1886 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTUllE. 



17 



vises catching the queen with the fingers while 

 clipping her wings. I have clipped the wings of 

 certainly more than a thousand queens with scis- 

 sors, and have clipped off just one leg of a queen 

 while doing so, and I have no fears of such a " hap- 

 penstance" occurring again. I couldn't see in that 

 case that the loss of a leg caused the queen to be- 

 come less valuable; but even the accidental clip- 

 ping-off of a leg is not advised. It is now years 

 since T abandoned the method of holding queens 

 with the fingers while clipping their wings, and ] 

 think that no one who gives tweezers a fair trial 

 will ever return to finger-catching. I use, for that 

 purpose, a pair of sharp-pointed tweez?rs, such as 

 jewelers use, with which 1 catch and hold the 

 queen by a wing while clipping. You keep the 

 right kind of tweezers for this work on your ten- 

 cent counter; but only the ones with sharp points 

 are suitable for this work. I have described this 

 way of using tweezers before; but if Mr. Doolittle 

 has overlooked it, many others must have done so 

 too. 



SOLAH WAX-EXTRACTORS. 



On p. 775 friend Israel, of California, describes his 

 solar wax-extractor, which is on the same principle, 

 but not so good, as the one I described nearly three 

 years ago in Gleanings. That old sacking he 

 speaks of laying in the bottom of the extractor, and 

 which seems to be such a favorite idea with manj', 

 is not only absolutely unnecessary, but would al- 

 most ruin the efficiency of the instrument in the 

 latitude of our Northern States. It will work bet- 

 ter, of course, in California, or any of the Southern 

 States; but even there it is more damage than 

 good. In our Northern States we have to utilize all 

 the heat from the sun's rays we can, and we can not 

 afford to let old sacking or any other unnecessary 

 article absorb any of the heat. The object for 

 which the sacking is used is arrived at by dipping 

 off the melted wax, as described in the original arti- 

 cle referred to (page 521, 1883). 



Another mistake made by friend Isi-ael, I think, is 

 in allowing the wax to remain in the dish, or receiv- 

 ing-pan, for several days. Instead of removing each 

 daj'. Wax becomes perfectly clarified in a single 

 day, and any further exposure of it to the sun sim- 

 ply results in hardening and bleaching the wax. 

 I have used these solar wa.\-extractors about ten 

 years, and am foolish enough to think I know some- 

 thing about them. I was in hopes, when I wrote my 

 first description of them, that they would be mate- 

 rially improved by some one; but so far, all pub- 

 lished experiments seem to be in line with the one 

 we have just criticised. What is wanted, in the lati- 

 tude of Northern Iowa, at least, is some device for 

 increasing the power of the sun's rays, and not 

 something that will absorb some of those rays. I 

 wish, friend Root, that whenever a description of 

 some straining device is sent in, you would call at- 

 tention, in your foot-notes, to the fact that, while 

 such devices are practically unnecessary anywhere, 

 they are a positive damage in the latitude of our 

 Northern States. 



AVHERE IS hawk's PARK? 



Quite a number of bee-keepers have asked me, 

 both verbally and by letter, "Where is Hawk's 

 Park?" "How far from New Smyrna?" Hawk's 

 Park is a newly established postoffice about three 

 miles south of New Smyrna, in Volusia Co. Nearly 

 or quite all the bee-keepers in this section used to 

 get their mail at New Smyrna, but about a half of 



them have changed their mail to the new oflBce. 

 Messrs. Sheldon, Detweiler, Dr. Goodwin, Lewis, 

 and others, are at New Smyrna, while Hart, Har- 

 dee, Olcson, Mitchell, Packwood and others are near- 

 er Hawk's Park. Both places are on the shores of 

 the Hillsboro Itiver, or lagoon, a sheet of tidal water, 

 and about two miles in a direct line from the ocean- 

 beach. Steamers come into the river from the 

 ocean at the inlet, some seven miles north of this 

 place. O. O. POPPLETON. 



Hawk's Park, Fla., Dec. 7, 1S£5. 



Many thanks, my good friend P., for your 

 kind suggestions and criticisms. No doubt 

 we liave overlooked the facts you gave us in 

 your former valuable paper, but we will now 

 try to '■'■ make a note of it," so it will not 

 slip our memory so easily. We shall pro- 

 ceed at once to make experiments in regard 

 to solar wax-extractors. 



ALMOST BURIED ALIVE. 



A STORY WITH A MORAL TO IT; LAVING TILE. 



JAM feeling tolerably stiff and sore this evening, 

 but will give you an item of interest. lam 

 now laying a 10-inch tile from the north-west 

 corner of my 8'2-ft. cellar that is dug in a dry 

 bank of sand. We found evidence that the 

 blue-grass sod and hard streak of clay at the top 

 had not wet thi-ough this summer or fall. The dirt, 

 or sand, after it got two or three feet from the top 

 of the ground, was as dry as it would be were it un- 

 der a good roof, for nearly a rod from the house, 

 then it got damp, when it made a "cave " on me. 

 I was down on the tile that was laid, on my hands 

 and knees, when it strucli me without warning. 

 We were nine feet deep. I tell you, I thought 1 

 was going to be buiied alive; for as the weight of 

 the sand increased, it moved me flat down on the 

 tile that was under me; and when I did move a 

 muscle it took up every particle of vacanc}', so I 

 soon thought I was in a tight place. Thanks to an 

 active, energetic Irishman, a hand that was help- 

 ing lue, who was raised in the old country, and who 

 knew how to shovel the few cart-loads of sand that 

 struck me, I was got out before the rest of the 

 bank fell in to about feet deep. I say I was got 

 out, for no one knows how a strong or tolerably 

 strong man's strength is taken out of him till he is 

 crushed under a few tons of bank sand. 



I write this, as it has its own moral, though some 

 may think it of no use to bee-keepers; but all do 

 not work with bees only, who keep bees; some are 

 farmers, as I am, who was raised on a farm, and 

 have to do such work as his hands are not used to 

 doing or can not do. We found the black ants 6 

 feet in the sand, where frost will never reach them, 

 in great numbci'S. Where they had burrowed it 

 looked like a very comfortable place for them to 

 winter, so they could eat honey next summer. 

 They ate lots of it, I guess, last summer, but they 

 rather prefer the sugar-barrel, I think, to honey. I 

 will close by saying we have over 100 feet of tile 

 laid 9 feet at the house, running to 7 feet where we 

 are now. I think we shall get in 200 feet. You 

 would hardly think one man could throw out such 

 a large pile of sand and dirt iu three days. I have 

 helped some to-day, but was bothered a good deal 

 to have the tile carried to me and handed down 



