1908 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



493 



tion, spend oui' time more protitably on a 

 few more colonies than in trying to bring all 

 up to this standard? 



A. I. Root's advice to rest, page 104, before 

 eating is (to those not very strong) one of 

 the best things between the covers of the Jan. 

 loth issue of Gleanings: and if heeded it is 

 well woi'th more than one year's subscription. 

 Better by far take the rest before than after, 

 but better after dinner than not at all. 



I fear your editorial on page 18, on the 

 "big field for bottling honey," is somewhat 

 overdrawn so far as New England is con- 

 cerned. Few stores here in this section that 

 can be persuaded to sell bottled honey, but 

 they have an opportunity to do so, and a 

 single firm in a single year has put out as 

 much as 17 carloads of extracted honey. 



Mr. Holtermann, in reporting the Michigan 

 convention, page 99, says Mr. Aspinwall ad- 

 vocated continuous passageways between 

 brood-frames and sections, as it gives better 

 ventilation, and the bees can go in a straight 

 line to reach the sections. 'This is all very 

 beautiful in theory, but I fear not in practice. 

 I believe Mr. A. has great faith in ventilation. 

 All right; but if too free communication is 

 given, bees are more apt to carry up pollen, 

 and the queen to lay eggs in sections, to say 

 nothing of the bits of dark wax or cappings to 

 injure the appearance of the finished section. 

 ^^ 



Glucose ! glucose ! glucose ! corn syrup ! corn 

 syrup I corn syrup! If a man steals a loaf he 

 is a thief. If hfe robs a bank of $100,000 he 

 is only a defaulter. If a man mixes 10 lbs. 

 of glucose with 90 lbs. of cane syrup it is 

 adulterated; but if he mixes 90 lbs. of glucose 

 with 10 lbs. of cane syrup it is corn syrup 



Well, defaulters are not so respectable as 

 they used to be; and if the so called corn 

 syrup is as bad as represented, the people 

 will soon find it out, and the reputation of 

 the offspring will be no better than its an- 

 cestor, glucose. Let us be patient Mean- 

 while let the people know how it is made. 



Some very interesting facts and articles 

 have appeared of late in Gleanings in re- 

 gard to feeding bees for winter. J. L. Byer, 

 page 99, prefers to feed syrup made two 

 parts sugar to one of water. This has been 

 my rule for many years. But unless I mix 

 some honey with it there is apt to be some 

 loss by granulation. 



Along this same line E. W. Alexander, p. 

 99, says, "If it requires 20 lbs. of honey to 

 winter a colony, this additional surplus would 

 be worth at wholesale about $1.50. Now, if 

 in its place we use 14 lbs. of sugar to make 

 21 lbs. of very thick syrup, costing about 75 

 cents, or half the amount the honey will 

 bring, there is a saving of over $400 in an 

 apiary of 600 colonies; besides, the bees are 

 given a much safer and better winter food" 

 I believe no one will dispute the statement 

 that the sugar syrup is a safer food, as a 

 rule, than honey — especially late-gathered 



honey. But that 14 lbs. of sugar made into 

 21 lbs. of syrup, and fed to a colony of bees, 

 is equal to 20 lbs. of sealed honey, there may 

 be, it seems to me, some question. 



Dr. E. F. Phillips tells us in "Miscellane- 

 ous Papers on Apiculture," pages 7, 8, that 

 the water in thoroughly ripened honey will 

 not exceed 25 per cent, and is generally not 

 more than 20; and some very ripe honeys will 

 have as little as 12 per cent of water, while 

 the thick syrup that Mr. Alexander speaks 

 of, page 39, is 33^^ per cent water. It would 

 seem that this extra 13^ per cent of water 

 must be eliminated before we can get a cor- 

 rect comparison of the actual feeding value 

 of the sugar. To this must be added the loss 

 caused by the activity of the bees in storing 

 the sugar syrup, and for wax for capping, so 

 we can not safely figure on more than 18 lbs. 

 of sugar stored that will be of equal value to 

 the honey extracted. It will probably be 

 less. Thus we must reduce the total amount 

 of honey secured from 600 colonies 1200 lbs., 

 which, at his estimate of 1\ cents as its value, 

 would make $90. To this must be added the 

 cost of the labor of extracting 12,000 lbs. of 

 honey and feeding 12,600 lbs. of syrup, which 

 might be from $25 to $50 more. 



Now that I have Gleanings for Jan. 1 be- 

 fore me I think I must stir up my good friend 

 Doolittle a little. In answering the questions 

 of T. E Howe, page 23, Mr. Doolittle as- 

 sumes that basswood always yields honey 

 when it blooms, and always blooms when 

 not killed by frost. This is undoubtedly true 

 at Borodino, for Mr. Doolittle would no more 

 knowingly make a false statement than cut 

 off his right hand; but what is true of Boro- 

 dino may not be true of some other places. 

 During the past five years I have seen bass- 

 wood bloom more plentifully than ever be- 

 fore, and yet fail to yield honey appreciably. 



There are places where basswood has yield- 

 ed even better than for Mr. Doolittle or Dr. 

 Gallup. Mr. O. H. Townsend, of Otsego, 

 Mich., told me last August that he once had 

 a colony that gathered over 40 lbs. (I think 

 it was 45 lbs.) for three days in succession, 

 and would have gathered more, but that by 

 4 o'clock P.M. the hive was so crowded there 

 was no room for storing more. So it seems 

 to me that much depends on location as well 

 as the amount of bloom. Near the bottom 

 of page 23 he says, "The fruit-buds and 

 leaflets to all trees with which I am familiar 

 are formed in June and July of the preced- 

 ing year, so the results of next season's hon- 

 ey-yield, so far as the buds and flowers are 

 concerned, are already in embryo on the ap- 

 parently bare and lifeless branches of the 

 basswood-trees. as we behold them these 

 zero Hays of winter." Now, this statement 

 is quite true of many fruit- bearing trees as 

 the apple, pear, plvim, peach, etc. ; but when 

 it comes to the basswood, I believe my friend 

 is a little off. If we look carefully we shall 

 find that the blossom-bud of the basswood 

 comes out of the new or present season's 

 growth of wood at the base of the leaf, or 

 where the pr. sent season's leaves join the 



