper 

 will read. 



Smoke and Proper Manipulation Better 



Than Bee-Escapes for Romoving Combs. 



For removing combs for extracting, with- 

 out the use of bee escapes, I do not remem- 

 ber of seeing better advice than the follow- 

 ing given by my friend S. T. Pettit in the 

 Canadian Bee Journal. 



" Removing filled combs from supers for 

 extracting and replacing therein empty 

 combs is looked upon by many as being a 

 slow trying job and fraught with danger 

 from many stings. And indeed, from the 

 way many go at tlie work, it is that part of 

 bee keeping to be dreaded. No wonder at 

 all that many resort to the bee escape for 

 help. 



The practice of brushing each comb clean 

 as taken out is so slow that the bees get more 

 or less demoralized before the super is more 

 than one-half clear of combs and a large 

 amount of smoke is often necessary in order 

 to go on with the work. And then the bees 

 will often boil over the side of the super and 

 besides that, brushing when first lifted out 

 will c luse them to sting ; then they get an- 

 other dose of smoke. Now, all this is hard 

 on both the operator and the bees. That is 

 the way I did it years ago, but a happy 

 thought came over me that there must be a 

 better way, quicker way ; one that could be 

 performed without danger of stings and al- 

 together better for the poor bees, and the 

 very first trial proved a perfect success. 



This is the way 1 do it now : first give a 

 couple of smart whiffs of smoke in the en- 

 trance, then blow smoke smartly under the 

 quilt and the bees will rush downwards, then 



