Dec. IH, 1902. 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



809 



neat and gentle, movements tell in their favor in capturing 

 (|ueens and handlinjf frames. Kven in regard to the heav- 

 ier and more trying calls on their strength and endurance, 

 I remember one of the examiners once vrrote wordsof praise 

 and commendation." — I). M. M., in the British Uee Journal. 



This shows that the women of England are pushing to 

 the front, for 3() women against 2(i men obtained certiticates. 

 That speaks well for the women. AKso that the journals 

 are willing to accord to the weaker se.\ their full rights and 

 privileges. 



Bee-Dress for Women— Smoker-Fuel, Etc. 



On page 713, the statement is made, that bees will sting 

 anything black more readily than any other color. Miss 

 Wilson says : 



" If there is anything our bees seem to object to, it is 

 something black. I have known at least a dozen cross bees 

 at a time to attack the black head of my hatpin, that being 

 the only black object in sight." 



Does Miss Wilson not wear a veil ? Does not that cover 

 at least 3 inches of the hat, making the rim black, besides 

 wearing it over the face ? If bees have such an antipathy 

 to black, why is the black net unanimously adopted for pro- 

 tection by all bee-keepers? and why do not the bees sting 

 the veil ? Our veils would be attacked and covered with 

 bees all the time, if they had such a keen appreciation of 

 the difference of the color. Indeed, I have many times for- 

 gotten and looked over a whole hive with my black veil 

 thrown up, entirely covering my hat, and not experienced a 

 sting. 



No, bees do not wait to see what colored shirt-waist you 

 have on, but they scent what odors are objectionable, and 

 if you have been doing light housework, or have been about 

 a domestic pet, such as a dog, or a horse, their sense of ex- 

 quisite odors are so acute they recognize it as a foreign 

 odor, and sting immediately. I make it a rule never to wear 

 my bee-dress outside of the yard. I disrobe on returning 

 and leaving the yard. No, the grand secret of no stings is 

 a perfectly clean garment, starched is best, and if worn only 

 in the yard it will attain a peculiar sweet odor from the 

 ozone of the hives, v?hich, whether black, green, yellow or 

 any other color, our little pets will delight in and never 

 sting. Of course, there are a few mad bees that will sting 

 any way. and when I have a colony that is cross I handle 

 them very firmly, not nervously (a good bee-keeper ought 

 not to have nerves) ; I give them a reasonable quantity of 

 smoke, and talk to them ; they learn in time to know my 

 voice; and, right here, I want to say, with all due deference 

 to the statement that bees cannot hear, I say bees can hear. 

 I don't ■• think they have ears, but that sound reverberates 

 almost with electric rapidity" though their little bodies, 

 and is the same to them as hearing is to us, one cannot 

 doubt. You cannot walk past a hive without attracting 

 their immediate attention ; and just fire off a gun in or near 

 the apiary, and see what aii uproar it will cause at each and 

 every hive. Tap on the hive, and how instantaneous is the 

 result. I cannot see how any bee-keeper can say that bees 

 cannot hear. 



I left my apiary for a month ; they wrote me the bees 

 were robbing, and on my return I was worried. I entered 

 the yard without veil or gloves ; I went up to one very 

 strong colony and spoke to them, and they all came running 

 out, tumbling over each other. I thought I would get badly 

 stung, but instead they just fluttered their little wings and 

 returned to their hive without attempting to sting me, as 

 much as to say, "You are here; we are all right now." 

 Three other persons vs-itnessed this extraordinary discern- 

 ment of sound, and remarked it. 



However, to resume : I smoke a cross colony three times, 

 with an interval of, say 10 minutes between, and usually 

 after three times smoking. I can open the hive and handle 

 the bees with no further trouble. 



Now as to the wearing of gloves. I think no bee-keeper 

 ought to handle bees without them, because the hand natur- 

 ally perspires, and this is exceedingly objectionable to the 

 bees. I always wear a pair of kid gloves that come well up 

 on the wrists, with the linger-tips cut off, so that I can feel 

 when I lift the frame if there are any bees under my fingers, 

 because if I squeeze and hurt them, they will sting, and the 

 gloves are no protection then, because the stings penetrate, 

 so one is better protected with the finger-tips of the Jgloves 

 cut off. Take an old pair of kid gloves, with no holes in 

 them, rub beeswax well into them, back and front, place 

 them in a warm oven until the wax has thoroughly per- 

 meated the kid, and you have an ideal covering for the 



hands, and our little pets will alight on the gloveH, crawl 

 over them, and never sting, because the scent is agreeable 

 them. I have written this before, for the sake of humanity 

 to the bees, and comfort to ourselves. I wish every bee- 

 keeper would adopt this method of wearing waxed gloves, 

 as it also prevents the per.^piration from saturating the 

 gloves. 



