1206 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Oct. 1 



dinarily find them, the cause is something else 

 than a poor queen. Carefully examine such a 

 colony in early spring, and you are very likely 

 to find the queen slim, or starved in appearance; 

 ■"spring-poor" bees, most of them old; the cap- 

 pings ot the honey hard and smooth, and about 

 as difficult for the bees to uncap as it would be 

 for them to gnaw through the skin of a grape or 

 a. plum. I have had just such cases, and have 

 watched the bees digging away for dear life to 

 get a bare living; but after giving a couple of 

 such combs a good scratching, then putting them 

 next to the brood, presto! the whole aspect is 

 changed; the lisdessness and apathy of the colony 

 are gone, and activity is apparent everywhere. 



This suggests stimulative feeding in early 

 spring, which I have always practiced since learn- 

 ing how to do it. When there is honey enough 

 in the hive, of course it is not necessary to feed; 

 but scratch the old comb, which amounts to the 

 same thing. 



I have had many cases parallel to the one you 

 mention; but I will mention one specially noted 

 at my Kankakee yard a few years ago, that of a 

 beautiful queen not quite a year old, but a colo- 

 ny dragging along all summer doing only enough 

 to live and put in honey for winter; but the next 

 year her colony was one of the best. The same 

 thing was true of the granddaughter of your fa- 

 mous old queen the next spring after getting her. 

 She was found in early spring, lean and off color, 

 laying drone eggs in worker-cells, and nearly half 

 the occupants of the hive were drones; but by 

 carefully feeding the bees she became fat and of 

 her usual bright color, and, besides giving me, 

 during the summer, several queens, she gave me, 

 by division, three colonies of bees. 



This I have written up before; but some have 

 seemed to question the accuracy of my statement; 

 but never was statement of matter of fact more 

 strictly true. I am thoroughly convinced, as I 

 before stated, that in seven-tenths of the failures 

 of colonies, excepting in cases of old queens, the 

 fault is with the apiarist. Many a good queen 

 has been hastily condemned and guillotined. 

 Evanston, 111. 



ARTIFICIAL LEVULOSE. 



Why Honey is a Suitable Food for Tliose 

 of Weak Digestion. 



BY \V. K. MORRISON. 



At the present time the United States is con- 

 suming considerable quantities of artificial sugar 

 in the form of saccharine, which is 550 times 

 sweeter than ordinary refined sugar. In a number 

 of countries this substance is hedged about with 

 restrictions so that its manufacture has been greatly 

 curtailed. In Germany there is now only one fac- 

 tory making saccharine, and it is now considering 

 whether or not it will apply to the government 

 for an indemnity and cease to exist. By careful 

 tests made by the best doctors in Europe, this 

 substance has been found deleterious to the human 

 system, even in very minute quantities, either 

 producing kidney troubles or aggravating them. 

 It is said Dr. Wiley is in favor lof suppressing 

 saccharine, whereas President Roosevelt takes an 



opposite view. One thing is clear — it is not a 

 useful food at all, and it would do no harm to 

 prohibit it entirely. 



The readers of Gleanings are not kept in 

 ignorance of the glucose controversy, but it 

 seems we shall ere long have to reckon with a 

 new rival to honey — namely, artificial levulose. 

 A few of our readers may not know that honey 

 contains dextrose and levulose in about equal 

 proportions. Tupelo, for example, has an excess 

 of levulose, and alfalfa an excess of dextrose; but 

 ordinary honey contains about equal quantities 

 of each. Levulose does not granulate as dextrose 

 does. 



Levulose is considered excellent for persons 

 suffering from diabetes, or "kidney trouble," be- 

 cause granular sugar aggravates the disease; hence 

 honey is the only sweet which such patients can 

 be allowed to eat. Tupelo honey would be just 

 the thing for these sufferers, though there are 

 probably not a dozen doctors in this country who 

 are aware of the fact, and yet diabetes is a com- 

 paratively common disease which often leads on 

 to death. 



At the international congress of the Sugar In- 

 dustry held in Liverpool, in April, 1908, Mr. 

 Sigmund Stein, the noted sugar expert, read a 

 paper advising the manufacture of levulose on a 

 large scale, for various reasons. It may be used 

 for medical purposes. First, as a food for dia- 

 betics, he says: 



Diabetes involves an incapacity for using carbohydrates as 

 nourishment. More or less of the sugar which is passed with the 

 food into the body, be it saccharose or lactose or dextrose, passes 

 through the body and acts like a poison. Levulose is recognized 

 by ihe highest medical authorities as the only sugar which most 

 of the diabetics can partake of, and which can be entirely assim- 

 ilated by the organisms. Saccharine, which is used by the dia- 

 betics at present, is harmful to such patients according to the 

 investigations of Prof. Stoklasa and Prof. Neumann. 



Second, as a preventive of hyper-acidity of the 

 gastric juice. Unlike saccharine, levulose has 

 the power of neutralizing the acids of the gastric 

 juices. Third, as a food for consumptives, he 

 says: 



within the last few years a number of well-known medical 

 authorities have recommended the use of large quantities of levu- 

 lose as a remedy against consumption in the first and second de 

 gree. According to these authorities, levulose acts in this disease 

 like a specilicum, and cures have taken place, in many cases, 

 through the daily use of several ounces of levulose mixed with 

 the food. Without doubt the use of levulose for this special 

 medical purpose will be better known when levulose is manu- 

 factured and sold at about the same price as our ordinary sugar. 

 Consumption and tuberculosis are spread, as is well known, 

 among a seventh part of the population of most countries of Eu- 

 rope. Levulose once manufactured cheaply will be the sugar 

 which the consumptives could exclusively use. 



Fourth, as a food for infants: 



Many medical authorities have lately recommended levulose 

 for infants, as levulose has not the aperient effect of lactose. 

 Medical authorities have further stated that levulose is an excel- 

 lent substance for the nourishment of infants which suffer from 

 wasting illnesses. Levulose has increased the weight of such 

 children 300 to 400 grammes per week. Professor Fuerst stated 

 that levulose deserves the preference over milk sugar for the 

 nourishment of infants, because the first is sweeter and has not 

 the aperient effect. 



Fifth, in industries: In confectionery to pre- 

 vent crystallization; in caramel to replace glucose 

 and invert sugar; in preserves, in the improve- 

 ment of wine, and in aerated waters. 



By using inulin, extracted either from dahlia 

 bulbs or chicory roots (dandelion might do), Mr. 

 Stein estimates the cost of manufacture at 12 

 cents per lb. At present it is sold at $1.20 per 

 lb. At the former price he thinks there would 

 be a great demand for it. 



