438 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



June 22, 190S 



spring the cows do eat wild garlic. The quality of the milk 

 may vary with the cow's food and health. Kut it is still pure 

 milk so long as some other secretion of the cow, such as blood, 

 etc., is not mixed with the milk: and the bee's secretion 

 (chemically changed nec'ar from any source) is still pure 

 honey no matter whether gathered from fruit-juices, a neigh- 

 boring farmer's kitchen, or elsewhere. 



A natural product may have many grades of various 

 qualities, but a natural product so long as it is left in its nat- 

 ural state can never be called adulterated. Adulteration, for 

 which a man can be punished, is a condition which the man 

 produced, not a condition which a bee produced. A man may 

 be forbidden by food commissioners (on the advice of boards 

 of health) to sell certain grades of honey, not because they are 

 not pure honey, but because they are unhealthy grades of 

 honey, just as a milkman can be forbidden to sell milk of a 

 cow just delivered of a calf, because of its undesirable effects, 

 but not because it is not pure milk. Milk with germs in is 

 also bad, but that is not a chemical impurity, originally 

 at least. It must have the germs added after leaving the 

 cow. Germs added to honey after the bee stored it would also 

 be an impurity. But in its pristine condition, after being 

 ejected from the bee's sacs into the cell, the honey is pure 

 honey no matter where the bee got her supply of liquid sweet 

 which in her foraging she collected. Any definition of honey 

 must be this broad to be true natural history ; and any defini- 

 tion of adulterated honey must Include some addition or un- 

 natural modification of this natural product. 



The stored natural food of adult bees is undoubtedly 

 honey, no matter where the bee secured its food. If the 

 health boards deem honey-dew an unhealthf ul source of honey, 

 they may recommend that food commissioners forbid the sale 

 of honey-dew honey, but this is because it is unwholesome 

 honey, not because it is not honey, just as the sale of a badly 

 sprouted potato should not be allowed, not because it is not a 

 potato, but because it is an unwholesome potato. 



Honey is the natural, viscid, sweet substance stored by 

 bees for food. It has varying flavors, colors, and qualities, 

 and if the writer understands aright, not always exactly the 

 same chemical make-up. But so long as it is the latter, un- 

 interfered with natural substance, taken by the bee out of 

 her honey-sac, and by her stored in a cell of a bee-comb for 

 the future food of adult bees, or to be later mixed with pollen 

 for young bees, then it is, in ihe bee's estimation, honey — pure 

 honey. What the bee classes as pure honey, it has heretofore 

 been the custom from Jonathan's day and before down till 

 now, for all mankind to call honey. To make a new definition 

 would be arbitrary. Neither naturalist, consumer, bee, nor 

 bee-keeper is calling for a new definition of honey. Let us 

 keep the old one. Putnam Co., Ind. 



m 



Savin? Weak Colonies— A Cheering Experi- 

 ment 



BY ALLF.N LATHAM 



IN writing our opinions for publication, too many of us I 

 fear write from too narrow a point of view, failing to put 

 ourselves in the other fellow's shoes while offering advice. 

 The veterans, in particular, are writing from the point of 

 view of the specialist, and have all too little sympathy for the 

 tender feelings of the man with two colonies. 



For instance, a beginner asks what he shall do with a 

 weak colony, and is told to double it up. Now a man with 

 100 colonies can not pamper a weak colony, for it will be a 

 waste of his time, for has he not the ninety and nine left ? But 

 the man with two colonies does not feel like cutting down his 

 apiary SO percent at one slash. 



I sometimes wonder whether even the old vets don't once 

 in a while recall the time when they would do almost anything 

 to save the individuiility of a weakling colony, a time when 

 the loss of a colony carried with it a pang akin to the loss of 

 a child, though the feeling be ever so far removed in degree. 



I have not yet reached the time when I can with com- 

 placency see th(! destruction of an individual colony, and I 

 still put myself to great inconvenience to save the' life of 

 suijh. It is the piirpose of this article to describe the savino- 

 of a little colony last yc^ar. " 



Some seven years ago I fell into possession of a stray 

 swarm which had been living on the branch of an apple-tree 

 two or three weeks. I cut off the branch and fastened it in a 

 common box about wiiirh I put many tliicknosses of paper 

 with roofing-paper outside. This colony built up and has 

 furnished me with one or two swarms nearly every season 

 since. Naturally it has acquired an individuality of its own. 



