398 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



July 1 



of water seen during the flight of the tee, 

 and by the means of the transferring of the 

 honey from place to place by the nurse bees. 



Some may ask how I explain the great de- 

 creases during the honey-ilow and tne ener- 

 getic fanning at the entrance by the bees 

 during the whole night. I claim the nightly 

 decreases (which, of course, exist also to 

 some extent during the day) to be the result 

 of the combustion of sugar and albumen in 

 the httle bodies of the young and old bees in 

 the colony. Each egg, worm, larva, or bee 

 is a httle stove which needs to be fed with 

 honey and albumen. The arising vapor, 

 though invisible to the eye, is formed of wa- 

 ter and carbonic acid, the loss of which 

 causes the decreases noted. 



In a good colony there are in the cells 

 about 2000 larvae, from 11 to 21 days old, dur- 

 ing June. A larva which is. making a cocoon 

 weighs at least 155 milligrams, and after ten 

 days only 115 milligrams, so that it has lost 

 in this time 40 milligrams. I estimate the 

 consumption or combustion of all the brood 

 in a colony to be 100 grams. The rest is 

 used by the adult bees, and is not at all 

 the result of evaporation. After a very 

 busy day the bees are obliged to work hard 

 in caring for the brood, producing wax, 

 building comb, transferring honey, polishing 

 cells, and ventilating. This ventilation is 

 necessary indeed, for otherwise the bees will 

 soon be intoxicated by the carbonic acid, 

 which is found in great quantity. By the 

 consumption of a pound of honey there is 

 produced 350 grams of water, of course in 

 the form of vapor, and 275 liters of carbonic 

 acid. Here we have the source of the water 

 which we can observe in the morning on the 

 alighting-board after a good day. Ot course 

 the air in the hive becomes damp on account 

 of so much water being formed in conse- 

 quence of the transpiration of the bees and 

 brood. It can be seen that, in such a moist 

 atmosphere, the evaporation on the surface 

 of the honey can not be very much. 



The following also proves my position: If I 

 give a colony in an evening in September, 

 where the decreases in 24 hours are from 30 

 to 50 grams, a kilogram of honey (without 

 water) , the decreases in the next 24 hours 

 will be at least 300 grams where evaporation 

 of water is out of the question. 



I repeat: The thickening of nectar into ripe 

 honey is not a matter of evaporation, but results 

 from the ability of the honey-sac of the bee to 

 withdraw a part of the water. By the transfer- 

 ring of the honey in the hive it. loses by degrees 

 its superfluous water, and is, at the same time, 

 inverted and enriched with formic acid and al- 

 bumen. 



Ottenbach, Zurich. 



[Many years ago our Mr. A. I. Root saw 

 the bees discharge this watery spray in the 

 midst of the honey-flow, just before they en- 

 tered the hive. He gave it as his opinion, at 

 the time, that this was surplus water that the 

 bees had in some manner discharged from 

 g.ahered nectar. Reports of his observations 

 at the time were given in Gleanings, and 



subsequently in our A B C of Bee Culture. 

 During later years, so far as we can remem- 

 ber, nothing had been stated about this mat- 

 ter, in our American journals at least, until 

 Dr. Bruennich did so m this article. 



Now that the question is opened up again, 

 we should be glad to get reports from many 

 sources, for we are now right in the midst of 

 a honey-flow, and it will be a splendid oppor- 

 tunity to make observations. 



Well do we remember the time when A. I. 

 Root was learning his A B C's of bee culture, 

 and how at the same time he was conducting 

 some experiments in a greenhouse. He put 

 several colonies in the house, along in the 

 early '70's, for the purpose of getting the 

 bees to rear brood in midwinter. He hoped 

 that he might train them to fly out into the 

 greenhouse and back into their hives. But 

 in this he was only partially successful, for 

 it will be remembered that many of the bees 

 were killed by bumping against the glass. 

 But he succeeded in getting some of the 

 bees trained to return to the hives. 



He put out some very thin syrup which 

 they gathered, and then observed, as they 

 were going back to their hives, how they 

 discharged a thin spray of moisture. In or- 

 der that he might determine whether this 

 were sweet or not he put out a lot of dinner- 

 plates. On these he caught the moisture, 

 and after rubbing his finger over the wetted 

 plates he applied it to his mouth, but found 

 the exudation was simply water. 



These observations of Dr. Brunnich bring 

 up another interesting question — that thin 

 sugar syrup, or, in fact, any sugar syrup fed 

 to bees, will not be evaporated or ripened 

 like the saccharine matter gathered from the 

 nectaries of the flowers. It goes to prove, 

 then, that the chemists are right in saying 

 that "sugar honey " is not the same as fiord 

 honey; for necessarily it can not be given 

 the same mode of treatment, and hence is 

 lacking in some of the essential elements of 

 a real noney. — Ed.] 



FOLLOWING THE DOOLITTLE NON-SWARMING PLAN WITH- 

 OUT MAKING INCREASE. 



When using the Doolittle non-swarminer plan, if one 

 has no weak colonies, and wants no increase, will it 

 answer to place the old brood-nest, after all queen-cells 

 have been removed, over the two supers on the old 

 stand with queen-excluder between supers and brood- 

 nest? Mrs. T. a. Beach. 



Delaware, Ohio. 



jThis question was referred to Mr. Doolittle, who re- 

 plies as follows.— Ed. J 



If you desire, cover the tops of the sections with 

 enameled cloth, with the exception of one little place 

 ritrht over the entrance to the hive below, so the bees 

 can go down and out at that place, thus keeping the 

 tops of the sections clean. The upper hive is taken off 

 at the end of 21 days, or after the brood has all emerg- 

 ed. In this way the hive of beelcss brood can be cared 

 for; but in this case, at least one frame of bees should 

 be left without shaking, so that there will be enough 

 bees to protect the brood. 



But if you are at all like me, you will prefer to take 

 frames of brood from some of your colonies a little less 

 weak than your stronger ones, and give these to the 

 stronger, so as to have all colonies that are shaken very 

 strong; and the few not shaken, weak enough to receive 

 the hives of beeless brood. In this way no increase 

 will be necessary, while those to be shaken, or worked 

 for comb honey, will give a greater vis'd. 



Borodino, N. Y. G. M. Doolittle. 



