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GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



July 1 



IS IT BEE PARALYSIS? 



I have been interested in bees for the past fifteen 

 years, and have been very successful in setting a frood 

 yield of honey, as well as beinsj very successful in win- 

 tering, until the past season, 1908, at which time I had 

 four colonies of bees in the sprint; which were in fine 

 shape, from two of which I secured about 150 lbs. of 

 extracted honey, which we consider fair. The other 

 two did not gather any surplus honey to speak of, and 

 seemed to be affected in some manner, and finally 

 dwindled away and died during the winter, leaving 

 nearly all of the combs partially filled with honey. 

 The two other colonies began to dwindle later in the 

 season. About the end of the honey-flow, which is 

 about the first of October, there would be large num- 

 bers of bees crawling around on the ground, and some 

 small clusters in front of the hives. The last two colo- 

 nies, if they may be called such, I succeeded in winter- 

 ing, but in such a weak condition that they will be un- 

 able to build up without considerable help. I have 

 visited every person who keeps bees, whom I know of 

 in this section, and I think I know nearly all that are 

 interested in bees; and the trouble, whatever it may 

 be, has affected this whole section for at least five 

 miles around. I have visited several apiaries as fol- 

 lows: First, one of 21 colonies, all dead except one, 

 which is in very bad shape; another of 12 colonies; 

 another of 17 colonies, all dead; another of 12 colonies, 

 all dead except four, which are in bad shape, and three 

 other apiaries of about 30 colonies, where the losses 

 are not so great, but the colonies are very weak, and 

 on the other portion of the affected territory. These 

 were the conditions in the spring of 1908 and 1909. 



Some attribute it to the placing of some sort of crude 

 oil on the marshes by the city authorities to kill mos- 

 quitoes; others to the spraying of fruit-trees when in 

 blossom; but I have not as yet been able to trace the 

 cause, but will get more bees this season for the pur- 

 pose of trying to find the cause, which, unless it is 

 abated, will cause us to suffer a serious loss of both 

 honey and fruit. 



Hugenot Park, New York. 0. W. BEDELL. 



[There seems to be a possibility and even a probabili- 

 ty that your bees have what is known as bee paralysis. 

 When a colony is affected with this disease its bees 

 will be seen crawling out around on the ground in 

 small groups in front of the hive. They are very much 

 swollen, shiny in appearance, and every now and then 

 will exhibit a sort of tremulous motion of the legs or 

 wings, hence the name. 



It is hardly probable that the oil on the marshes to 

 kill mosquitoes has any thing to do with the matter. 

 If the spraying of the fruit-trees with poisonous mix- 

 tures were responsible there would be no dying of the 

 bees except during the spraying season. As we under- 

 stand it, the malady, whatever it is, continues unabat- 

 ed from month to month. If so, this only strengthens 

 the theory that your bees have what is known as bee 

 paralysis. The Poppleton cure has given good results, 

 and you will find this given very fully in our booklet, 

 " Bee Diseases."— Ed.] 



BITTER CO.MB HONEY; WHAT TO DO WITH IT. 



I find my honey is very bitter, unsalable— in fact, 

 uneatable. One of my good neighbors says it is caus- 

 ed by horsemint and blackgum. I don't know the 

 cause; but what I want to know is a remedy. Is there 

 any way to make the honey fit to eat? 



Reform, Ark., May 31. BYRON FRENCH. 



[There is nothing you can do with this honey except 

 to keep it off the market and off the table. We would 

 advise extracting it out and feeding it back in early 

 summer for stimulating brood-rearing. There is no 

 remedy to apply. 



If there is bitter honey to be gathered, and it is not 

 actually poisonous, the bees will get it. There is no 

 way that you can make it sweet or palatable. The sug- 

 gestion has been made that a dark honey might be run 

 through pulverized charcoal to lighten its color, but 

 this would in no way affect its flavor, and probably 

 not very much its color. 



This bitter honey should be kept out of the hive dur- 

 ing the winter or early spring, as it would, in all prob- 

 ability, induce dysentery.— Ed. 1 



A COLONY WORKED ON THE ALEXANDER PLAN FOR IN- 

 CREASE AND HONEY. 



Colony No. 1 was very strong, and last Wednesday, 

 May 19, I decided to divide it on the Alexander plan, 

 as described in your ABC book, page 279. I followed 

 your plan very carefully, and yesterday I looked over 

 both hives. I forgot to mention that I gave the new 

 hive or lower chamber six brood-combs of last year 

 and four frames of wire foundation; full sheets, and a 

 frame of brood with the queen. 



