May 10, 1906 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



403 



* Contrtbuteb -f 

 Special (Articles 



Mice, Rats, Chipmucks, Squirrels, and Honey 



EV G. M. DOOLITTLE. 



I SEE bj the American Bee Journal that both Mr Hasty 

 and Dr. Miller "entertain some doubts'' about mice eat- 

 ing honey. 1 looked carefully for some proofs regard- 

 ing those d( mlits, for something to show that 1 was wrong, 

 and for some reasons which led them to doubt, but neither 

 of them give any proof or reasons for their doubting my 

 statement that, "The house-mouse eats the honey, and does 

 not touch the bee as food." 



Mr. Hasty says. "I think the house-mouse rarely eats 

 honey except when near to starvation — but sometimes peels 

 the cappings off for pastime, when time hangs heavily on 

 his hands. However, poor mousie does face starvation at 

 close range pretty often, in which condition he naturally 

 has to eat anything he can get." After admitting that much, 

 I cannot see why Mr. Hasty "entertains some doubts" that 

 the house-mouse eats honey, for he virtually admits that it 

 does, though he qualifies it by saying that it is only when 

 "near starvation" that it does so. But when not near star- 

 vation it "peels the cappings off for pastime, when time 

 hangs heavily on his hands." Glad to learn this. But you 

 will note that Mr. Hasty is very guarded in what he says. 

 Instead of giving any proof for any of this, he prefaces it 

 with "I think." Well, nearly all of us think good thoughts 

 sometimes; and sometimes those which are not well- 

 grounded. 



But it will be noticed that the good Dr. Miller is still 

 more guarded and shrewd about his "some doubts," for he 

 does not even venture an "I think." He proposes that Mr. 

 Hasty conduct an experiment to prove that his doubts are 

 correct. Then he takes all the "thunder" away from Mr. 

 Hasty's "I think the house-mouse rarely eats honey except 

 when near starvation," and wants that gentleman in conduct- 

 ing the Doctor's proposed experiments, to pile corn, oats, 

 wheat, barley, grass-seed, pumpkin and squash seeds, etc., 

 mountain high all about the mouse, the only exception made 

 in this epicure diet being that it shall have no sweet except 

 honey. 



This makes me think of the way resorted to, to prove 

 that an old soldier would not eat "hard-tack." They piled 

 pork and beans, roast beef, sausage, pie, doughnuts and cake 

 all about him, and then put two or three of the hard-tack 

 down deep in a bucket where he could just squeeze his hand 

 in if he got it, and then sat down to watch him behind some 

 bushes. Soon he tried all the goodies — goodies to this sol- 

 dier — and ate of all till he needed nothing more, except exer- 

 cise, when he went for the bucket, fished out the hard-tack, 

 and went to throwing them at a mark he had set up. 



So Dr. Miller wants Mr. Hasty to provide the mice with 

 all they can possibly eat, and besides give them " a new coma 

 containing a little honey, none of ii sealed, and nunc of the 

 cells well filled, and then let him report to us whether the 

 mice have torn down any of the cells to get at the hone™ 

 and whether they have torn down for mischief any of the 

 cells that do not contain honey." Oh! Doctor! Mice are not 

 like an old soldier. When they have eaten till they are full, 

 they generally lie down and go to sleep. And then, the places 

 where they congregate are not apt to have "food in abund- 

 ance" therein. As Mr. Hasty says, the majority of the 

 time the mouse faces starvation: and at such times it eats 

 honey, as Mr. H. allows. 



My article on page uo. which called out this matter, 

 was written about mice troubling bees in winter by getting 

 into the hives, and therefore carries with it the idea that 

 the mouse must live in the cellar with the bees, or in the 

 out-door hive with them. We do not put an "abundance" 

 of mouse food in such places here in York State, whatever 

 they may do in Illinois. 



