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summeis in a sleeping-tent ; he has a shack 

 with a kitchen, a cased honey-room, an 

 automobile-room, and a general storeroom 

 and workshop. He is an enthusiast with 

 bees; has his own way for doing every 

 thing, and violates most of the rules of the 

 books. For example : He does not use queen- 

 excluders; he says, ''If the old lady wants 

 to lay in the extracting-eombs or supers, 

 bless her heart, let her do so." In extract- 

 ing, if he finds unsealed brood, he leaves it 

 till it is sealed; then extracts the honey and 

 distributes the brood to where it is needed 

 in other colonies. He uses no followers or 

 self-spacing frames or springs; wedges his 

 sections in with wood from spoiled sections. 

 In handling supers he does not try much to 

 save bees. " A few bees smashed is cheaper 

 than time." He has about 250 colonies, all 

 hybrids. " The blacker the better." They are 

 a' mixture of almost every standard breed 

 produced by the introduction of queens 

 at different "times. He says these hybrids 

 are the best hustlers, and make the whitest 

 honey. The stock for his apiary was form- 

 ed by a lot of hybrids from southern Texas 

 which he shipped to Colorado years ag-o. 

 Some of Mr. Johnson's bees are as cross as 

 hornets. They boiled out everyw^here with 

 their tails up sizzling with venom like rat- 

 tlesnakes. He raises his own queens in 

 nuclei formed from combs with queen-cells 

 on them. These queens are of all shades 

 imaginable. We found one whose head and 

 thorax were clean of all hairs, polished, and 

 black as ebony. That part of her looked 

 more like a black beetle than a bee. The 

 abdomen was of a brownish-yellow color 

 with prominent black rings shading almost 

 into each other along the back. Mr. John- 

 son said he had never seen a queen like her. 



He boils his waste combs in a big tank. 

 When cold he dumps the whole on the 

 giound and throws the chunks of wax. dead 

 bees, and slumgum into gainny sacks and 

 keeps these in the shade of a tree until the 

 season is over; then he renders all in prop- 

 er manner, using the wax-press. He says 

 the bees don't disturb the dirty cakes in the 

 sacks. 



He put up arguments for the eight-frame 

 hives that were unanswerable by an amateur 

 like myself. His record for last year foi- 

 250 colonies was between 11,000 and 12,000 

 lbs. of honey, 5200 lbs. of wliich was bucket 

 honey, composed of chunk and extracted. 

 His comb honey was all sold to a shipper 

 from California. The bucket honey was 

 shipped to Portland, Oregon, and peddled 

 out ; ])rices were in the neighborhood of 

 I2V2 cents a pound all around. 



I was very much interested in a device 

 of Mr. Johnson's own invention. He calls 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



it an " Indicator." With the compass he 

 draws a circle two inches in diameter on the 

 back end of each hive. Through the center 

 he draws a ijerpendicular and a horizontal 

 line. At the intersection of these lines with 

 the circumference, and also half way be- 

 tween said intersections he drives tacks, 

 eight in all. This forms a kind of dial. 

 For a hand he uses a piece of soft galvanized 

 wire. No. 12. He bends a loop on the end 

 of the wire by means of two headless nails 

 driven close together in the bench. Then 

 after the bend he cuts the wire something 

 near an inch long and fastens it in the 



QUEENLESsi (gf ImOREROOM 



/V9 ;s iv//fe. 



^ NAILS 



center of the cii-cle with a %-inch screw, 

 tightening just enough to remain set in any 

 position. Then he makes an enlarged chart 

 to hang in his workroom for reference. On 

 this he writes at every tack a certain con- 

 dition of colony. Beginning at the top, for 

 instance, he will write "0. K. ;" the next 

 tack to the right will be " Diseased ;" the 

 next, " More room;'" the next, "Queen-cell;" 

 the next, "Weak;" the next, "Young 

 queen;" the next, "Queenless;" the next, 

 " Attention." For this device he claims the 

 following advantages: 1. No book or pencil 

 is required ; tacks and circle can not be 

 erased, and will show the same after the 

 h.ive is painted. 2. It is not in the way in 

 tiering \\\) and shipping hives, even when 

 the latter are taken apart and shipped in 

 the flat. 3. Never wears out. 4. Cost for 

 labor and material is only about three cents 

 to the liive, and they can be made at home. 

 5. Can be used for any pui'pose, the chart 

 being changed according to purpose or 

 whim of the beekeeper, or for different 

 seasons. In a large apiary, Mr. Johnson 

 does each separate act on all liives before 

 beginning the next act. Fo?' instance, he 

 sets his compass and draws circles on all 

 hives; then he returns and draws lines in 

 all circles, then drives tacks in all; thei. 

 fastens the wire indicators. I enclose an 

 illustration of the device. Mr. Johnson savs 



