August, 1914. 



279 



American Hee Journal 



committee. 



(Signed) "Mrs. Bi.\by." 



" Papa, dear," said my better half, a 

 half formed tear in either eye, "that's 

 tomorrow. I ought to go, but how in 

 the world could you manage this ex- 

 tracting alone ? ' 



The world stopped revolving. The 

 sun stood still. The moon went out, 

 and the stars refused to shine. After 

 about four ;cons — " Never mind, my 

 dear, 1 can manage to do it somehow. 

 Fossibly get a man to help me," I ven- 

 tured. 



Now I am not on principle opposed 

 to woman suffrage. Indeed, I had 

 written several articles for the local 

 press during the campaign in its favor. 

 And, too, when my wife was appointed 

 upon a committee to go before the 

 legislature and lobby for the bill, I felt 

 that the whole family had been hon- 

 ored, and now that a call had come 

 for her to go I could not say her nay. 

 But as for me — if the seven labors of 

 Hercules had just then been thrust un- 

 der my nose they would have looked as 

 tiddledywinks beside the dumbfound- 

 ing work befoie me. To e.xtract or 

 not to extract — that was the question ; 

 whether it was nobler to run and hire 

 a man to "juice" those bees for me, or 

 to stand my ground and fight it out by 

 main strength and awkwardness! I 

 chose the latter course. And before 

 the erstwhile companion of my stings 

 and hysteria was out of hearing I was 

 evermore making that old extractor 

 hum. It hummed so loudly that its 

 toe-hold gave way, a cable " busted," 

 and I was forced to put it in dry dock 

 for repairs. 



The riext thing that went end-to was 

 when, in my muscular enthusiasm, I 

 turned so fast that the honey overran 

 the pail and found a receptacle in my 

 boot. When my wife left she gave me 

 a spoonful of lard and cautioned me to 

 keep all the bearings of the machine 

 oiled. I wanted to use axle grease or 

 cylinder oil, but she insisted on the 

 lard. I was soon to find out why. I 

 guess I failed to open the gate to the 

 extractor wide enough, for the bottom 

 of the tank soon filled with honey. 

 I began to notice concentric circles of 

 dark honey. On examination I found 

 that a too generous application of 

 lard on the bearings in that neigh- 

 borhood was the cause of the streaks. 

 Then I was forced to throw away the 

 honey and oil the bearings again. 



That night I attempted to put the 

 empty supers back on the hives. Every 

 time I lifted a cover from a hive the 

 bees literally blackened me. The little 

 rascals acted as though they were say- 

 ing : "Now, here comes the fellow 

 who took our cloak; now he will take 

 our coat, also. Let's go for him." And 

 they went. My veil was the first one 

 Eve made for our ancestor, and my 

 gloves had ringworm in the fingers. 

 To enhance my esteem for the job, I 

 wore low shoes! Now, don't smile, 

 you smug, complacent veteran! I 

 maintain there is nothing funny in a 

 bee sting. It's the most matter-of-fact, 

 business-like transaction I ever met 

 with. But there are some folks who 

 are mean enough to smile or even guf- 

 faw when some poor dupe gets the 

 " hot stuff." 

 The following day I managed to 



swipe " 25 or 30 supers from the bees 

 and began extracting. The honey-flow 

 had ceased ; the bees began to " whee- 

 whee "all around the house for a taste. 

 I couldn't keep the uncapping knives 

 hot. The honey was so thick the ex- 

 tractor wouldn't throw it out. I got 

 hot and began to slam-bang things 

 around in great shape. In the me/t;- I 

 turned over .5 gallons of honev, which 

 proceeded to splash out of the honey 

 house to feed the bees. I soon had the 

 nicest mess of robbing on my hands 

 you ever saw. I was still warm under 

 the collar when the uncapping knife 

 ricocheted over a bumpy comb and 

 shaved a quarter-section off the palm 

 of my hand. A little later my shirt 

 sleeve caught in the free-running crank 

 of the extractor, which incident left 

 me in a state of statuesq e nudity. 

 Then I sat down to perspire and medi- 

 tate. "Thinks I, if these are the joys 

 of beekeeping spoken of by the ABC 

 book, then let me to more peaceful 

 pursuits; such, for instance, as lion 

 taming or lassoing crocodiles." 



The man who had made up these 

 hives had evidently got hold of the 

 wrong instruction sheet — possibly a 

 sheet explaining how to put together a 

 Wright aeroplane. The tin rabbets 



were put in flat so that the rib stuck 

 out inside the hive. The frames were 

 the Hoffman shoulder spacing type. 

