442 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



July 15 



with the gate open all the time. It is a poor 

 and expensive way simply to close the gate 

 when a full pail is exchanged for an empty 

 one. The other way is much better. 



Remus, Mich. 



[Keeping the extractor gate closed a part 

 of the time, and opening the same when it is 

 desired to draw off the honey, solves the dif- 

 ficulty of honey running over and wasting, 

 providing there is a little extra capacity be- 

 low the extractor reel. — Ed.] 



EUROPEAN AND AMERICAN BASS- 

 WOODS. 



Different Time of Blooming, etc. 



BY W. J. GREEN, 

 of the Ohio Experiment Station. 



Mr. A. I. Root: — I have never seen men- 

 tion, in any publication, of the fact that the 

 European and American basswoods bloom 

 at different times during the season. This, 

 it seems to me, is an important matter for 

 bee-keepers to consider. The American 

 basswood blooms earlier than the European 

 by at least ten days. About the time the 

 American basswood begins to go out of 

 bloom, or a little later, the European com- 

 mences, thus extending the season. It 

 seems to me that the European is more pro- 

 lific in bloom than the American, and I think 

 that the tree begins to bloom at an earlier 

 age. The European basswood begins to 

 bloom at from five to eight years of age, and, 

 being of quite rapid growth, it soon makes 

 a tree of considerable size. In appearance 

 the European basswood is rather more sym- 

 metrical than the American, and is somewhat 

 pendulous in habit. It is a handsome tree 

 Tor a lawn, and makes a good tree for a 

 windbreak. It is more plentiful in the nur- 

 series than the American, but the two are 

 usually sold at about the same price. Small 

 trees can be bought quite reasonably at any 

 of the large nurseries. The basswood to 

 which I refer is usually called the small- 

 leaved European linden. There are several 

 varieties of linden aside from the European 

 and American, but I have not had an oppor- 

 tunity to note the time of blooming of each. 



It would be quite possible to select a very 

 early-blooming American basswood and a 

 very late European, thus extending the sea- 

 son still more. If bee-keepers would give a 

 little attention to this matter they might be 

 able to lengthen out the season several days; 

 but it would be necessary, when trees of an 

 earlier-blooming and later-blooming habit 

 were found, to propagate by budding or 

 grafting, which is not a difficult process in 

 the case of the linden. 



If anybody knows of very early or very 

 late blooming of trees of these species the 

 Experiment Station would be glad to hear 

 Irom them. The European linden is in full 

 bloom now at the Station, and the bees are 

 working vigorously on the blossoms. 



Wooster, Ohio, ouly5. 



[Many thanks for the above, friend G. 



We have called attention to the fact before, 

 and we h^ve a few European lindens on our 

 own grounds. The handsomest basswood- 

 tree, however, that I ever came across is one 

 we purchased of the Storrs & Harrison Nur- 

 sery Co., and is called the "silver-leaf" 

 basswood. It has a much darker foliage, and 

 the under side of every leaf is of a bright 

 silver color. It promises to have a much 

 larger bloom than our American basswoods, 

 and, like the European, it is quite a little 

 later. While our common basswoods are 

 now in bloom, July 6, the silver-leaf does 

 not look as if it were nearly ready to bloom. 

 I think some of our readers can probably 

 furnish you information in regard to late- 

 blooming basswoods; but these will proba- 

 bly be found in dense shaded pieces of 

 woodland. I have tried growing basswood 

 from cuttings; and although they start nice- 

 ly without any trouble, I have never been 

 able to get a continuous growth from them. 

 -A. I. R.] ^^ 



SHAKING ENERGY INTO BEES NOT AC- 

 CORDING TO NATURE. 



BY WESLEY FOSTER. 



We know it is necessary to the best man- 

 agement of bees to know the condition of 

 each hive; and the more we can find out 

 without opening the hive, the better for the 

 bees, and time is saved for us. Nature did 

 not intend that the brood-nest of the hive 

 should be molested, and the nearer we can 

 come to this the better. 



No one can tell how many good queens 

 are superseded because of tne disturbance 

 to the cluster. Many a hive supersedes a 

 queen that, to all appearances, is a prolific 

 one. May not this be caused by the frequent 

 opening of the hive? This is one of the ob- 

 jections to the "shaking-energy" scheme, 

 that many good queens will be superseded 

 and some killed outright. 



The bee-keeper who keeps an eternal vig- 

 ilance over the inside conditions of every 

 hive will always have plenty to do, and the 

 number of colonies he can care for will be 

 small. He finds the queenless colony soon 

 after it becomes so, caused, no doubt, by his 

 last manipulation, and he soon has another 

 good queen introduced; but he has spent a 

 lot of time and wasted a lot of the bees' time 

 that could have been put to good advantage. 



This going through the brood-nest every 

 few days brmgs about conditions that make 

 it necessary, while the most successful bee- 

 men care for larger numbers and work more 

 from general and outside conditions, letting 

 the bees take their own course and shoulder- 

 ing the small loss which is made up by the 

 profits from the greater number of bees 

 handled. 



Thank you, Mr. Steengrafe, for putting 

 me right on honey importations, p. 284, May 

 1. The impression given by Thomas' Week- 

 ly Review is misleading, as nothing is said 

 about any of the honey being in transit to 

 Europe. 



Boulder, Col. 



