IS97. 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



147 



heavy down-pour night before last, and last night, and all 

 this forenoon. It is bright and beautiful this afternooii. Bee- 

 keepers are all laughing in their sleeves here. 



Orange Co., Cal., Feb. 20. 



Foul Brood Amoog Bees — A Roof Apiary. 



r.V CHAS. F. .MIITH. 



When foul brood wras introduced to tho neighborhood of 

 Cincinnati, oiy roof apiary was affected along with the rest. 

 My roof had been built for the purpose, and my apiary was, 

 perhaps, the only successful roof apiary in a large city, that 

 ever e-Kisted. I had sometimes 100 and more colonies of bees 

 oil my roof, but iO to 50 colonies, during a season, was my 

 average. My crops of white clover honey, in a season, were 

 as high as 7,000 pounds or over, and my largest average 

 crop per colony was 19S pounds, spring count. It was in the 

 good olden times, when the idea prevailed that there were 

 . seven good seasons to one poor one; when comb honey sold at 

 • 8o to 40 cents a pound, e.vtracted at 2-5 to 30 cents; when 

 wheat wasSl. 2.5 to SI. 50 a bushel, corn 50 to 80 cents, 

 potatoes 7o cents to .SL.OO, hogs ,S0 to .S7 per 100 pounds, 

 etc. I sold, at that time, quite a number of colonies of bees, 

 and received regular shipments, in early spring, of 25 or 50 

 colonies at a time, from Dr. O. M. Blanton, of Mississippi, 

 and also a Mr. Parks, in Arkansas, and others. 



The appearance of foul brood in my neighborhood suc- 

 ceeded in putting down my enthusiasm as well as in extin- 

 guishing my roof apiary. Being an industrious reader of all 

 bee-literature, and blest with the gift of observation in bee- 

 matters, I soon learned to distinguish between the malignant 

 and the harmless foul brood, and I was cue of the Hrst in 

 America who could promptly cure them both. My teachers 

 had been Dr. Schoenfeld and Emil Hilbert, of Irermany. 



I made it no secret having foul brood, but posted our 

 friends through our bee-journals at our bee-keepers' meetings, 

 as to the progress the disease made in my apiary, and my suc- 

 cess in curing it. Having given my experience with " Foul 

 Brood ■' in my pamphlet, "Practical Hints to Bee-Keepers," 

 it is not now my object to jaw over a subject which has been 

 diseust bountifully by parties of experience, and by others 

 who never knew anything about it. 



My object now is, to state that I believe I know that the 

 germs of foul brood (the spores) will keep alive for 18 months, 

 or longer, in the abandoned hives, in the fissures of the wood, 

 in front of hives, and are ready to re-infect newly-introduced 

 colonies. From my experience of two years ago, I believe, 

 also, I know that those spores will not keep alive for five 

 years. So, if I am correct, after all the bees have been killed 

 off in a neighborhood, for five years or more, as has been the 

 case with Cincinnati and her vicinity, we may keep bees again 

 and enjoy the old sport once more. 



In the summer of 1895 I brought home, from a tree in 

 the yard of a friend, a swarm of bees, dusted out a hive out of 

 which the bees had died of foul brood five years previous to 

 that time, and, without any further disinfection, put in a nice, 

 large swarm of hybrids. They built out their foundation, 

 and went into winter quarters strong in bees and melilot 

 honey. 



Last summer (1896) they gave me 120 pounds of ex- 

 tracted sweet clover honey, and a strong artificial swarm, 

 which also was put into one of those old hives without sub- 

 jecting it to any disinfection other than a good dusting out. 

 This colony went into winter quarters hail and hearty, and 

 with plenty of melilot honey. I have one more of those old 

 infected hives, which I shall try next summer. All the bal- 

 ance of my hives were made into kindling wood in (what I 

 thought) due time. Hamilton Co., Ohio. 



The Proposed " Deep-Cell " Foundatioa. 



BY W. Z. HUTCHINSON. 



