184 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



March 1, 19C6 



the bottom-bar. Weed-process foundation, made from good 

 wax and well wired, will not sag enough to buckle at the 

 bottom under these conditions. 



Mr. Alpaugh. of Gait, thinks more combs are sagged 

 out of shape by shaking to get bees off, when they are full 

 of honey and hot from the hive, than in any other way. 

 It doesn't seem to me that theory will quite hold water, 

 although Mr. Alpaugh is more careful and painstaking in 

 many ways than I am. Chris Edmondson has the wires in 

 the frame loose, then draws them down in the middle when 

 embedding. Thus they act as a truss, and support the 

 foundation from sagging. 



As to weight of foundation, many prefer it as light as 

 possible without danger of sagging — about 7% to 8 sheets 

 to the pound. R. H. Smith said with good wax the bees 

 would thin the base of heavy foundation and use the wax in 

 wall-building, so there, is no particular economy in using 

 foundation extra-thin. But R. F. Holtermann contended 

 that particularly in a heavy honey-flow the secretion of 

 wax by the bees is partly involuntary, and if not used in 

 comb building or capping it would be plastered on the in- 

 sides of the hive and wasted. Hence note, incidentally, 

 there is no economy in extracting uncapped honey, for the 

 wax which the bees will secrete for capping anyway would 

 be wasted. 



For fastening foundation in sections H. G. Sibbald rec- 

 ommended a block to fit in the section just to the middle. 

 He lays in a square of foundation which just fits the sec- 

 tion, and with a quill stripping brush, such as carriage 

 painters use, he brushes melted wax around, sticking the 

 foundation fast to all four sides. By this means there are 

 no openings except what the bees in a slow honey-flow 



might make. 



^ i ^ 



Wintering Bees 



All the members of the Brantford Convention, who had 

 bees in the cellar, were complaining of high temperature 

 and noisy bees. Geo. Howard, of Lynden, put out his 64 

 colonies for a flight on Jan. 22, and put them back in when 

 the weather turned cooler. He said they did not seem to 

 be needing a flight very badly, and were very quiet when 

 put back. Mr. Howard has promised to report in " Cana- 

 dian Beedom " on the condition of these bees when they 

 come out for good in the spring. 



An idea for getting bees into the cellar quietly came 

 from Mr. Edmundson, of Brantford. He pries hives loose 

 from the bottom-board the night before, and slips a fence- 

 staple in flatwise to keep them from sticking together again. 

 A nail would roll, and let the hive slip out of place on the 

 bottom-board, but a staple will not do that. 



For outdoor wintering Mr. Alpaugh has an entrance 

 ^'/z^Yi inch, and no projection of the bottom-board. Winter 

 and summer his bottom-boards are exactly the same length 

 as the hive. The outside entrance of the packing-box is 

 lower than the entrance of the hive. This serves two pur- 

 poses : It " breaks joints," so no cold wind or sunshine 

 •can get directly into the hive, and it gives a place where 

 the live bees can drop dead ones without going clear outside 

 and getting chilled. 



Mr, Alpaugh believes in having his bottom-boards 

 perfectly level. If they slope forward, bees falling from 

 the cluster roll to the entrance in the death struggle. The 

 "entrance soon becomes closed by dead bees ; but with a 

 level floor they lie where they fall. For upward ventila- 

 tion he cracks the honey-board loose late enough so that it 

 will not be propolized fast again before winter sets in. 



See Langstroth Book Offer on another page of this 

 copy of the American Bee Journal. 



Honey as a Health-Food.— This is a 16-page honey- 

 pamphlet intended to help increase the demand for honey. 

 The first part of it contains a short article on "Honey as 

 Food "' written by Dr. C. C. Miller. It tells where to keep 

 honey how to liquefy it, etc. The last part is devoted to 

 "Honey-Cooking Recipes" and "Remedies Using Honey. 

 It should be widely circulated by those selling honey. The 

 more the people are educated on the value and uses of 

 honey, the more honey they will buy. 