And now, with regard to fuel for the smoker. I have 

 tried everything for l.S years. I find chips from the wood- 

 pile make the fire too hot, and sparks tly out of the top. I 

 (ind rotten wood too hot, and also sparks and cinders fall 

 out of the top. I find excelsior burns out too quickly. I 

 use old sack, cut in pieces, say 4 or 5 inches square. I dip 

 one corner of the piece in coal-oil, and light up the smoker ; 

 as soon as it is about 'j burnt out. I put in 2 or 3 pieces 

 more, thus creating a smouldering fire which if renewed 

 say every '2 hour or 1". hours, according to how rapidly it 

 is blowed, I get a good volume of smoke, with no spark or 

 cinders to annoy the bees or cause danger of fire. Saltpeter 

 I have never used, but if it caused the sack to burn more 

 quickly, it would not answer my purpose. In this way I 

 have kept rags smouldering for 3 hours, and while I go to 

 lunch and back. 



I bought a Bingham smoker 10 years ago and am still 

 using it. I had to have a new funnel made, but the body is 

 as good as ever, and the tin is not burned out vet. 



I started bee-keeping with D. A. Jones, of Canada, and the 

 dress I wore then, I think, can never be excelled for cool- 

 ness and comfort. My dress was grass-linen, with blouse 

 waist, rufties at the neck, and buttoned at the wrist, and an 

 elastic run into the blouse at the waist, fitting tight over an 

 ordinary gored skirt with a deep hem, a pair of bloomers of 

 grass-linen, with elastics and a ruffle, fitting over my boot 

 tops — thin kid boots, not laced too tight; a white hat, with a 

 strip of Victoria lawn hemmed at each side, and made long 

 enough to tie with bow and ends, which could be removed, 

 and laundered and replaced each week with a clean tie. 



I have been reading with much interest the different 

 methods of queen-rearing, and although I have only reared 

 queens for my own apiary, I wish to say, that D. A. Jones 

 had all his SIO.OO queens fertilized in those little hives, 

 which I believe Mr. Alley is now using. I think Mr. Jones 

 and Mr. Frank Benton were the first to use them, the latter 

 for shipping from Italy, and many a beautiful leather- 

 colored queen, with her 3 black dots, have I seen liberated 

 out of said little hives. The small hive is no new idea — Mr. 

 Jones had hundreds of them. This winter I will write an 

 article on his method of fertilizing queens on the Islands of 

 the Georgian Bay, of which there are 27,000. 



Maybe Miss Wilson had a little sister who had inadver- 

 tently handled that hatpin with sticky hands, or else the 

 bees mistook it for the center of a flower ; certainly the 

 odor was objectionable if they were stinging it. 



Sonoma Co., Calif. Mrs. F. S. A. Snvdkr. 



Yes, you are right, the veil I wear is black ; mine is 

 sewed under the brim of my hat. I had for the moment for- 

 gotten it, but the veil is not nearly so black as the head of 

 the hatpin or black cloth, as only the thread is black, the 

 larger part of the veil being open-work or holes. 



We don't all think alike about wearing gloves. While 

 you and I prefer to wear them, the larger majority of bee- 

 keepers could not be induced to wear them, as very few 

 men wear them, I believe. 



Your fuel is excellent. Mr. Cogshall uses gunny-sacks 

 for fuel. He rolls them up, I believe, in a roll, ties them at 

 intervals with a string, and then with an ax chops them up 

 the right length to go into the smoker. I am surprised that 

 you are bothered with sparks and cinders from the chips. 

 We are not troubled in that way. 



Those small nucleus hives have been in use a long time. 

 I don't know how long Mr. Alley has used them, but Adam 

 Grimm used them many years ago, probably before Messrs. 

 Jones and Benton started on their bee-keeping careers. 



Why Not Help a Little — both your neighbor bee-keep- 

 ers and the old American Bee Journal — by sending to us the 

 names and addresses of such as you may know do not now 

 get this journal ? We will be glad to send them sample 

 copies, so that they may become acquainted with the paper, 

 and subscribe for it, thus putting themselves in the line of 

 success with bees. Perhaps you can get them to subscribe, 

 send in their dollars, and secure for your trouble some of 

 the premiums we are constantly offering as rewards for 

 such effort. Di CH^ 



