APRIL 1, 1913 



Beekeeping Among the Rockies 



Wesley Foster, Boulder, Col. 



SWEET AND SOUR SOIL. 



Acid soil is sour, and will not grow clo- 

 vers well. Acid soil will turn litmus paper 

 from blue to red. If you have an acid 

 mouth your breath will do the same to the 

 blue litmus paper. If j'ou have an acid 

 mouth you will soon be going to the dentist 

 unless you sweeten your mouth out with a 

 toothbrush and tooth-powder. A clean tooth 

 never decays. Lime sweetens the soil and 

 allows the clovers to grow. And what could 

 be more natural than for a sweet soil to 

 grow plants that will produce abundant 

 nectar? Emerson said there are many 

 sweets in the soil if we but knew how to 

 come at theiru He did not tell us, but we 

 now know how to come at them by liming 

 the soil and planting the clovers. The bees 

 will collect the sweets for us. A land flow- 

 ing with milk and honey will be found 

 where limestone sticks out of the hillsides. 

 The clovers grow, the cattle fatten, milk is 

 abundant, the locusts tluive on the clover, 

 and the wild bees collect the wild nectar for 

 the diet of any John the Baptist who cares 

 for a diet of locusts and wild honey. 



GLASS SUPER COVERS. 



On page 52, Jan. 15, you spoke of Mr. Babberger 

 using panes of glass for honey-boards. Will you 

 be so kind as to give me a little information on the 

 subject? I also use the Danzenbaker hive. Does he 

 use panes of glass 16 x 20 the same size as the hive? 

 and does he use single or double strength glass? Is 

 it not likely to get broken in prying it up, being 

 stuck with propolis ? Does he let it stay on there all 

 the year ? Does he use a super cover of wood in 

 connection with it ? 



North Carolina. S. D. M. 



Mr. Babberger uses glass 16 x 20, or 

 very close to that. They are the size of the 

 outside of the hive. He uses single-strenglh 

 glass, and says he has but little trouble with 

 breakage. I believe he told me that he broke, 

 on the average, two glasses each season. 



Mr. Babberger says that bees should not 

 be molested when the propolis sticks. I 

 should judge from his remarks that he does 

 not open liis liives except in warm weather. 

 He tells me that he can give his bees a vei-y 

 fair examination without removing the glass. 

 The glass is used as a honey-board over the 

 supers in summer, and nothing but the cover 

 is used with it. 



WEIGHT OF HONEY IN 4 X 5 SECTIONS. 



You speak of Mr. Hill and Mr. Babberger using 

 4x5 plain sections. How do these men get the 

 4x5x1% sections to come under your "fancy" and 

 No. 1 grades ? As I understand it, these grades must 

 weigh 131/^ oz. I am using the 4x5x1% sections. 



and can't get the very best of them to go over 13 

 oz. Do these men use 4x5x1% or the 4 x 5 x 1 V^ ? 

 I am thinking of changing to the 1%. What will 

 the 4x5x1^^ weigh when well filled? I want a 

 plain section that will weigh a pound when well 

 filled. Will the 4x5x1 1/2 do this ? 



Missouri. T. H. B. 



Neither Mr. Hill nor Mr. Babberger 

 grades honey according to the Colorado 

 rules. The Colorado rules are made for the 

 4^ X 4^/4 X lyg-iiieh section. But I do not 

 understand why you can not get heavier 

 honey than an average of 11 V2 to 12 oz. 

 in 4 X 5 X 1% sections. This is the size used 

 by Mr. Babberger, and I think Mr. Hill's 

 are the same, although I am not certain. 



Leaving the bees a bee-space on each side 

 of the beeway section, and allowing for the 

 bee-space provided by the fence separator 

 used in the Danzenbaker super, I find that 

 the 4 X 5 X 1% section has 27.5 cubic inches 

 of available sjjace for the building of comb, 

 while the 4l^ x 4^/4 x lyg-inch section has 

 only 27.09 — a diiference in favor of the tall 

 section of about two-fifths of a cubic inch. 

 I am satisfied that Mr. Hill has many sec- 

 tions weighing from 13 to 15 ounces. Sev- 

 eral years ago I produced quite a little 

 honey in 41/4x41/4x11/2 plain sections, using 

 fences, and had little trouble in getting 

 them to weigh 13 to 14 ounces, though I 

 could not get the bees to put a jDound in 

 them. 



Do you put in full startei-s, filling the box 

 full with a top and bottom starter? Per- 

 haps you had an unfavorable flow this last 

 season ; or you may put on too many su- 

 pers, and make the bees slight their work. 

 I have had no experience with the 4x5x1 V2 

 section ; but I know some Colorado beekeep- 

 ers who have used 4 x 5 x 1%, and they get 

 comb honey averaging a pound, and some 

 sections will weigh more than that. I 

 doubt whether you can get the average comb 

 built in a 4 x 5 x 11/2 to weigh a pound. 



Why do you not use a standard section? 

 By removing the super-follower, using sep- 

 arators between each row of sections, hav- 

 ing a top starter of two to three inches, and 

 a bottom starter of % inch, you can get 

 combs to weigh one pound each. But that 

 space left when the follower is removed 

 must be equalized as nearly as possible be- 

 tween all the rows of sections. The way 

 one Colorado beekeeper (Walter Martin) 

 does is to shake the super from side to side 

 lightly, thus leaving the spacing about right. 

 When the bees have begun work, any un- 

 even spacing may be adjusted, and then the 

 bees will soon glue it so that it will stay. 