Prices prepaid— Sample copy for a two-cent stamp; 50 

 copies for 70 cts.; 100 for $1.25; 250 for $2.25; 500 for $4.00; 

 or 1 000 for $7.50. Your business card printed free at the 

 bottom of front page on all orders for 100 or more copies. 

 Send all orders to the office of the American Bee Journal. 



* (£ontributeb * 

 Special Ctrticles 



Conditions Affecting the Honey-Flow 

 Matters 



Other 



BY H. S. PHILBROOK 



I WISH to give a few observations I have made relative 

 to the honey-flow, and no flow. There are three known 

 elements required to produce a good honey-flow, and a 

 fourth unknown. The three are, in my part of the country — 



First, and most important, the bees must be in good 

 condition, free from disease and strong in numbers. 



Second, we must have abundant rains before the season 

 has advanced too far. 



Third, we must have warm, balmy sunshine, and not 

 too much cloudy weather after the flow is on. 



And now for the fourth, and unknown condition and 

 observations I have made in connection with this condition : 

 In 1884, I think it was, I was located 14 miles north of Lom- 

 pac, in Santa Barbara County. We were enjoying a plenti- 

 ful flow of sage honey, when a thunder-storm of considera- 

 ble force came on, accompanied with a slight rainfall, but a 

 grand display of lightning. It lasted only part of the day 

 and night, but our honey had vanished, and for nearly a 

 week the bees were furious, and on the robbing order. 



At that time I thought the slight rain had washed the 

 flowers free of honey, but this put me to observing the re- 

 sults of rains since then during the flow, and I find, or seem 

 to find, that clouds and an electrical display will always 

 stop our flow for a time, even with no rain. 



I have been engaged in the culture of sugar-beets for 

 the past 7 years, and we are paid according to the percent 

 of sugar our beets contain, each load being tested by a sam- 

 ple caught at random as the load is being dumped into the 

 cars, and the same thing appears in the sweetness of the 

 beet. No lain, with a grand electrical display, reduces the 

 percent of sugar nearly as much as rainfall does. Our beets 

 are very sweet here, frequently going 28, and sometimes 

 over 30, percent sugar ; so such things are readily noticed. 



A Carload of Honey. 



And now a word for Mr. Hasty's carload of honey. Here 

 on the Western Coast, a carload by water is 10 tons, and a 

 carload by actual car, or by rail, is IS tons. 



Effect of Dark and Light Colors on Bees. 



W. W. McNeal, on page 728, asks for opinions regarding 

 bees being angered by black objects. It is, in my opinion, a 

 fact beyond dispute that bees have a great dislike for any- 

 thing of a dark color; the lighter the color the less an 

 angry bee will notice it, and, the darker, the more infuriated 

 will she become. 



To illustrate : Take a black felt hat and stick it up in the 

 apiary, say 6 feet high, on a stick some cool day, and at the 

 same time place a light felt hat in a similar position. But, 

 mind you, put them far enough apart so the angry bees 

 from the black hat will not fool with the light one, and in 

 the evening count the stings in the black one and compare 

 with the light one. I mean this to be tried during a short- 

 age of honey, when bees are naturally cross. Invariably 

 the black one will out-reach the light one. 



I have seen a great deal written about two queens in 

 one hive, and the writer always uses the " mother and 

 daughter " theory. Now, as pretty as this sounds, I am in- 

 clined to doubt the assertion. In my experience, and I have 

 found many of them, it has always been two young queens — 

 I don't mean virgin queens, but both young fertile queens — 

 of about the same age, and invariably one will seem rather 

 deformed about the sting, she being very thick and blunt 

 at the end, and, if taken and introduced to a queenless col- 

 ony, she will do very poor service for a time, and finally be 

 superseded by the bees themselves ; while the other will be 

 a very nice, neat-shaped queen, and do as well as any may 

 be expected to do. 



Building Comb on Tree-Limbs. 



As to a swarm building comb outside on a limb, that is 

 avery common thing here in California. If one is located 