Well, on looking them over yesterday I found the 

 queen in the lower hive had done nothing, while in the 

 upper hive I found six queen-cells 'not yet capped). 

 Accordingly I separated them, putting the old hive on 

 a new stand. Did I do the proper thing in separating 

 them? The new hive on the old stand is flying strong, 

 having all the field bees, while the old hive on the 

 new stand, having the queen-cells, is inactive. Locust- 

 trees are yielding heavily, and the bees are filling the 

 hives. 



Please advise me what to do. Shall I leave them 

 apart as they are, or would you put them together 

 again? If you advise the former, shall I leave them to 

 hatch the queen-cells or give them a queen? If I leave 

 them as they are, will both hives of bees store any sur- 

 plus this season? When shall I give them supers? 



Cincinnati, Ohio. Albin Platz. 



[You did right in removing the upper story to anoth- 

 er location; indeed, this was in conformity with Mr. 

 Alexander's directions. With regard to the queen- 

 cells, you can leave them all in the hive but one, pro- 

 vided the queen on the old stand was a good one; oth- 

 erwise we would recommend killing all the cells and 

 giving the colony a cell from some select queen, or, 

 better still, introduce a young laying queen. 



Both hives may store some honey. It will all depend 

 on the season and the management. It is usually time 

 to put on supers when the bees begin to build on new 

 wax on the tops of the brood-combs. — Ed. J 



WHAT SYRUPS ARE SUITABLE FOR FEEDING. 



In your ABC book, page 199, you say there are cer- 

 tain grades of molasses and sorghum that may be used 

 as feed for bees. I should like to ask what those 

 grades are. What about feeding raw beet sugar? 

 Now, my feeding will all take place when the weather 

 is warm enough for the bees to fly on an average of 

 four out of five days in February and March. What I 

 want is not something for the bees to use up as winter 

 stores, for that is a very small consideration here, but 

 something to live on in the early spring and summer 

 when a late frost or a drouth has interfered with the 

 honey flora. A. C. HARRIS. 



San Antonio, Texas, May 29. 



[Almost any molasses or sorghum that makes a good 

 table syrup would be suitable for feeding bees to stim- 

 ulate brood-rearing during the late spring or warm 

 weather. Any syrup from the sugar cane would ans- 

 wer an excellent purpose providing it was not burned 

 in the process of making. But we would not advise, 

 as a matter of economy and safety, giving the bees any 

 food for winter except first-quality light honey or syr- 

 up made from the best granulated white sugar. It 

 would not be advisable to feed raw beet sugar, although 

 a raw unrefined cane sugar will do very well. 



Any syrup containing glucose or so-called corn syr- 

 ups should never be given to bees.— Ed. J 



LESS HONEY UNDER EXCLUDERS. 



Replying to Stray Straws, page 223, April 15, I would 

 say that last year I used excluders on all my hives 

 and in the fall found that about half the colonies need- 

 ed stores. I fed them, and every colony came through 

 in nice shape. L. C. Taylor. 



Gibsonburg, O., Apr. 23. 



WOULD BLASTING IN THE VICINITY OF A BEE-YARD 

 DISTURB BEES? 



There is to be a tunnel built near my apiary, and I 

 should like to know if the blasting will hurt the bees. 

 I am told it will kill unhatched chicks. Do you think 

 it will injure or kill the brood or bees? also do you think 

 I could collect damages in such a case? 



Surrey, Cal., May 19. J. W. Kalfus. 



[We do not think that any blasting of the sort men- 

 tioned would have the least effect upon the bees. It 

 could not begin to shake up a yard as much as heavy 

 freight trains that go thundering by our own apiary of 

 four hundred colonies at Medina. We can feel the 

 ground shake for some distance from the road. We 

 have never discovered that our bees paid the least at- 

 tention to it. 



Very often hives are located in an apple-orchard 

 where apples areconstantly dropping upon hive-covers. 

 While the fall of thefruit occasionally brings out a few 

 bees to the entrances it has no other effect. Apparent- 

 ly they seem to take it as a matter of course. 



We do not know much about the chicken business; 

 but it is a safe guess to say the embryo chicks would 

 not be affected by the disturbance mentioned.— Ed.J 