 These he had nailed so that both shoul- 

 ders were on the same side of the 

 frame. The bees had been trained to 

 swim in propolis and subsist upon 

 slumgum. So that the tools needed to 

 manipulate the hives consisted of a 

 crowbar and a can of nitroglycerine. 



In spite of all these things, like Paul 

 of Tarsus, I persevered. By the last of 

 the week I finished the job, and Sunday 

 morning greeted my smiling family at 

 home. 



"My, but you area mess!" greeted 

 my better three-quarters. "You look 

 as though the land was flowing with 

 milk and honey, and there were no 

 boats for you to cross in. But were 

 you as successful on your mission as I 

 on mine ?" 



"Three thousand pounds," replied I 

 boastfully, "and a wagon load of cap- 

 pings! But say, old girl, do you know 

 I'm the biggest fool that ever swatted a 

 bee or fanned an extractor." 



"How's that?" asked my wife anx- 

 iously." 



"Why, I went and bought that 

 bloomin' yard." 



Cottonwood, Ariz. 



Send Questions either to the office of the American Bee Journal or direct to 



Dr. C. C. Miller. Marengo, III. 



He does not answer bee-keepine questions by mail. 



Requeening During Summer 



In reading an old Bee Journal of nine 

 years ago ([505). I noticed an article on " Re- 

 queening During Summer," by its present 

 editor, in which he says: "It is a mistake 

 to requeen colonies that have good prolific 

 queens just because they are two years old." 

 Is that still his view ? Ontario. 



Answer.— "A bird in the hand is worth 

 two in the bush." and while requeening we 

 may replace a prolific queen by one equally 

 prolific. I have seen so many good queens 

 prove good the third year that I prefer not 

 to replace a first-class two-year old queen 

 by one whose ability is unknown to me. 

 The bees usually requeen in good time, if 

 the matter is left to them. But with an in- 

 ferior queen or one just fair, requeening is 

 necessary.— C. P. D. 



Requeening 



I. Is a table cloth an advantage on frames; 

 if so. state what months to keep it on in 

 Ontario? 



2 Colonies with one. two or three cells of 

 European foul brood, say first of June, and 

 it I kill the queen the last half of clover flow 

 and let these bees rear their own queen, 

 will this cure foul brood ^ If so. state time 

 to do it. Clover flow from June 20 to July 20. 



1. If hives are broodless and queenless by 

 June I. and if given a frame of eggs, larvas. 

 and sealed brood to rear a queen, will the 

 queen be fairly good ? 



4. if I lift a frame of brood above queen- 

 excluder, will the bees start queen-cells; 

 then when queen is hatched take off ex- 

 cluder ? Will the young queen go down and 

 kill the old queen ? Ontario. 



Answers —I. You probably mean enam- 

 eled cloth or oil-cloth. 1 used such cover- 

 ings at one time, but have not had any for 

 years, having nothing between top-bars and 



flat covers, except when supers are on. I 

 think they are not in use nearly so much as 

 formerly. If you use such coverings at all, 

 you will use them at any and all times ex- 

 cept when supers are on. and may even use 

 them over supers. 



2 A cure would be likely to follow. Better 

 not wait until the last half of the flow, as the 

 case would be getting worse all the time, 

 but act at the beginning of the flow. But if 

 only two or threediseased cellsare present, 

 and the queen is good, all you need do is to 

 cage her in the hive for 10 days. 



3. Young bees are the ones to rear a good 

 queen, and in the case you mention there 

 are probably few or no young bees, so the 

 resulting queen would not be likely to be 

 very good. The best thing to do with such a 

 colony is to break it up and unite with an- 

 other colony or with other colonies. If you 

 haven't the heart to do that, then a better 

 way than the one you mention is to give 

 your queenless colony the queen of some 

 other colony, and let that other colony rear 

 its own queen. 



4. The bees are not at all certain to start 

 cells over an excluder, and if they do, when 

 you take away the excluder the young queen 

 is likely to be killed if the old queen is a 

 good one. 



Large Hivet 



To prevent swarming why don't they use 

 a larger hive than they do ? They say a col- 

 ony swarms because they haven't room to 

 work; also the queen runs out of comb to 

 lay in. Oregon. 



Answers. -"Why don't they?" They do. 

 Ask Dadant & Sons, and you'll find they use 



