1894 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



r25 



and he carried the water and a quart cup. I 

 put in 10 lbs. of sugar, and said to him, " Now 

 put in four quarts of water." 



"Why not put in live quarts'?" said he. 

 " II. R. Boardnian has come to the belief that 

 it is better to use equal parts of sugar and wa- 

 ter in feeding."' 



" All right." said I. " Five quarts it is. H. R. 

 Boardnian is a pretty solid sort of man to fol- 

 low. Very likely he is right." 



I had thought I was pretty radical to use, for 

 every 5 lbs. of sugar, 4 lbs. of water instead of 

 two, the orthodox quantity; but it seems to 

 work all right with equal quantities, and, as 

 Doolittle would say. it's more according to na- 

 ture, for nectar is pretty thin stuff. 



I was anxious to have that feeder show off in 

 good shape while Ernest was here; but the 

 bees didn't touch the feed till I baited them in. 

 Then they worked it in good shape, and in 

 about 4S hours it was dry. I wish I had 40 like 

 it. But I'll stuff in rags and make the old Mil- 

 ler feeders do. 



Marengo, 111. 



[In my opinion, Dr. Miller has made what 

 j>romiscs to be one of the most important im- 

 provements, in the way of feeding, that has 

 been made for many a year. Of course, the idea 

 of using dry sugar, and pouring just simply 

 water on it, to make bee-feed, is old. Years 

 and years ago, the senior editor of this journal 

 experimented a good deal, but he did not suc- 

 ceed in attaining satisfactory results. In all 

 his experiments the sweetened water would be 

 taken up by the bees, leaving the dry sugar to 

 stick to the feeder. In order to get the bees to 

 take up all the sugar, it required constant 

 moistening with water. This took so much 

 time and bother that he concluded it was bet- 

 ter to pour boiling water on the sugar and 

 make an actual syrup, the same to be poured 

 into the feeders from a syrup-can. But Dr. 

 Miller has taken a long step in advance, in 

 what apparently is a success. That being the 

 case, all he has to do is to carry the dry sugar 

 and a pail of water; pour an equal quantity of 

 each into the feeder, close the hive, and the 

 work is done. You will observe he has simply 

 adapted the percolator idea to the feeder; and 

 herein lies the success of the plan. 



We have been trying the plan outlined above 

 by Dr. Miller, and so far we are pleased with it. 



Although I saw the plan working successful- 

 ly at Marengo on my recent bicycle-trip, when 

 I got home one of the first things I asked our 

 apiarist to do was to try this new way of feed- 

 ing. I was in such a hurry that I could not 

 wait to get common flannel, but asked him to 

 go to the book-binding room and get some com- 

 mon cheese-cloih and poke it under the inside 

 partition of the ordinary Miller feeder, as we 

 make and use it. That you may understand a 

 little better, I herewith show a cross-section of 

 the feeder in question. The cloth was cram- 



med in under the boards B, right where the 

 arrows are coming out into the larger compart- 

 ment; and it was crammed in tight enough 

 so as to make the syrup percolate through 

 It, in order to get into those narrow passage- 



ways under A on either side. Well, what was 

 the result? ••All that my fancy painted it," in 

 the lauguag<^ of Dr. Miller, where the cloth 

 stuflfing was properly put in. Where we failed 

 to crowd the cloth in tight enough, some of the 

 water escaped before it had incorporated very 

 much sugar; but in all other cases the bees 

 used up all the sugar syrup. 



I forgot to tell you that we put into the feed- 

 ers equal parts of sugar and water, and, of 

 course, the syrup, as the bees got it. was thin- 

 ner than they ordinarily get it— more like the 

 nectar from the field. 



As Mr. Boardman says in another column, 

 this syrup will never granulate, because the 

 bees ripen it; and right here I ought to credit 

 Mr. Boardman with the idea of making the 

 syrup of sugar and water, half and half. The 

 fact that Dr. Miller was leaning the same way, 

 only shows that great minds sometimes run in 

 the same channel. 



Without percolation, the water would not 

 have time to take up the sugar sufficiently be- 

 fore the bees would have it taken down into 

 the brood nest. Well, when there is not enough 

 water to take up the sugar, the latter simply 

 dries, because the bees will take away the for- 

 mer in very short order. The cloth seems to 

 prevent the water from escaping before it has 

 had time to take up all the sugar; now, then, 

 by putting in an excessive amount of water — 

 that is. perhaps twice as much as is necessary 

 for actual saturation, the sugar is more apt to 

 dissolve, and, when dissolved, to percolate 

 slowly through the cloth. 



I had intended to prepare some illustrations; 

 but the matter seems to be so very important 

 that it ought to be given to our readers at once 

 for what it is worth, and after all I think they 

 will be able to catch on to the idea. 



Perhaps the majority have not already in 

 use the Miller feeder. Well, as Dr. Miller in- 

 timates above, you can secure the results by 

 the use of a tumbler, a piece of cloth, and a 

 saucer. But suppose you desire to feed faster, 

 you have plenty of upper stories that you can 

 put on to the hi vis. The same plan, perhaps, 

 can be secured by using a gallon crock inverted 

 over a piece of flannel, the whole set on a plate 

 or large tin pan. 



-Later.— Since writing the foregoing we have 

 tried three one-gallon crock feeders, inverted 

 over several thicknesses of cheese-cloth on 

 plates. So far as I can judge, the experiment 

 seems to be a success; but instead of using 

 flannel we used on one plate four thicknesses 

 of cheese-cloth; on another six, and on another 

 eight. The last mentioned seems to give the 

 best results. In each crock was, of course, put 

 an equal quantity of sugar and water by mea- 

 sure; and in 48 hours, when they were exam- 

 ined, the syrup was all taken out of two of 

 them, and in the third a little yet remained. 

 In what is regularly the bottom of the crocks 

 was a slight residue of sugar still clinging. 

 The water had probably settled away from it. 

 This would make no trouble, because the 

 crocks can be used on other colonies, or the 

 same one if more feed is required, putting in 

 more sugar nnd water as before. The slight 

 i-esidue of sugar still in the crock would make 

 no trouble with a fresh supply. I hope others 

 will try this experiment and report results. In 

 the meantime we shall continue the experi- 

 ments on a larger scale. 



This plan of feeding by percolator feeders is a 

 little slower — that is, it takes the bees about 

 twice as long to get the same amount of feed as 

 by the old plan, when syrup is given to them; 

 but this is rather an advantage; the syrup, be- 

 ing thinner in the first place, is taken down 

 more slowly, and will be ripened better. — Ed.] 