But now to the reasons for what I said regarding the 

 house-mouse eating honey : I supposed that my honey-room 

 was mouse-proof, till one day I looked at some fancy section- 

 honey I bad standing on a platform therein, when, to my sor- 

 row, I found several places where the capping had been 

 peeled off the surface of the combs in these nice, fancy sec- 



tions, just as Mr. Hasty says the house-mouse will do "foi 

 pastime when time hangs heavily on his hands." I took 

 these sections .Mid placed them on the hives again, leaving 

 those that were all right just where they were. As some 

 children had been in the shop and honey-room the day he- 

 fore, 1 thought the work was done by them; yet I did not 

 see why children should do work in that way. I left the 

 door of the hone} room open while I went into the room 

 where \ write articles, for something, which I did not readily 

 find, leaving the door Of this room open also. I was de- 

 tained longer than I expected, and upon turning around to 

 go out, 1 saw a mouse run across the shop floor and 

 through a small bole in one corner, which apparently led 

 into the honey-room. 'I hinking I might catch him I tip- 

 toed to the other corner of the shop, where J could look into 

 this honey-room through the open door. Nothing was in 

 sight for several minutes, when the mouse carefully came Up 

 on the platform where the honey was. 



I was all interest now, for I believed that here was the 

 culprit, instead of the children. The mouse came up to the 

 comb in the section, smelled of it a moment, when with an 

 upward motion of bis head he chipped off the capping to two 

 or three cells, when he put out the tongue and went to lapping 

 and eating the honey. This he continued to do till the honey 

 was lowered enough in the cells so that the wax in the sides 

 of the cells touched bis mouth, when be went a little to one 

 side and chipped off some more of the cappings, beginning to 

 sip the honey again. I did not wait longer, but drove that 

 mouse out in a hurry, stopped the hole and set a trap near 

 it, baited with squash seeds, and the next morning I found 

 that mouse in the choker-trap, having passed beyond the 

 condition of wanting honey i ir anything else. 



A year or two later I left some frames of sealed honey 

 standing on the shop floor over night, and the next morning 

 I found many larger places with the capping off and the 

 honey licked off from under where the capping was. I said, 

 "More mice." Still it seemed as if there must have been 

 a lot of them to do so much work in one night. I went into 

 the writing room, leaving the door open, as it was warm 

 weather, and sat down to write an article for one of the bee- 

 papers. When nearly half through, I heard a little noise 

 on the shop floor, so I kept still and watched. Soon a big 

 rat appeared, and cautiously went up to the frames of honey, 

 smelled of the comb, and then began chipping off the cap- 

 pings the same as the mouse did, only taking off much more 

 at each bite, when he began to sip the honey. I watched him 

 till he had taken the capping off in several places, sipping 

 honey from each place, as soon as the cappings were off; 

 when a little stir from me caused him to "scoot" in a hurry 

 for his hole (which he had dug under the wall). This rat 

 was more cunning than the mouse, for it took me a week to 

 catch him, which I finally did by putting a cloth over a 

 steel trap, and putting some honey, in bits of comb, on the 

 cloth. 



Then, we bad a chipmuck — sometimes called striped squir- 

 rel and ground squirrel — that came to live in the bank near 

 the bouse, as our home is near the woods. We thought much 

 of him, and he soon got so he would climb all over me, 

 take corn out of my hand, let me stroke him, etc. One day a 

 friend of mine and myself were in the shop when he came 

 in the door. The friend said. "See that chipmuck." I said, 

 "Yes, he is our pet." 



While we were talking the chipmuck went up to a comb 

 of honey I had brought into the shop a short time previously, 

 ami began gnawing off the cappings and eating the honey. 

 This pleased my friend immensely, so I let him eat what 

 honey he wished, when he vent out. But that was almost 

 the spoiling of that chipmuck for me, for he would dodge 

 into the shop every chance he could get, and finally dug 

 holes under the wall, and became a great nuisance, till one 

 day a neighboring cat got him. My wife was very sorry, 

 but I did not know whether to be sorry or glad. 



Then we had a red squirrel that came down to us from 

 the woods, and he became a pet. In fact, several came, and 

 we bad all sorts of shows when the little ones were old 

 enough to play. They would climb the screen-doors, chase 

 each other about the porch, climb into my pockets and all 

 over me to get things 1 carried about in my coat and pants' 

 pockets for them. I hej finally found out there was hone] in 

 the shop, and gnawed holes to get in, and became a worse 

 nuisance than any of the rest, one even getting drowned in 

 the tank of extracted honey. My wife declared that the 

 honey had to be thrown away, but I told her that I did not 

 think it would hurt the bees any if we used it for feeding 

 them. 



Now, Messrs. Hasty and Miller, I have given y.ou the 



