1908 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



899 



and tlie old; and experience alone can tell which 

 is the more economical. 



It is evident that, if honey is taken from the 

 hive with the bee-escape, and drawn home, it 

 will be too cold to extract to good advantage, so 

 it will have to be warmed artificially. The most 

 feasible way to do this for the average bee-keep- 

 er is probably to set up a heating-stove in a small 

 room in order to make matters more convenient, 

 and also to save fuel. If this stove were set in 

 the center of the room the supers of honey could 

 be piled criss-cross around it. Since the hot air 

 ascends, it is well to build an open platform two 

 feet from the floor, on which to pile the honey, 

 for supers placed next to the floor would not get 

 warm, and they would have to be lifted up 

 eventually to a warmer part. We have used three 

 benches to good advantage, placed around the 

 stove in the shape of a triangle, though leaving 

 an open place through which to fire the stove. 

 Of course, it would be possible to get the room 

 so hot that the honey would be warmed, no 

 matter where it might be placed; but in order to 

 do this the heater should be large or else the 

 room quite small. O. H. Townsend, of Otsego, 

 Mich., has a plan similar to this, onlv he goes a 

 step further and even cures that part of the honey 

 that was not capped. Concerning this, he writes 

 as follows: 



For a fail flow of honey, the pl;in of extracting the honey after 

 the Row is certainly a good one. If the building is put up proper- 

 ly the work can be handled very easily, and the honey extracted 

 just as well in November as in July. 



One thing must be remembered, however, that the supers, 

 when they are stacked up, must not be covered tightly or else the 

 moisture will not escape; and any unsealed honey will sour in 

 two days in such a warm room. In taking off my honey last year 

 I found that there were eighteen nr twenty Heddon extracting- 

 supers that had been put on very late, and these contained practi- 

 cally no sealed honey. 1 left them on the hives so that the bees 

 might move the honey down if they would; but they did not, so 

 I shook the bees from these supers on the ground in front of the 

 hives and set them in my little bee-escape building, which is six 

 feet square inside, with open screened windows. The weather 

 was cool and rainy, so the honey was undoubtedly very thin, al- 

 th lugh I was not afraid of its souring, because of the cold tem- 

 Prrature. I should have put it in my extract! ng-room; but as I 

 K as busy there I left it outside, where it was more out of the 

 way. After these cases had been exposed to the damp air for five 

 or six days it was set into my honey dry-kiln, where it was left 

 just men days, when it was extracted. 1 then found that it had 

 been exposed to the warm air about four days too long, as it was 

 possible to get only a part of the honey out of the combs. This 

 thin watery honey was, theiefore, evaporated down to the heavi- 

 est-bodied honey I ever saw, in seven days. 



.My building is built well. It is sheeted with planed un- 

 matched boards, then covered with a good firm quality of build- 

 ing-paper, and finally sided over with ordinary beveled siding. 

 The room at the end for warming the honey is 10 x 14 feet, and 

 is lined on the sides and ceiling with the same kind of paper as 

 that used between the sheeting and siding, this paper being 

 lapped and fastened to the studding with lath, making good tight 

 joints. I find that the paper retains the heat as well as or belter 

 than plastered walls, and it allows the Kioisture to pass through 

 it, insuring a dry room. The paper cost 50 cents per roll of 500 

 square feet. 



In the center of the room is a box stove with oval sides, the 

 first joint of the stovepipe having a damper. As the fire-door fits 

 tight, the draft can be regulated to perfection, which feature is 

 important, as it allows the heat to be controlled, and prevents 

 the waste of fuel. With wood of fair size the fire can be kept 

 over night if the dampers are properly regulated. 



When the extracting is to be done in cold weather I start the 

 fire a day or two beforehand. As mentioned before, three or four 

 days are necessary to ripen thin honey; and when the evapora- 

 tion has been kept up long enough the covers can be placed 

 tightly on the supers to prevent the further escape of moisture. 

 There is some danger of melting the combs in the upper supers if 

 the covers are tight; but if one is careful to keep the temperature 

 right, there will be no trouble. I have quite an air-space above 

 the supers of honey in the gable roof, which keeps the tempera- 

 ture of the room more nearly constant. 



I do not depend upon the warm room for ripening all my hon- 

 ey, as it is left on the hives all through the season. However, 



there is generally some that is not sealed, and this is greatly im- 

 proved by the evaporation. Q. H. Townsknd. 



When following the plan of extracting the 

 honey late in the year the combs may be freed 

 from bees with the bee-escape or by brushing. 

 At our Kalkaska yard, where both comb and ex- 

 tracted honey are produced in the same super, all 

 supers are taken off' with the escape. One day is 

 sufficient to free the bees from a shallow super ; 

 but more time will be necessary to get the bees 

 out of a full-depth super. Knowing that the 

 Hutchinsons have had much experience in get- 

 ting bees out of full-depth supers with the es- 

 cape-boards, I asked Mr. Elmer Hutchinson, of 

 Pioneer, Mich., to teJl something of the plan. 

 His letter is as follows: 



We put only one full-depth super over an escape-board, for the 

 bees are rather slow in leaving if more than one are put on at 

 once. We give the bees a few vigorous puffs of smoke, driving 

 down perhaps half of them, and then put on the escapes. If 

 these are put on in the morning of a warm day, from one-half to 

 three-fourths of the supers will be ready to come off by evening, 

 and most of the others will be free of bees by the next morning. 

 I have not noticed any difference in the time in takes, whether 

 the combs are all sealed or only partly sealed; but a few dozen 

 cells of brood will hold the be >s in the supers a long time. 



There is one thing about wi;i.h I should like to caution begin- 

 ners: Be sure the colonies haie a queen; and, no matter how 

 tight the covers are, keep a close watch, for there may be trouble 

 from robbers. ELjtEK Hutchinson. 



Remus, Mich. 



USING HONEY FOR CANNING. 



Honey Cheaper and Better than Sugar for 



Canning Fruit; Honey Better than 



Molasses. 



BY MRS. FRANK Mc GLADE. 



In the March 1st issue of Gleanings, page 

 278, I notice that the strawberries put up with 

 honey were all right, as I was sure they would 

 be. So far I have used honey for canning fruit 

 only in a small way. but have watched the re- 

 sults carefully, and am fully convinced that it 

 can be used in place of sugar for any kind of 

 fruit with much better results than if the sugar 

 were used. When using honey 1 have never 

 had a can spoil, and have always found the fruit 

 far better and richer than that put up otherwise. 

 We have been eating some peaches this winter 

 that were put up three years ago, and in that 

 time we have moved once. In every instance the 

 " gude mon " has handed up his dish for a second 

 helping, which is always a sign that it "hit the 

 spot." I would, therefore, advise those wishing 

 to try the honey to do so by all means. 



Formerly, when I canned strawberries I took 

 two quarts of good firm berries, just from the 

 vines, stemmed them late in the day, rinsed them 

 quickly in cold water, and drained in a colander 

 until I could prepare another can. I put them in 

 a stone crock and covered them with a cup of 

 granulated sugar and set them in a cool place un- 

 til morning. I then put them on the stove, boil- 

 ed them well, and canned them. With this 

 amount there is enough to fill a quart Mason jar, 

 and a little over for a taste. When using the 

 honey in place of sugar the same method is fol- 

 lowed except that only half a cup of honey is used, 

 which is poured over the berries so that it goes 

 down through and all around them. We are 

 careful to use good fruit, as one over-ripe berry 

 may spoil the whole lot. Cherries, raspberries, 



