fi40 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Aug. 



As to the use of smoke, we never make it 

 a practice to blow it into the entrances un- 

 less the colony to be manipulated has the 

 reputation of being a cross one. With the 

 average Italians, a very little smoke blown 

 over the top of the frames is sufllcient. 

 With pure Cyprians and IIoly-Lands, and 

 with most hybrids, if you want to work with 

 the greatest caution (say when visitors are 

 around whom you don't wish to have stung), 

 blow a few puffs of smoke in at the entrance 

 and afterward over the frames. On certain 

 days, when the air is misty and raw, it is 

 sometimes advisable to use smoke liberally, 

 even with Italians. The usual tendency 

 with beginners is to use it too liberally. I 

 have seen some so careless, heedless, and 

 cruel, as to smudge the gentlest Italians 

 clear down through the hive ; and, as if that 

 were not sufficient, have somebody on hand 

 to keep puffing smoke among them to avert 

 any possible attack. On a good day. when a 

 little honey is coming in, two-thirds of the 

 average Italians, if the colony is not too 

 strong, with proper care can be handled 

 without any smoke whatever ; but to work 

 rapidly a little smoke should be used. If 

 your '' Golden bee-hive'' man blows smoke 

 into the entrances of every hive containing 

 Italians, the hive itself must be a poorly 

 constructed affair to render such a precau- 

 tion uecessary. Perhaps we might add right 

 her»% that tlie manipulation of some hives 

 requires the use of more smoke than the 

 manipulation of some others. 



THE KING-BIRD. 



SOMETHING ABOUT THEIR HABITS. 



R. ROOT: -Please find inclosed the head of a 

 bird that is verj- destructive to the bee- 

 more so than the bee-bird. This loolis like 

 the bee-bird, but is not. The bee-bird will 

 follow the bees within 10 feet of the hive, 

 and catch them. It will get on small weeds, and as 

 the bees are working on flowers it will ruffle the 

 feathers on its head and make a very nice-looking 

 flower of the feathers. The bee thinks it is a flow- 

 er: and when he goes to alight on it he gets caught. 

 Take the head and blow in the feathers between 

 the eyes and you will see what it is. 

 Montezuma, O., June 3a, 1888. Elias Stafford. 



A graduate of Cornell University, Mr. 

 E. II. Sargent, to whom we forwarded the 

 specimen, replies : 



Friend Ernest:— 



The head came a day or so after the letter. 1 

 feared it had become too fragrant for the olfactories 

 of some of Uncle Sam's mail-clerks, but found my 

 fears were ungrounded. It is the head of the king- 

 bird, Tyrannus Carolinaisis (Baird), Tyrannua intre- 

 pidus (Vicill). It is also called tyrant fly-catcher, 

 or V)ee-martin. Coues and others state that it de- 

 stroys a thousand noxious insects for every bee it 

 eats; but notwithstanding the above, I am inclin- 

 ed to believe that, in the vicinity of an apiary, the 

 kingbird soon discovers that it is far easier to get 

 his fill of juicy honey-laden bees than to ply his vo- 

 cation with the common run of insects; he there- 

 fore easily and quickly adapts himself to these sur- 

 roundings, and becomes a constant and unwelcome 



attendant. He speaks in his letter of the " common 

 bee-bird." I do not know what he means by it, as 

 he states it is not the one he sends. I will write 

 him about the ruffling-up of the feathers to show 

 the concealed orange patch, making the head resem- 

 ble a flower, for the purpose of attracting bees 

 within reach; if that is so, it is a very interesting 

 fact, and 1 wish to work it out further. 



E. H. Sargent. 

 Mr. Sargent (an old '' chum " of Ernest's), 

 formerly took charge of our apiary. He has 

 since graduated from a four-years' course in 

 Cornell in the department of Xatural His- 

 tory, and has also taken a post-graduate 

 course in the same institution. 



MICROSCOPIC TESTS OP HONEY-ARE 

 THEY INFALLIBLE? 



FRIEND COOK RENDERS IMPORTANT SERVICE IN 

 ANOTHER SERIOUS CRISIS. 



fRIBND ROOT:— Your inquiry in reference to 

 the reliability of the scientific tests for hon- 

 ey is very opportune. I made, the past win- 

 ter, in revising my book, a careful investiga- 

 tion of this whole subject, and I am led to 

 doubt the existence of a sure test for honey, either 

 chemical or by aid of the polariscope. As you 

 doubtless know, there are two kinds of sugars- 

 cane, and the glucose group, or reducing sugars. 

 The latter are so called because they reduce the 

 copper sulphate, when made strongly alkaline by 

 the addition of caustic potash. Of the reducing 

 sugars, we have the glucose of our factories, hon- 

 ey, liver sugar, digested starch, or the sugar of di- 

 gestion, etc. The chemist using the copper test as 

 given above calls all these sugars identical, simply 

 because they give the same reaction with the cop- 

 per sulphate. I don't believe they are the same. 

 It so, why will bees forsake common commercial 

 glucose for honey? or why will they die on the 

 purest commercial glucose, and thrive on good 

 honey? Cane sugar will not reduce the copper 

 salt; and when eaten by animals it must be digest- 

 ed to be absorbed and assimilated. Thus when we 

 eat cane sugar we do what the bees do with nectar 

 —we convert it into a reducing sugar, very likely 

 the same as honey. 



As will be seen by the above, nectar contains 

 cane sugar. Indeed, the cane sugar in nectar oft- 

 en equals in amount all the other sugars put to- 

 gether. Analyses show, however, that the amount 

 of this cane sugar in nectar varies. Let this be re- 

 membered: The amount of the different sugars varies 

 in the nectar of different flowers. Again, as the bee 

 sips nectar it is mixed with the secretion from the 

 racemose glands of the head and thorax; and this 

 acts like our own digestive secretions on the cane 

 sugar, and changes it to reducing sugar. Now, 

 suppose the bees are gathering very fast from the 

 basswood, for instance, where a single colony may 

 gather over 20 lbs. per day; does it stand to reason 

 that they can digest this nectar as perfectly as 

 though they were gathering from some source 

 where they secured their stores in mere driblets? 

 Thus in such cases of very rapid gathering the di- 

 gestion would be less perfect, and the honey would 

 contain much cane sugar. May this not account 

 for the marked sweetness of basswood honey? In 

 this connection it is suggestive that, in the various 



