84 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Fel. 6, 



attached to his best straw-hat appeared, I must needs get one 

 just like it, but I found it a most uncomfortable affair — too 

 stiff and unbending, too close and hard, leaving an inflamed 

 sweat-mark all across the forehead, and hurting the back of 

 the head. I did not know before that there was any difference 

 in bobinet meshes. After this, I shall look out for the hex- 

 agonal form as a help to seeing as plainly as possible, which 

 is a matter of the greatest importance in connection with the 

 use of bee-veils. 



WiNTEKiNG Bees. — The condensed symposium on this 

 subject on page 777 (1895), will repay not only perusal but 

 study. I agree with Editor Root that the essentials in which 

 all the writers agree are — good bees of right age ; good food ; 

 and suitable protection. But is there not another? Ventila- 

 tion, somewhere, either at top or bottom ? It does not seem to 

 be of much consequence where, if there is only enough. If 

 much on top, little at bottom, and vice versa. What Editor R. 

 says as to granulated sugar fed early so as to be well ripened 

 holding first place, I somewhat doubt. If I thought that was 

 the best food for bees, and that even " good light honey " 

 holds only second place, I might be tempted to think it was 

 the best honey for human consumption, which would be rank 

 heresy if not unpardonable sin. But what does Dr. Miller 

 mean by saying in Gleanings (page 887) : " Part of my bees 

 will be wintered in the cellar this winter, the rest out-doors ? 

 Number in cellar, 157. Number out-doors, 1 ?" Is that to 

 be taken as his estimate of the comparative merits of cellar 

 and out-door wintering ? Or is it merely one of the Doctor's 

 little sallies of wit ? In justice to the advocates of out-door 

 wintering, he should explain. 



Virtues of Honey. — Let me call special attention to 

 what Rev. Emerson T. Abbott says on page 777 (1895), 

 about honey being a germicide and an antiseptic. No doubt 

 these qualities make it valuable as a preventive as well as a 

 remedy for microbe diseases of all kinds. As for its whole- 

 someness in the case of diabetic patients, there is a big field 

 for discussion, and a big opening for the usefulness of the 

 honey-bee when the day comes that the sugar-honey question 

 can be sifted to the bottom. But switching off from that as 

 dangerous ground, are bee-keepers generally aware that while 

 the foul-brood bacillus can live in a state of suspended anima- 

 tion in honey, it cannot multiply itself there ? This is an in- 

 teresting and encouraging fact. Honey has an acid reaction, 

 and the bacillus alvei cannot grow in any fluid of that nature. 

 It must come into contact with an alkaline substance to be 

 quickened into active life. Has the sale of unripe honey and 

 honey adulterated with glucose and other substances had any- 

 thing to do with the spread of foul brood, owing to lack of a 

 sufficient percentage of formic acid ? This is a question which 

 it will pay to look into. 



Making Bees Drunk. — That scheme of J. H. Andre's on 

 page 752 (1895), to make bees honest by smoking them till 

 they are drunk, is not to be commended. There is a stage of 

 inebriety in the case of human beings in which they are very 

 good and pious, tender, penitent, and resolved to lead better 

 lives, but it all wears oft' when they get sober. I feel sure 

 that bees made drunk will return to their bad ways when they 

 sober off. The only sure cure for robbing I have ever found 

 to work in all cases is to contract the entrance so that only 

 one bee at a time can pass and repass. If the weather is hot, 

 so that the hive needs more ventilation than itcan get through 

 so small a fly-hole, a piece of perforated zinc or tin having 

 plenty of holes in it, but only one large enough to permit a 

 bee to go through, will fill the bill. Colonies that are weak in 

 numbers are the ones that are most liable to be robbed, and 

 these can be fixed in the way described so that they will have 

 air enough, and yet be able to defend themselves from all 

 intruders. 