Last winter nearly proved its death. When the bees flew 



in March last there were but a mere handful compared with 

 the pile of dead bees on the bottom-board and the thousands 

 which clogged the spaces between the combs. It was a most 

 disheartened and wretched weakling, and I felt assured that, 

 unless I bore a helping hand, it would be numbered with the 

 dead. 



Understand that I am writing to the man with one or two 

 colonies, and you who own your hundreds will only scoff at 

 what I have to say, so you would better not read further. 



I made a box much larger than the hive, and in the box 

 arranged a shelf of thin board about 10 inches from the bot- 

 tom. Flush with this shelf in front was a flaring entrance, 

 while under the shelf was built a chamber which opened by a 

 double door to the outside in the rear. The hive was set in 

 without its bottom-board on the shelf, and all about it was 

 packed ground-cork. Thus the hive was amply protected 

 from cold. Over all was put a tight cover. It required less 

 than one afternoon to put the whole thing together in good 

 shape. 



An old gallon can was hunted up, filled with boiling 

 water, and put in the lower chamber. Over the entrance, 

 which I have said was flaring, the outside size being about 10 

 by 3 inches, was nailed a wire-cloth screen, lightly nailed so 

 that it could be easily stuck on and pulled off. 



In less than 3 hours the bees began to feel the warmth 

 from the water and began to appear at the entrance. The 

 next motning I removed nearly a cupful of fragments of bees 

 from the wired-in porch of the hive, and for about 3 days 

 nearly the same amount of refuse was piled out next to the 

 wire-cloth. The colony was extremely weak and made little 

 effort to leave the hive, bending all its energies to house- 

 cleaning. I had, of course, brushed out all the dead bees I 

 conveniently could before setting the hive in place, but the 

 bees found hundreds dead in the cells, and to get them out 

 they had to pull them to pieces. 



The can of water was renewed daily, or else brought to 

 the boiling point by setting on the stove. By the way, always 

 remove the stopper when the can is set on the stove. I did 

 not do this one day, and when it blew out later on there was 

 a good exhibition of a spouting geyser. 



In a few days this little colony was carrying in more flour 

 and meal than any other colony, and seemed to be getting 

 into prosperous shape. For 3 weeks they carried flour and 

 afforded an opportunity to compare flour with pollen. Flour 

 is a poor substitute, though better than none. Bees brought 

 up on flour appear to be short-lived and less energetic, unless 

 the experiment for some other reason cut down the length of 

 life and energy of the bees. The nurse-bees are rendered 

 costive by flour, and find difficulty in ridding their systems of 

 the pasty mas? which, as it is ejected about the hives, has the 

 appearance after drying of vermicelli. 



The can of water was furnished the colony for 4 weeks 

 and more, till the colony had gained a strength that war- 

 ranted letting it shift for itself. By early June it compared 

 very favorably with ray average colonies. 



I drove a swarm from it late in June, and to-day I have 

 the swarm and the parent colony both in excellent condition, 

 and in every way equal to my best. 



I got much pleasure out of the experiment, for the work 

 came at a season when bees required little attention, and 

 there was solid comfort in seeing the colony grow from a 

 hopeless wreck into a self-supporting colony. 



So I say to all little bee-keepers : Do not double up your 

 colonies from necessity, for if you wish to save a weak colony 

 so that your apiary may hold its own in numbers, you can do 

 so by doing as I did. 



Does it pay to double up ? Even if your colonies number 

 hundreds doesit pay ? Evidently it does or so many success- 

 ful apiarists would not recommend it. Yet my own experi- 

 ence in doubling up has never been satisfactory in the results 

 obtained. 



It has always been my experience that the double swarm 

 seemed to have at the end of a few days only as many bees as 

 the single one which occupied the stand had before doubling. 

 Possibly I do not understand doubling, but it is my opinion 

 that after doubling many bees are stung, many do not like 

 new quarters and leave, and many die from failing to mark 

 the new location. For a day or two the double colony appears 

 to have received new life, but there follows a rapid decline 

 into a state no better than existed before doubling up. 



The fact is that in the weak colonies, as a rule, there are 

 only old bees, and old bees are not worth doubling. But if 

 there are a few hundred new-season bees the results will be 

 very different. I have seen amazing results follow the intro- 

 duction of a pint of young bees into a weak colony — new life 

 and rapid building up quickly follow. 



New London Co., Conn. 



