292 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Apr. 



Various articles of the display were awarded tlrst 

 premiums; and the jfcneral verdict of all is, that as 

 a bee-keeper Mrs. Heater has no equal in Nebraska. 

 She has studied the science for years, and has em- 

 barked in the enterprise in a purely business man- 

 ner. Such an exhibit as this is the best means of 

 Retting before the people the fact that, for bee- 

 keeping, the natural resources of Nebraska are 

 among the foremost of those of any of the States of 

 the Union."— LivcoUi Daily State Jownal. 



We congratulate our Nebraska friends on 

 having so enterprising and go-ahead woman 

 as Mrs. Heater ; and we hope her example 

 may prove contagious. The photograph 

 she sends us gave so many ideas in regard to 

 arranging and getting up an exhibit for 

 fairs, Tliat we tlioiigiit it best to have it en- 

 graved. No wonder that people flocked 

 around her exliibit and asked questions. If 

 she stood at her post and answered them all, 

 I am inclined to think that she decided, be- 

 fore the fair was over, that it was harder 

 work than managing a large apiary. We 

 should be very glad indeed to get further 

 communications from the lady in regard to 

 the honey-yield in Nebraska, and of the 

 way in whicli she manages. We will ex- 

 plain to onr readers, that Mrs. Heater is al- 

 so a snpply-dealer, and she will no doubt 

 be glad to send her price list to all who are 

 curious in regard to her ways of working, 

 and of her success in bee culture. 



SECTIONS WITH SLOTTED SIDES. 



ARE SECTIONS WITH OPEN SIDES AS WELL AS TOPS 

 AND BOTTOMS GOING TO BE ADOPTED? 



fHE advantage of openings to allow communi- 

 cations between sections laterally, arises 

 from the fact that the more free the com- 

 munications the more nearly we approach 

 the condition of having the bees all in one 

 mass. It is pretty well established, that a very 

 small body of bees isolated, can accomplish but lit- 

 tle. One hundred colonies, or, rather, nuclei, hav- 

 ing one hundred workers each, would not accom- 

 plish as much in the course of a season as a single 

 colony made by uniting the hundred. In the days 

 when holes were bored in the tops of hives, and 

 surplus boxes placed over, a 20-pound box was 

 filled in not so much. greater time than a 5-pound 

 box. A large cluster is needed to keep up the heat. 

 Take a T super a foot wide, and let us see what are 

 the conditions. With sections having no opening 

 at the sides, six of them placed side by side make a 

 box. at least a cavity, 4X4X13 inches. Now put 

 in separators, and we have the space cut up into 

 six smaller ones, each 4X4X2. Now, if there was a 

 recognizable difference between the work done in 

 20-lb. and in 6-lb. boxes, will there not be a serious 

 loss in shutting up bees in 1-lb. boxes? 



But it is not always safe to reason in this way. On 

 actual trial, I think the bees have shown no such 

 difference. If we look a little closer we shall see 

 that the conditions in the two cases are not alike. 

 The 20-lb. box was a thing by itself, as was the 6-lb.; 

 and it is not improbable that the working difference 

 in the two cases arose from the fact that propor- 

 tionately fewer bees were in the outer and colder 

 part of the cluster in the 20-lb. than in the 6-lb. box. 

 Tn other words, dividing them up into small clus- 

 ters made the bees colder. But in the 1-lb. boxes or 

 sections we have quite a ditterent state of affairs. 



Suppose we turn our attention for a minute to one 

 of the central sections in a super having separators 

 and no slots in the sides of the sections. Let us 

 take away the wood from the sides of the section, 

 making slots there. Have we thereby made that 

 section any warmer? Hardly. What have we gain- 

 ed by the slots? We have given free communica- 

 tion from side to side. But what advantage is 

 there in side communication? There is free pas- 

 sage up and down for all the bees that can work in 

 the section, and what will be gained by giving the 

 bees a chance to travel further bj^ a circuitous 

 route? Of course there is a chance that I may be 

 wrong, that I have left out some important factor 

 in the problem; but just as it looks to me now, the 

 slots add nothing to the heat of the cluster, and 

 give no freer access to the sections. 



FOSTER'S SUPERS. 



A correspondent asks me to give my opinion of 

 Oliver Foster's system as compared with raising 

 comb honey in T supers. It is not easy, always, to 

 make a fair comparison between two things, if I 

 am very familiar with the workings of one and 

 have only read about the other. I will try, how- 

 ever, to answer as fairly as I can from my stand- 

 point. My correspondent mentions two advan- 

 tages over the T super that appear to him in Fos- 

 ter's arrangement. 



" First, Foster's case allows the use of side open- 

 ings to sections, which I think must be a decided 

 improvement." So does the T super allow it just 

 as well. I tried sections with side slots two or three 

 years ago, and in practice did not find the advan- 

 tages claimed for them theroretically, so I gave 

 them up, not because the T super was not suited to 

 their use, but because I did not consider them de- 

 sirable—at least not in my hands. 



The second supposed advantage is the absence of 

 bee-space between the honey-board and sections. I 

 suppose the T super could be made to sit directly 

 on the honey-board without a bee-space between; 

 and although some like this, I think the majority of 

 bee-keepers do not. T know that I kill more bees 

 than I like with nothing but the edges of the supers 

 touching, and the difficulty would be increased by 

 dispensing with bee-spaces. 



I have no doubt that, taken as a whole, friend 

 Foster's appliances in his hands are a success. 

 I like the T super because it is cheap, simple, and 

 easy to handle. The matter of cheapness would 

 not matter so much if I were sure I would not 

 change again, for a well - made super ought to 

 last a number of years. But judging by the past I 

 have no assurance that something quite different 

 and very much better may not come up within a 

 few years, for which the T super shall be thrown 

 aside. C. C. Miller. 



Marengo, 111. 



Friend Miller, I believe I pretty nearly 

 agree with you. There is no super before 

 our people that combines all the advantages 

 we could ask for. Now, I hope our inventive 

 friends will not send us by express a great 

 lot more for us to pass an opinion on. In 

 fact, so many have been sent in already that 

 I dread to see a new one. One reason why I 

 dread to see them is because the greater part 

 of them are too much machinery. We must 

 have something simple, tight, and strong. 

 Another thing is, almost every thing that 

 is sent in we have seen before, arid sometimes 