Evolution of Associations. — Mr. Hilton's account of 

 the way the "Newaygo County Progressive Bee-Keepers' As- 

 sociation " expanded into a Farmers' and Bee-Keepers' Asso- 

 ciation, and now seems likely to undergo another process of 

 evolution into a Farmers' Institute, that shall comprise every 

 department of rural industry, suggests the question whether 

 special or general organizations best promote the public wel- 

 fare. We have now agricultural, horticultural, fruit-cultural, 

 apicultural, and any number of live-stock-cultural societies. 

 I doubt if the present system is calculated to make good, all- 

 round farmers. It is doubtless fitted to make specialists, but 

 the various forms of rural industry run into one another and 

 have such intimate relations that to be specially qualified 

 along one line, implies and necessitates knowing something 

 about several more. The amalgamation of the two great bee- 

 keepers' associations is an example of the tendency of things; 



by-and-by, we shall probably get horticulture, or at any rate 

 the small fruit branch of it, added to bee-keeping, and ulti- 

 mately, perhaps, a comprehensive body like the Farmers' In- 

 stitute will be made broad enough and big enough to take in 

 the entire circle of rural pursuits. 



HivE-CoNTBACTiON. — There is a great deal written on this 

 subject which I do not more than half believe. I have no 

 faith in any system of bee-keeping which goes on the princi- 

 ple of everlastingly disturbing a colony of bees. I have no 

 doubt many colonies are disturbed to death. The Heddon 

 plan of contraction by splitting a hive that has a divisible 

 brood-chamber, has an air of common-sense about it, but 

 monkeying with individual frames, changing them for dum- 

 mies when the honey harvest is on, and changing back again 

 when the honey harvest is over, involves more meddling with 

 the bees than I think is good for them. My ideal of bee-keep- 

 ing is to have a brood-nest which shall be a kind of family 

 home, undisturbed from year to year, all the surplus opera- 

 tions, whether by extracting or section-boxes, being carried 

 on in the top-story. Will any advocate of contraction tell me 

 what advantage there is in cleaning out all the stock and store 

 of honey each year, and not permitting any quantity of old 

 honey to remain in the hive from one season to another ? Bees 

 are provident creatures, and I believe it is a comfort and satis- 

 faction to them, and an encouragement to increase and mul- 

 tiply, to be assured at all times that they are in possession of 

 an abundance of stores. 



-*****■ 



CONDUCTED BY 



DR. C. C. MILLER, MJlIiEIfGO, ILL. 



[Questions may be mailed to the Bee Journal, or to Dr. Miller direct.! 



IJsiug Sei>aralor§ — Afler-Swarni Prevention — Ex- 

 tracted vs. Comb Honey. 



1. Is it necessary to use separators with sections with full 

 sheets of foundation, to secure straight combs? 



2. Will giving the old colony a young, fertile queen pre- 

 vent after-swarms ? and is it necessary to cut out queen-cells 

 before introducing? 



3. How much more extracted honey per colony can be 

 secured by furnishing them with empty combs, than comb 

 honey in sections with full sheets of foundation? 



4. Where can sweet clover seed be obtained ? 

 Tacoma, Wash. W. S. 



Answers.— 1. That depends. If you are producing only 

 a few combs for home use, or for a home market, then you 

 can do very well without separators. If you are shipping to a 

 distant market, then it will pay you well to have separators. 

 Whole sheets of foundation will not prevent the sections bulg- 

 ing in such a way as to make trouble about packing for ship- 

 ment. 



2. If you don't cut out queen-cells there will be much 

 danger of swarming after you give the new queen. If you 

 cut out all queen-cells you'll make a pretty sure thing of it. 

 But please remember that it's a difficult thing for even an old 

 hand to make sure that he has missed no queen-cells. 



3. I don't know. Nearly every one will agree that more 

 honey will be stored in the combs, but as to hoiv inuch more, 

 there is by no means close agreement. Some say twice as 

 much, and some say half as much more. Perhaps both are 

 right. You'll only know just how it is with you after you've 

 tried a considerable number of both kinds side by side for 

 more than a single year. 



4. Watch advertisements. 



Sweet Clover for Forage and Honey. 



I, like yourself, am very much interested in the growing 

 of sweet clover, whether or not we can profitably use it for 

 stock feed. About the only thing that I fear is, that on ac- 



