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GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



Oct. 15 



Stray Straws 



By Dr. C. C. Miller 



Don't forget, when there's a shortage in 

 the home market, that you ought not to sell 

 to your grocer for the price you could get 

 for it in a distant market, but for about the 

 price it would cost him if he bought in that 

 market. 



That plan of having for State fairs a 

 permanent equipment ot observatory hives, 

 glass jars, etc., page 597, is very bright, and 

 worthy of imitation in other States. I suspect 

 that long-geared German who is superin- 

 tendent of the apiarian department got up 

 the plan. 



Foundation-splints were originally used 

 by me for the sole purpose of getting combs 

 built clear down to bottom-bar. It was a 

 long time before I learned that they had a 

 much more important office, preserving the 

 proper size of cells for the use of the queen 

 at trie top, without having an inch or two of 

 honey there. This year I noted again frame 

 after frame during the breeding season with 

 brood clear up to the top-bar. That's the 

 work of the splints, and that part of their 

 work they do, even when the bees gnaw 

 away the lower part. You may count on that 

 gnawing if the bees have the splints when 

 they are not gathering. 



Queen-excluders with perforations of 

 .187 of an inch allow young queens to pass, 

 but .177 holds them, says Monjovet, Apicul- 

 teur, 314. [Dr. G. L. Tinker, some 20 years 

 ago, conducted an elaborate series of experi- 

 ments, testing the different sizes of perfora- 

 tions of queen-excluding zinc. He found 

 that .160 was too small, and .168 and .170 too 

 large; .165 was about right, except that it 

 would occasionally let a queen pass, and 

 therefore he decided on .163. Some four or 

 five years later we went all over Dr. Tinker's 

 work very carefully, and came to the con- 

 clusion that the size could be anywhere from 

 .163 to .165, but decided on .165 because we 

 thought it was better to let an occasional 

 queen pass than to put up a hindrance to all 

 bees when loaded with honey. — Ed.] 



Mr. Editor, don't be too much discourag- 

 ed at that "big barrier," p, 557. Even if we 

 never control mating, persistent breeding 

 from best queens and encouragement of best 

 drones can not fail to bring general as well as 

 individual improvement, and in time all our 

 drones will be improved, no matter what the 

 point of improvement aimed at. I know it 

 from what I've done myself. [Yes, but the 

 process is very slow; but when one has a 

 strain of bees with extraordinarily long 

 tongues it is very difficult to perpetuate that 

 strain, because the "sport" is so far remov- 

 ed from the average stock that it has a strong 

 tendency to revert back to the general aver- 

 age. If we could control the male parentage, 

 as can be done with ordinary domestic stock 

 on the farm, it would be very easy to retain 

 the trait.— Ed.] 



I've had more uniting than usual this year. 

 Here's how: At a time of day when all bees 

 are in the hive, bring one hive and set it over 

 the other, on the stand of the latter, a sheet 

 of newspaper between. A few days later 

 move any frames of brood from the upper to 

 the lower story. The bees unite so gradual- 

 ly by gnawing away the paper that there is 

 no fighting, and the temporary imprisonment 

 in the upper story makes the bees stay in the 

 new location. [Strange that we at Medina 

 have so little trouble about uniting our bees 

 in the fall. While, of course, the old bees 

 will return to their old stands, it is seldom if 

 ever that there is any fighting. A gentle 

 strain of Italians, according to our experi- 

 ence, will unite where the extra yellow or 

 cross bees would fight each other to a finish. 

 Nevertheless, it is, perhaps, wise for the be- 

 ginner to err on the safe side — to use smoke 

 or to separate the two divisions of the united 

 colonies by a sheet of newspaper as above 

 described. — Ed.] 



"For the purpose of extracting, wires 

 are much better than splints," page 612. I 

 wonder, now, I wonder. If you know that 

 the two have been tried side by side, and 

 that the splinted combs break out more read- 

 ily than the wired ones, then I've nothing to 

 say. If you're only reasoning that as the 

 splints "can be only partially attached to the 

 frame they can not hold the combs in the 

 frames as well as wires," then I think the 

 question is still open. When a comb breaks 

 in the extractor, in my little experience it al- 

 ways broke first in the center, providing it 

 was well built to the frame. Is not the comb 

 built to the frame as well with splints as with 

 wire at top and sides, and better at bottom? 

 Is not the splinted center a little stiffer than 

 a center with sagging horizontal wires? Does 

 a splinted frame, fastened well on four sides, 

 break out more easily than a wired one? I 

 don't know — I merely ask. [No, we were 

 not aware that the two methods of support- 

 ing foundation in the frames had been tried 

 side by side in extracting; but it would seem 

 that, where the stays are not securely fasten- 

 ed to the end-bars or top and bottom bars, if 

 the line of breakage is at the point where the 

 comb joins the top-bar, the splints would not 

 hold the comb in the frame nearly so well as 

 if they had been wired, wires passing through 

 the end-bars. Even if the combs were broken 

 entirely loose from each of the end-bars, the 

 wires would hold the combs just the same. 

 Unwired or unstayed combs break out in 

 getting to and from the extracting and in un- 

 capping, more because there is no connec- 

 tion to the bottom-bar, or only a very partial 

 connection to the end-bars, the line of cleav- 

 age taking place very close to the top-bar. 

 Unless the wood splints pass througn the 

 bottom-bar and top-bar, and are glued there, 

 the comb would fall out of the frame if not 

 built down to the bottom-bar and end bars, 

 almost as readily with the splints in as with- 

 out. Yes, we were arguing that the splints 

 could be only partially fastened to the frame. 

 It is that fact we had in mind when we made 

 the comparison. — Ed.] 