Away back nine or ten years ago, two brothers, E. B. and 

 A. B. Weed, of this State, did a lot of experimenting in trying 

 to manufacture artificial comb. They made hexagonal "dies 

 the size of the Inside of a honey-comb cell, and placed these 

 dies very close together— so close that when wax was forced 

 out between them it was about the thickness of the walls in 

 a honey-comb cell. Wax was warmed until it was as soft as it 

 could be without melting, then placed in a chamber one side 

 of which was made of these afore-mentioned dies. A screw 

 pressure was then applied to the wax in the box. The result 

 was that great, long cells, all connected together, were formed 



yards and yards in length. These long strips of cells could 

 be easily cut up into any length, by means of a wire heated 

 by electricity. There was no trouble In cutting it up into 

 pieces the right thickness for comb, but the dilliculty lay in 

 putting iu the septum. Many trials were made by using a 

 wire heated by electricity, using different sized wires, heated 

 at different degrees of heat and moved at different rates of 

 speed, etc., hoping in some way to strike the right kind of a 

 combination so that a sort of film of wax would follow after 

 tho wire and thus form a septum. It was a failurn. The best 

 that could be done, or was done, was to stick these " sawed- 

 off" cells upon a thin sheet of wax as abase. The pressure 

 required to force the wax through the dies was something 

 enormous, and nothing above a piece of comb four inches 

 square was ever made. Mr. Weed frequently came out to see 

 Mr. M. H. Hunt, to try to get him to "take stock "in the 

 enterprise, but Mr. Hunt always told him that when they had 

 produced a perfect comb of Langstroth size he would be ready 

 to talk with him. Other people, however, became interested, 

 and put money into the scheme, but nothing practical re- 

 sulted. 



During the last year or more Mr. Weed has been experi- 

 menting in the same line at the establishment of The A. I. 

 Root Co., and has at last succeeded in making a very fine 

 specimen, the samples sent out having cells % of an inch 

 deep, but it is said that they can be made deeper if necessary. 

 I presume, but, of course, douH know positively, that the cell- 

 walls are made in a similar manner to those made in the 

 former experiments, and I presume that the septum is a thin 

 sheet of wax to which the side-walls are in some manner at- 

 tacht, just how I don't know, but I presume it is by means of 

 heat. It is not done by means of passing through an electric 

 wire, as, in that case, the bottoms of the cells would be e.K- 

 actly opposite, which is not the case, each cell being opposite 

 the three opposing cells, as in natural comb. I think i* is not 

 strictly exact to call it "deep-cell" foundation, as it is not 

 foundation in the sense in which we use the word. It is 

 neither rolled nor prest out, but the cells made in such man- 

 ner as I have described, and then stuck in such manner upon 

 a base formed of a flat sheet of wax. At least, that is the 

 way it looks to me. As in the former case, no large sheets 

 are yet made, nothing but samples about 3 by IK inches. At 

 least that is the size that was sent to me. 



That such comb will be accepted by the bees there is no 

 kind of question, and that its use would increase the quantity 

 of comb honey I have no doubt at all, and I should hail its 

 advent with delight were it not that I feel absolutely certain 

 that its use will greatly impair the eating quality of comb 

 honey. It is quite likely that the base and walls can.be made 

 as thin as those of natural comb — man's ingenuity is great, 

 and can accomplish what is almost a miracle — but the trouble 

 will be in the quality of the material. It will be tough and 

 leathery. It will be like doing up extracted honey in thin 

 sheets of wax — that is exactly what it will he. We all know 

 that when bees build their combs naturally, and then fill them 

 with honey, the comb is of a friable, brittle character, and 

 when chewed up with other food, as biscuit, for instance, this 

 comb breaks up into small pieces and mingles freely with the 

 wax, so much so that its presence is not noticed. In fact, 

 this gradual breaking down of the comb plays no small part 

 in the deliciousness of comb-honey consumption. 



Great was the kick against comb foundation when it was 

 first introduced, but manufacturers have reduced it to such 

 small proportions (thinness) that it is now tolerated ; but I 

 venture the assertion that there is not one who reads these 

 lines who would not choose naturally-built combs for his own 

 consumption. I know that I would. Comb foundation has 

 certainly injured the eating quality of our comb honey, altho 

 it may have, and probably has, greatly increast the quantity. 

 I presume, in fact I feel certain, that the use of this new comb 

 will increase the quantity of our comb honey, but I do cer- 

 tainly fear for its effect upon its quality. Comb honey is a 

 luxury — a luxurious luxury — and when people find it is honey 

 done up in tough, leathery wax that forms in "gobs" in their 

 mouths, I fear that it will lose its luxurious character — that 

 this new comb will prove a boomerang. 



I know, of course, that it is to be used only in an experi- 

 mental way at first, but, even if it does injure the character 

 of our comb honey there would be men who would use It if 

 they could get it, if it would increase the quantity. I am glad 

 that it is to be patented and become the property of The A. 

 I. Root Co., because, if it should prove to be detrimental to 

 the best interests of apiculture, they would have it in their 

 power to suppress Its manufacture. At least, I suppose they 

 would. GeDesee Co., Mich. 



[About the same time we received the foregoing article 



