360 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



May 18, 1905 



bread and butter by producing honey Stems 

 to have gotten hold of this great improve- 

 mentby which their profits could be increased 

 sixfold ! 



^-^^ 



Delightful Weather for Bees 



We are having delightful weather, and the 

 bees are enjoying it most thoroughly. They 

 are in fine condition, no weaklings this 

 spring, just strong, vigorous colonies. Plums 

 and cherries in full bloom May 3, with the 

 thermometer at 85 degrees. Pretty good 

 weather for bees, but then we may be having 

 frost ere many days — can't tell. 



Honey as a Soap Substitute 



Honey is said to be as good as soap for 

 cleansing the hands. Directions are to rub it 

 on when the skin is dry, moisten a little and 

 rub again, use more water and rubbing, and 

 finally wash thoroughly when the hands will 

 be as clean as though the strongest compound 

 of grease and lye were used. — The Farmers' 

 Review. 



1 did not have very much faith in the 

 cleansing properties of anything as sticky as 

 honey, but concluded to give it a fair trial. 

 Say, it works better than you may think it 

 would. Give it a trial and see. 



only explanation she could give for the fact 

 that her honey does not candy, while the 

 raspberry honey of that region is celebrated 

 for candying solid as soon as cold weather 

 comes, is that her extracting is all done late 

 in the fall. She just piles the hives up one 

 story on top of another, so as to give the bees 

 room. When extracting lime comes, the 

 combs are taken into a warm room, and kept 

 there long enough to get well warmed 

 through. The room is kept at a pretty high 

 temperature where the extracting is done, 

 because the honey is so thick it is a pretty 

 hard matter to throw it out. 



"Of course, there are other bee-keepers, 

 many of them, working on this plan. The 

 honey is better ripened, a good deal, than the 

 average comb honey, especially comb honey 

 that is taken from the hive before it is soiled 

 by the bees tramping over it. And I for one 

 do not want any more comb honey so long as 

 I can get Mrs. Morrow's extracted. I have 

 submitted my sample to a good many people 

 since then, and they pretty much all agree 

 with me. The honey is so thick it is difficult 

 to get it out of the bottle without warming, 

 or letting it stand in a warm room. Of course, 

 such thick honey ought to bring more money 

 than the ordinary liquid honey on the market ; 

 but I for one would be willing to pay for it." 



A Little Sister's Report 



A Sister's Well-Ripened Honey 



Mr. A. I. Root, in his notes of travel, gives 

 an interesting account of the success of a sis- 

 ter bee-keeper in northern Michigan. She 

 not only takes the entire charge of between 

 50 and 60 colonies of bees and secures good 

 crops of honey, but adds to that the honor of 

 producing a very superior article. Score one 

 for the sisters. Mr. Root says : 



" It was my privilege to stay over night at 

 the home of Mrs. Morrow, who has between 

 50 and 60 colonies of bees, but as neither her 

 husband nor one of the children take to 

 bees, she manages them entirely herself. She 

 has secured good crops of honey, and, strange 

 to tell, her honey never candies. It is stored 

 in sap-pails with a cloth tied over the top ; 

 and on a frosty morning you can turn the 

 pail of honey upside down and not spill a 

 drop, it is so thick, and yet it is just as clear 

 as glass. For quality it suited me so well I 

 took a bottle of it home to show our Medina 

 folks what good, thick honey is like. The 



Dear Miss Wilson: — I will answer Dr. 

 Miller. He wanted to know where his little 

 Abel girl was. I am sorry to tell you that my 

 sister "Hope" died on Aug. 16, 1904. She 

 was 10 years, 8 months, and 3 days old. The 

 queen that she ordered is still alive. She is 

 rearing brood, and is in the strongest colony. 

 We have 16 colonies. We lost one colony the 

 past winter. We had a very long and cold 

 winter. Papa had all the bee-hives opened on 

 April 20, and all are in good condition. The 

 weather is changeable, one day freezing, the 

 next day warm, and the next day raining. 

 My sister got that queen from Mr. York on 

 Aug. 13, but she never saw it. Now I must 

 help papa in her place. I will be 9 years old 

 Sept. 16. My papa's name is E. W. Abel. 

 Florence M. Abel. 



Northampton Co., Pa., April 22. 



Thank you very much for your nice little 

 letter. Write again ; we are always glad to 

 hear from the girls. I am sure the sisters 

 will all unite with me in extending our sym- 

 pathy for the loss of your sister. " Papa " is 

 to be congratulated that he has another little 

 girl so willing to fill her place. 



r 



VTiw ^asty s Clftcrtl^ougf^ts 



The " Old Reliable" seen through New and Unreliable Glasses. 

 By E. E. Hasty, Sta. B. Rural, Toledo, Ohio. 



=/ 



WINTERING 0B9ERVAT0RT HIVES. 



Dr. Miller was not the only one to be sur- 

 prised at Allen Latham's success in wintering 

 observatory colonies. Well for us to inquire 

 a little into the why of this success. Mr. L. 

 himself thinks it's partly owing to stimula- 

 tion late in the fall— that is, into October. 

 This is reasonable ; yet I do not feel absolutely 

 sure that extra-late breeding counts for very 

 much. I conjecture that the ail-along pros- 

 perity of the colony (as shown by their swarm- 

 ing) is the main element. Page 361. 



THE BEE-KEEFEBS' HIVB-TOOL. 



