374 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



May 1. 



holes near the center; then I bored fourteen IJ^- 

 inch holes around the outside for the bees, and 

 put the candy into the center holes. I shall not 

 take any new orders for Australia, as it does not 

 pay. I have shipped to England successfully, 

 but never to Australia. 



Now, Dr. IMiller, I can beat your washing- 

 recipe all to pieces (p. 843). Soak the clothes 

 half an hour in soft water, and rub soap on the 

 dirty spots; then boil 20 minutes in the follow- 

 ing preparation: Enough water to cover 

 clothes; 34 barsoap; 3 tablespoonfulsof "wash- 

 o-lene." Do not put clothes in till the soap is 

 dissolved; stir occasionally, rinse thoroughly; 

 blue, and hang out. This will not injure any 

 kind of clothing; but, of course, you must not 

 Jjoil those that are likely to fade. Try it. Ram- 

 bler, and I will bet a last year's drone that you 

 do not get any kerosene into your flapjacks. 



Give us the footnotes. They are as essential 

 as the salt in our food— "little, but all there." 

 I always want to know what the Roots think of 

 other people's views. 



I use tin-can transplanting-tubes (see p. 67). 

 I melt both ends off; and when I go to take up 

 a plant I lay a small block on top of the can and 

 work it down with a rocking motion, much as 

 you sink the tile-spade. If one end gets bent, 

 use the other; when both ends are too crooked 

 for further use, get new ones. 



I shall move 600 strawberry-plants a mile in 

 the spring, and will go with a wagon and (500 

 cans, and get all at one trip. S. F. Trego. 



Swedona, 111., Feb. 5. 



[We don't like your export queen-cage " a 

 little bit." With the large-sized Benton we 

 have delivered at times nearly all the queens 

 alive; but during the past season it was the 

 exception when we succeeded in getting queens 

 through alive. If it wasn't the sea-water it 

 was some peculiarity of the climate at the time 

 the queens were sent last season. — Ed.] 



CALIFORNIA HONEY-YIELDS PAINTED IN 

 TOO ROSY COLORS. 



A fb:w facts on the "other side;" a very 



READABLE ARTICLE. 



By W. O. Hewes. 



On page 100, F. L. S., of Minnesota, wants to 

 know what is the net profit per hive of bees in 

 California; and the editor answers very correct- 

 ly that a " fair colony under good management 

 in a fair season ought to yield 75 or 100 lbs. of 

 extracted honey," and then calls upon Rambler 

 to help him out. On page333 Rambleranswers; 

 and his statement, 150 lbs. as the average yield 

 per colony, is so excessive an overestimate that 

 I feel called upon to correct it. Rambler's 

 neighbors may have been playing him for a 

 tenderfoot by feeding him on yarns; or he may 

 have reached these conclusions from a discus- 

 sion on this subject which took place at a re- 

 cent meeting of the State Bee-keepers' Asso- 



ciation (see Gleanings pages 146 and 176j 

 From another source I learn that Messrs. Corey 

 and Wilkin are among those to whom these 

 statements of large averages are attributed. 

 I believe these gentlemen were misunderstood, 

 for I know they would not knowingly make in- 

 accurate statements. From Rambler's report 

 (page 146) one would infer that there are sea- 

 sons when the general average throughout the 

 country is 400 lbs. 



Some one, page 176, has led Prof. Cook to be- 

 lieve "that from 300 to 500 lbs. of honey were 

 often secured from each colony in the apiary." 

 In my ten years' experience as a bee-keeper in 

 California I know of but one instance where an 

 apiary of one hundred colonies or over has^ 

 made an average of 400 lbs. of honey; and I 

 believe all such cases throughout California, 

 from the beginning of time up to March 35. 1894^ 

 can be counted on the fingers of one hand. 



Mr. Wilkin and Mr. Mclntyre are accounted 

 as among the best bee-keepers in the State, and 

 the location of their famous Sespe apiary is bet- 

 ter than the average. In Gleanings for 1891, 

 page 774, and page 173 for 1893, is to be found 

 a report giving the averages of the Sespe api- 

 ary for sixteen years. According to that report, 

 the average for that apiary was 73 lbs., or less 

 than half of Rambler's estimate. 



The best yield of any one year was 375 lbs. 

 per hive. Only four years in the sixteen did the 

 average exceed 100 lbs., and three seasons no 

 honey at all was secured, and half of the bees 

 starved. 



My own average for ten years has been only 

 about 50 lbs.; yet in only one year was my yield 

 surpassed by the generality of my neighbors. 

 There is something of a rivalry among bee- 

 keepers as to who shall average the most honey 

 to the hive. Some get big averages by bare- 

 faced lying, calling a four-ton crop fourteen, 

 etc. Others, with a little more conscience, ar- 

 rive at similar results by a piocess of reasoning 

 something like the following: 



He has, let us say, 100 hives, and cans up .5000 

 lbs. of honey. He loses a few swarms, he 

 doesn't know how many, but estimates them at 

 .50, and that each one would have given a sur- 

 plus of 100 lbs. of honey. He lets his tank run 

 over, spills about a gallon, but it looks like a 

 ton. He calls it so. He's delayed in extracting 

 for a few days from not having cans or tanks 

 into which to put his honey, and promptly per- 

 suades himself that he has lost two extract- 

 ings, which he estimates at 40 lbs. per hive for 

 each extracting, or 8000 lbs. By this reasoning 

 process a .5000-lb. crop and a50-lb. average are 

 changed into a 20,000-lb. crop and a300-lb. aver- 

 age; and when his neighbor hails him with 

 "Hello, Spoopcndyke, how much honey did you 

 get?" he promptly answers, "Ten tons." 



C. W. Dayton seems to have sized up the 

 weakness of the fraternity better than Prof. 

 Cook or Rambler; for, when he speaks of aver- 



