Gleanings In Bee Culture 



Published by The A. I. Root Co., Medina, Ohio 



H. H. ROOT. Assistant Editor 



A. I. ROOT, Editor Home Department 



E. R. ROOT, Editor 



A. L. BOYDEN, Advertising Manager 

 J. T. CALVERT, Business Manager 



VOL. XXXVI 



SEPTEMBER 15, 1908 



NO. 18 



Stray Straws 



Dr. C. C. Miller 



Young fellow, if you want to get near the 

 head of the procession you'd better read careful- 

 ly all that J. E. Crane says on page 1058. Then 

 turn back to page 1056, where G. M. Doolittle 

 says, "I would first requeen, with the best stock, 

 in the apiary, all colonies whose woric had shown 

 during the season that their queen was not of the 

 very best order." A lot of trouble, that; but if 

 you keep it up year after year you will be likely 

 to get somewhere. 



Ventilation at the back of the hive by shov- 

 ing forward the lower section-super certainly 

 helps to prevent swarming. The objection to it 

 is that it retards the finishing of sections nearest 

 to the opening. This year, during the first part 

 of the clover flow, and on through its height, this 

 ventilation seemed to have very little effect on 

 the sections. Later on, the effect was very great. 

 It is probably advisable to close all such ventila- 

 tion when the season is well advanced. 



This year, more than ever before, I have 

 watched the matter of worker brood in drone 

 comb. I have seen a number of cases, and al- 

 ways the mouth of the cell was contracted by the 

 addition of wax. I think almost any bee-keeper, 

 if he will look through his hives, especially in 

 nuclei or colonies, with young queens, will find 

 patches of drone cells thus modified. Is there a 

 case on record in which workers were reared in 

 unmodified drone-cells.'' [We do not know. Has 

 any one else noticed any exception to this rule? 

 —Ed.] 



" Hereafter any employee caught smoking 

 cigarettes will be dismis'^ed from the service." 

 That's the order issued by Supt. Easley, of the 

 Rock Island R. R., Aug. 26. A clear head and 

 steady nerves are needed by a man who has the 

 lives of others in charge, and cigarettes and 

 whisky are incompatible with a clear head and 

 steady nerves. [This thing is becoming more 

 and more general with the big roads. It is not a 

 case of morals or sentiment, but because it is a 

 matter of economy to employ men with steady 

 nerves. — Ed.] 



A QUEEN, after being clipped, if placed on top- 

 bars, is likely to run about in a frightened man- 

 ner, inducing the workers to take after her, and 

 possibly ball her. Lay a brood-frame flat; and, 

 after you have clipped your queen, drop her on 

 the brood right among the bees, and she acts at 

 home. This applies to those who hold the queen 

 in their fingers while clipping her. [Yes; or 



when you clip the queen, let her drop down be- 

 t'-weeti the frames. It is when she is on top of 

 the top-bars, where there is no brood or comb, 

 that she becomes frightened. — En.] 



James G. Smith writes: "What for so much 

 chin-chin about hive-number tags.?" and encloses 

 a red and a blue crayon. I don't know whether 

 red or blue would be any more permanent than 

 black. I have used black. On an unpainted 

 hive it becomes dim, and, besides, hives are often 

 shifted, and numbers changed, making movable 

 tags better. [Red and blue pencil-marks on a 

 slate tablet, after standing a time, become almost 

 indelible. We have given up such a pencil be- 

 cause we could not afterward erase the writing. 

 Whether the red or blue crayons would make a 

 fast color we do not know. — Ed.] 



That prettv shipping-case, p. 1060. Each 

 of the front bars has two nails at each end. I 

 use only one — abundantly strong, and I think it 

 looks better. On p. 1061 the instruction is that 

 the two holding cleats and the cover should be 

 put in place and then one of the cleats nailed. I 

 don't believe you do it that way, Mr. Editor. I 

 suspect that you first nail one of the cleats in 

 place without touching the cover at all, and then 

 put on the cover and the other cleat, and nail. 

 [We are inclined to believe that your method is 

 better than ours. But the point we wanted to 

 bring out was, not to nail on the two cleats first, 

 and then expect the cover to fit. — Ed.] 



Hildreth & Segei KEN speak of opening the 

 case " by simply pulling out the one nail and 

 sliding the cover off." I don't understand how 

 you can get out that one nail without taking off 

 one of the cleats. But, of course, that isn't much 

 trouble. A woman insisted I was wrong, so we 

 tried it. She took a smooth half-inch nail and 

 drove it in; pried up with a knife close to the 

 nail, and then pushed the cover down. That 

 left the nail projecting, to be drawn with a 

 claw-hammer. I gave it up. But you must send 

 a woman with each shipment to show the grocer 

 how. [Almost any grocer is familiar with that 

 little trick of the tiade. We hardly believe, 

 however, that, in the majority of cases, it is nec- 

 essary to use the nail at all. The friction of the 

 cover Ehould be sufficient to hold it in place. — 

 Ed.] 



The bees of No. 29 were very dark. July 17 

 I killed their queen. A yellow queen was in- 

 troduced, and was at large in the hive July 22 or 

 23. Not until Aug. 22 were yellow bees seen in 

 supers, and then only a few. It seems that the 

 young bees stayed on the brood-combs at first, 

 and (assuming that the queen promptly began 

 laying) did not enter the supers until nine or ten 



