326 



THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW 



of a grain he just stupefies a bee and weighs 

 him as you would a hog. Weights are best 

 reported by telling how many it would re- 

 quire to make a pound. The heaviest drone 

 he caught was 1,808 to the pound, the light- 

 est 2,122, both more than twice as heavy as 

 workers. (By the way are we not still de- 

 stitute of weights on queens?) As to work- 

 ers his lightest in recent observations are 

 5,495 to the pound. Should fear that these 

 were dwarfs and unhealthy ones such as 

 the colony, when they feel like it, drive out 

 or kill. The heaviest workers were 3,680 to 

 the pound. The Professor must pardon a 

 shade of doubt as to whether they were not 

 carrying ijome honey. Under some circum- 

 stances bees will come out of the hive with 

 loads — notably when they have just been fed 

 inside — and it is possible that smoking the 

 entrance to make them forbear attacking 

 the experimenter might result the same 

 way. The excitement might lead to their 

 taking up more or less of a load ; and when 

 they had regained composure, excepting a 

 trifle of curiosity, they might go out still 

 carrying what they had taken. It is new 

 and interesting if normal bees vary as much 

 as this in their weights; and such things, 

 like patent medicine, should be well shaken 

 before being taken. Prof. Koon's average 

 is 4.800 to the pound, two or three hundred 

 lower than the current estimation. Strikes 

 me we ought not to put the standard lower 

 than 4,(!00 or 4,700 until considerable cor- 

 roboration arrives. Only one small apiary 

 was drawn on, and some of the hybrid col- 

 onies may be abnormally little fellows. 



Had the same method been followed in 

 weighing loads of nectar the result would 

 have been more reliable, it seems to me : as 

 occasional bees coming in light could have 

 been detected by their individual weights 

 and thrown out. As it was, several dozen 

 incoming bees were captured and weighed 

 in a mass, the gross weight being divided by 

 the number of bees. Then several dozen 

 out going bees were treated in the same 

 manner. The difference between the two 

 results was called the average bee load for 

 that day and hive. I should call this a tol 

 erable accurate method for a time when the 

 honey flow was strong, but nearly worthless 

 at other times. Bees are coming in with 

 water, coming in from exercise, carrying 

 nothing, coming in from prospecting tours 

 in which little or nothing was found, com- 

 ing in with trifling weights of propolis ; and 



ley^ 



to average such a lot with the few carry: 

 normal loads of honey and call the result 

 average bee load is not the thing — no beti 

 than guessing, if indeed it is as good, i^ 

 his best result, a pound of honey to 10,1." 

 loads, is well worthy of a place in our mem 

 ories and record books ; but the other ex 

 treme, a pound of honey to 45,(i42 loads, i 

 mere smoke in one's eyes. It would beii 

 teresting to know what the average load i 

 when honey has to be struggled for long au 

 patiently, but some other way than thi 

 must be taken to get at it, methinks. Au 

 this defect in the method makes me stroc. 

 ly object to his proposed average of 20,0U. j, 

 bee loads to the pound. 



Gleanings has a new and interesting cor 

 respondent in Belgium, Prof. Verlinden (itt 

 He churns his extracted honey when it be 

 gins to solidify ! The effect is to haster 

 the process, and to make the granules finer 

 and I suppose the finished product is dryei 

 and better looking. Gleanings 73t). As ! 

 have but one customer who wants his honej 

 solid guess I won't humor him by churning |j,i 



Dr. Miller finds that queens barred of 

 with zinc either above or below are verj 

 slow to get to laying again. Gleanings 739 

 How can you blame them ? The worken 

 can go where they like, and they stick to th< 

 old brood nest. Queen thinks she is shu 

 out of paradise, and feels dismal. But i 

 happens oftentimes that above the zinc 

 when no queen is up there, the workers pre- 

 pare and reserve a brood nest, ignorant o) 

 the fact that the queen cannot come. Jusi 

 you put her up there under such circiimstan- 

 ces and see if she don't go right to work. 



Doolittle on page 740 of Gleanings gets 

 at a very important topic, how to keep from 

 having half your sections unfinished at the 

 end of the season. He conquers it ( after a 

 fashion ) but the amount of work required, 

 and the constancy of the attention called 

 for, seem to leave something more to be de 

 sired. If one wished to have as much of 

 his honey unfinished as possible, he could 

 hardly invent a system of procedure lend- 

 ing itself more easily to that result than 

 the one now in most common use — the one- 

 tier case adapted to tiering up. For years I 

 have had very little unfinished honey. As I 

 have done no work at all for that especial j, 

 purpose it looks as if my system — the dou- j, 

 ble tier wide frame, with the center of one- 

 frame baited clear to the top — was largely 

 the cause of this excellent showing. A long 



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