Apropos to F. Greiner's new tool made of a 

 piece of buggy-spring, it is apparently better 

 than the prevalent putty-knife as a lever; but 

 it does not remedy the worst short-coming of 

 the putty-knife for the work of removing 

 burr-comb. As human knuckles must have 

 room to move along in, the operating edge is 

 continually being crowded down in spite of 

 us against the wood of the frames — and snub 



right into the wood. Can't you have the tool 

 made a little longer, with one end drawn to a 

 screw-driver shape for the lever work, and a 

 bend of 30 or 40 degrees put in it two or three 

 inches from the broad end? 



Oft we want to remove wax and burrs from 

 combs that are not in the possession of bees. 

 It naturally occurs to one that an old table- 

 knife is the proper tool to do it with. You 

 try it and get mad. Even a very dull knife 

 won't travel in beeswax if it can find wood to 

 plunge aside into. One of the queer perver- 

 sities of materials and tools. Page 262. 



HIVING BEES ON FULL SET OF DRONE-COMBS 



I think some one has said that bees are 

 decidedly inclined to leave if hived on a full 

 set of drone-combs. Mr. Greiner goes on 

 record that they don't always do it. but some- 

 limes go ahead and rear a lot of worker-brood 

 in the dronecooab. Curious. Old bee-writ- 

 ings sometimes tell of bees tearing down 

 drone-comb and rebuilding in worker size 



(that's what human beings would do, of 

 course), but who can tell time and place 

 where bees ever actually did that? Page 262. 



PUTTING WEAK COLONIES OVER STRONG ONES. 



That sub-head on page 262, " Uniting weak 

 colonies in the spring," is wrong. It means 

 putting weak colonies over strong ones with- 

 out uniting — a kink decidedly off the old, 

 familiar track. What about iti It seems 

 that two of the Michigan folks who tried it 

 largely like it. The apparent advantage is 

 that a queen, which in all probability would 

 have been lost, is saved. The apparent dis- 

 advantage is that the lower colony's heat is 

 used and much of it liable to be wasted. None 

 seem to report any fighting, which is curious. 

 Presumably some of the upper colony's bees 

 desert when put back to the old stand, but not 

 nearly enough to offset the gain realized by 

 three weeks of parasite life. I suppose they 

 not only go through the premises of their 

 stronger neighbors, but help themselves to 

 much that they find there. And according to 

 page 307, bees from below often come up and 

 help in the work. But don't forget that the 

 inventor (E. W. Alexander) warns us that 

 queens will be killed if such pairs are kept 

 together too long. 



DO BEES EVER SMOTHER? 



Bees never smother, eh? The backer of 

 that, George E. Hilton, seems inclined to push 

 Hutchinson in the heresy contest. The essen- 

 tial fact In this connection is that excited bees 

 feed a great amount of air, and if they can 

 uot have it they very speedily perish, while 

 perfectly quiet bees will do very well with no 

 more air than will go right through ice, or 

 bricks, or boards. Whether a colony lives or 

 dies is very often a mere matter of feeling and 

 deportment with them. No harm to shut bees 

 in unless the bees themselves object to It — 

 but if they do, then look out. 



In somewhat similar manner banking with 

 snow is good — unless — unless it sets them to 

 breeding, as it frequently does. If this takes 

 place look out — look out and see a " blasted 

 hopes " apiary. I imagine that the air which 

 filters through snow is too stimulating — too 

 much ozone in it. Page 263. 



CROSSING CROSS BEES WITH CYPRIANS. 



So " South Carolina " crossed his cross bees 

 with Cyprians, thinking to make them gen- 

 tle ! Next he'll be crossing his hens with 

 Dominiques to make them non-sitters. Some ' 

 eminent bee-folks have the " gall " to claim 

 that pure Cyprians are gentle; but I think 

 they mostly give it up about the mixed bloods. 

 Page 265. 



Feeding Bees in the Cellar 



Sugar syrup may be given to bees in the 

 cellar with the regular division-board feeder 

 of the Doolittle type. It would be advisable, 

 as you suggest, to put the feeder in the mid- 

 dle of the brood-nest; but a better way would 

 be to give the bees cakes of hard candy. 

 The candy should be made by boiling granu- 

 lated-sugar syrup, with a little honey in it, so 

 that, when cool, it will form into a hard- 

 translucent cake. A two or three pcund 

 brick of this when put on top of the brood- 

 frames will be enough to take care of any 

 colony short of stores. — Gleanings in Bee- 

 Culture. 



♦^ 



Comb Honey in Confectionery 



I have been unable to learn anything fur- 

 ther about the way in which comb noney 

 is used in confectionery, owing to the ab- 

 sence from home of the friend who sold the 

 honey for this purpose; but I imagine that, 

 like most soft candies, it is made with but a 

 moderate amount of cooking and a great 

 deal of stirring, especially just after it is 

 removed from the fire. In this manner the 

 wax is thoroughly mbced through the candy, 

 and helps a very soft candy to keep its shape 

 instead of melting down and becoming sticky 

 with the changes of temperature and moisture. 

 Parafline is sometimes used for this purpose; 

 but the comb honey, containing wax in about 

 the right proportion, already finely divided 

 and well mixed through the mass, is prob- 

 ably less trouble, besides being superior in 

 other respects. — J. A. Green, in Gleanings in 

 Bee-Culture. . 



