330 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Jrr\r 1 



Stray Straws 



By Dr. C. C. Miller, Marengo, III. 



German bee journals number 27. With 

 only three in this country we manage to get 

 along nicely, thanlc yDU. 



Those flaps flipping about on ihe new pa- 

 per cases will be in the way on the counter — or 

 elsewhere. As the new kind costs 9 per cent 

 more than the Crane, the Crane is likely to win 

 out. Still, there's that stickerless business. A 

 woman says, too, that the side of the latter case 

 looks neater. 



The British Bee Journal, 99, says of the Silver 

 bottom-board with its " 3-in. air space for winter- 

 ing or for giving extra ventilation in hot weather 

 to prevent swarming," that "a queen-excluder 

 below the brood-nest in summer will prevent 

 comb-building." If an excluder will do it, a 

 much cheaper rack ought to do it as well. Mind 

 you, there's a three-inch space. 



My opinion — I think the common opinion — 

 has been that, on the same journey, a bee gathers 

 both pollen and nectar. So high an authority 

 as Gaston Bonnier says that the same bee gathers 

 only pollen or only rectar or only water or only 

 propolis. [Our bees are busily working on dan- 

 delions. We can see the pollen in little lumps 

 hanging to their legs, while their abdomens are 

 very much podded out, indicating that they have 

 gathered considerable honey at the same time. 

 If both honey and pollen are present in the same 

 blossom it would seem very strange if the bees 

 ignore the honey and take only pollen. — Ed.] 



J. E. Crane, I've been trying to get the ans- 

 wer to your question about per-capita consump- 

 tion of honey in the United States. Dr. E. F. 

 Phillips estimates production of comb honey at 

 60,000,000 to 75,000,000 pounds, aud of extract- 

 ed at three or four times as much — say 67,500,000 

 comb and 3>2 times as much extracted, ard we 

 have a total of 303,750,000 pounds. Divide that 

 among 80,000,000 people, and each one gets 

 3.797 pounds. If he consumes the modest 

 amount of 2 oz. at a meal he will eat honey 30>i 

 times in a year, or once every 12 da\s. Correc- 

 tions must be made, however, for exports, im- 

 ports, honey used in manufactures, etc. hxports 

 and imports nearly balance (in the last eight 

 years imports were 15 per cent more than exports 

 in 'value) ; but manufacturess, etc. , may cut down 

 the allowance considerably below the 3.797 

 pounds. 



Swan And'rson, thanks for reporting failure 

 with splints, page 320, and especially for telling 

 why you failed. You left one-inch space be- 

 tween foundation and bottom-bar, and, of course, 

 the bees would gnaw those barelegged splints be- 

 low the foundation, and, having started, they 

 kept on half way to the top-bar. Please try let- 

 ting foundation come clear to the bottom-bar. 

 I hope that others who have had failures will re- 

 port them, and ^ivhy. [It would be interesting 

 and valuable if we could get reports from others 

 who have used Dr. Miller's splints to stay up foun- 

 dation. Havt they or have they not been satis- 

 factory.? Thousands and thousands of these 



splints have been sold. T* •' resuni^bic i at, 

 where they have given sai u tion, the user of 

 them has not thought it neces ary to make a re- 

 port. But when one is dissatisfied with them it 

 would be natural for him to say so in the bee- 

 journals. Let us hear from both crowds. — Ed.] 



The Sch'-weizerische Bztg. ,58, gives an inter- 

 esting page of winter consumption at the 34 

 Swiss stations. For ten years the average annual 

 consumption per colony for November was 1.56 

 Ibi. ; December, 1.51; Januarv, 2.1; February, 

 2.84; March, 4.54. Total, 12.5 lbs. for 5 months. 

 Note how consumption increases after Novem- 

 ber, being 43 per cent more in the last two 

 months than in the first three months; March 

 just three times as much as December. At the 

 different stations, the five months' consumption 

 of honey varied from 6 to 21.5 lbs. But 13.35 

 of that last 21.5 was in March alone, caused by 

 stimulative feeding. [These figures ate indeed 

 valuable, and, so far as we can remember, they 

 conform in the main to the lecorded experiments 

 made in this country. — Ed.] 



Let me add a little to the excellent instruc- 

 tions of Bro. Doolittle for finding a queen, page 

 300. If you don't find the queen on the second 

 time going over the frames, it sometimes hap- 

 pens that you'll not find her if you keep on for 

 half an hour. I don't know whethei she is hid- 

 den in a cell, or what is the matter; but at any 

 rate you can't get a sight of her. Just close up 

 the hive for half an hour, or until another day, 

 and you may find her the first thing. But some- 

 times it happens that, for some reason, you just 

 must have that queen before any thing else is 

 done. In that case put the frames in pairs. Put 

 a pair of frames close together in the empty hive- 

 body beside your hive, the pair crowded close 

 together, but an inch or two away from the hive- 

 wall. Then, leaving a space of an inch or two, 

 put in another pair. Arrange the combs in the 

 hive also in pairs the same way. Now you've 

 only half the ground to look over, for it's mor- 

 ally certain that the queen will be in the middle 

 of one of the pairs. Lift out the frame nearest 

 you of each pair. As you do so, glance over the 

 nearest side of the frame left in the hive, and 

 then quickly search the further side of the frame 

 in your hands. Another thing, if your pairs are 

 well apart, and you let them stand long enough, 

 the bees will remain quiet on the pair where the 

 queen is; the others will be uneasy. You may 

 also sift the bees through an excluder set over a 

 hive containing one or more frames of brood. 

 Put a hive-body over the excluder, and brush the 

 bees into it. They will go down, leaving the 

 queen above the excluder. I ' your queen is clip- 

 ped, brush all the bees on to a sheet or into a 

 hive some distance away. Smoke a little, and 

 the bees will fly back to their home, the clipped 

 queen remaining. [We have tried the scheme 

 here outlined by Dr. Miller, time and time 

 again, and it works just as he says. There are 

 many of these little kinks of the trade that are 

 not in any of the standard text-books. We hope 

 to have in the next edition of the A B C book many 

 of these kinks incorporated; indeed, we have mark- 

 ed this very subject to go in the next edition. 

 Say! it won't do any harm to have the subject 

 discussed now. Let's compare notes. We will 

 gladly grant space for them. — Ed.] 



