670 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Sept. 



bringing to me a loss of f 100, would not have re- 

 sulted in a corresponding gain to the fraternity. I 

 think it is right to have alwaj's in mind what will 

 help our business. If a farmer were to make a 

 specialty of raising potatoes, and never had any on 

 his own table, we should think he was hardly doing 

 his share toward keeping up the potato-market; 

 but we should hardly expect him to have his table 

 loaded with potatoes, to the exclusion of all other 

 food. A line must be drawn somewhere between, 

 and perhaps no two persons would agree just ex- 

 actly where to draw the line. 



It may be thought, by some, that it is all right, In 

 a failure of the honey-crop, when feed must be 

 bought, to buy sugar rather than honey; but that it 

 is quite wrong to take away honey when the bees 

 have enough to winter on, and replace it with sugar. 

 I do not see that the cases are materially different, 

 if the matter of loss and gain is the same in each. 

 Unless, however, a considerable gain is to be made 

 by doing otherwise, t pre*'er to let the bees gather 

 and use their own stores. It is better for the honey- 

 market. It gives less chance for the cry of adul- 

 teration, and it is less trouble. Bee-keeping is not 

 one of the fixed sciences, and it would not surprise 

 me if a good many who practice contracting the 

 brood-nest to such an extent as to necessitate feed- 

 ing maj' change their views. Just how and when to 

 contract to greatest advantage, is to me, at least, 

 not a fully solved problem. C. C. Miller. 



Marengo, 111. 



Friend M., you have covered the subject 

 pretty well ; but there is one point where 

 you have not laid emphasis enough. If the 

 bees have stores of honey that you suppose 

 to be good, already sealed up in their combs, 

 it will hardly pay to uncap it and throw it 

 out, then feed sugar syrup enough to get 

 them to store and ripen it, and then cap it 

 over. I do not believe that such an opera- 

 tion would pay, even if you could get 15 

 cents a pound for extracted honey, and 

 could buy white sugar for S cents, as so 

 much would be lost in the operation of rip- 

 ening and sealing over. Where we must 

 buy either sugar or honey, I would, howev- 

 er, without hesitation, buy the sugar, even 

 if 1 could get honey at 8 cents or sugar at 8 

 cents ; and in buying honey I would be very 

 careful to know that, by no possibility, could 

 this purchased honey have any foul brood 

 in it. 



FROM GERMANY. 



SOMETHING ABOUT THE HONEY-YIELD AND COMB 

 FOUNDATION. 



fHE bee-papers of America tell us of a cold and 

 backward spring in America, and I must 

 confess it was no better in Germany. In 

 spite of this we had, however, in some sec- 

 tions of our country, some swarms in the 

 month of May. This was the case where the bilber- 

 ry abounded in our forests, and rape bloomed in 

 the spring. My bees had only a few days of fine 

 weather to frequent this honey source, but I do not 

 need to do any spring feeding. The old saying of 

 bee-keepers here is true: "One drop of fresh honey 

 that the bees carry into their entrance is of greater 



benefit to them than three times as much as one 

 feeds them." Kape is always the best honey source 

 in early spring I know of. The onl.\' drawback with 

 it is. that the weather is seldom favorable when it 

 is in full bloom. But only a few days of good flight, 

 and all is well. Where the weather has been favor- 

 able when the rape was in bloom, I have extracted 

 at this time, in April or May, from one of the best 

 colonies, some ten or more pounds of honey. That 

 is necessary, as otherwise the queen will not have 

 in such colonies enough cells to deposit her eggs, 

 and the swarms will be very small, or there will be 

 no swarms at all. As the rape will thrive only on 

 good loamy soil, it can not becultivHted everywhere. 

 But as the benefit of rape hooey is so groat, some 

 bee-keepers of Germany take care to bring their 

 bees near a rapefleld. At least, I do it. Thus I 

 wandered with my colonies this spring 8 miles from 

 here to the south; and as the rape bloom was over, 

 1 brought my bees 8 miles from Wilsnack to the 

 north, where white clover, locust, and linden abound. 

 At the end of July, or in the beginning of August, 

 I bring my bees to the heath. You see, dear friends, 

 I am a wanderer; but I should not have had any 

 honey yield, as so many bee-keepers of Germany 

 have had who do not wander. I have some colonies 

 herein Wilsnack, but they have no honey to extract, 

 while they live only from hand to mouth. It is 

 curious, that in some sections of GerniJiny there 

 was a great honey-flow, and in some others the bees 

 got nothiug. Sometimes we have had some very 

 fine days for the bees to work, but we have had rain, 

 wind, cold weather, and the mountains decked with 

 snow. If the weather should be favorable in the 

 months of August and September, 1 ho]ie we shall 

 have a good crop from buckwheat and heather. 

 The latter is to-day as brilliant as it can be; but it is 

 a pity that the heather honey can not be extracted. 

 For comb honey we have no market; at least, it 

 does not pay to sell to such as we have. Extracted 

 honey, by the way, we have a very good demand 

 for. We call it "slung honey " {scMeudcr honig). 

 It sells from 18 to 3.5 cents, and comb honey from the 

 heather will sell in good years from 13 to 15 cents. 

 You see how favorable it is for the German bee- 

 keepers to sell extracted honey. One year 1 thought 

 I could sell comb honi'y in sections. I got .500 nicely 

 filled sections, and my heart was proud when 1 saw 

 my riches. The year before, I had made a trip to 

 England and saw at Kensington the beautiful comb 

 honey exhibited. No doubt, 1 thought, it will pay to 

 sell such beautiful "dclicatesses." Well, I sent 

 samples of my honey to all the dealers I know, but 

 they would pay only 13 to 15 cents for a pound of the 

 finest locust and lindeu honey, while I got 35 cents 

 for slung honey. 



"Please, Mr. Gravenhorst," said a customer one 

 day, " would you not be so good as to take the hon- 

 ey out of that frame ? I like it better without it." 

 What could ] do but cut the houev-comb out of the 

 frames? I sold nearly 3ii0 sections; the others, 300, 

 I have extracted, and since this time 1 have run my 

 apiary for slung honey. 



You will, of course, have observed' that the bees 

 build their combs, when let alone, so that one angle 

 of their cells is at the top and one at the bottom. I 

 was ever of opinion that this position would give 

 the comb greater solidity than when the cells have 

 a broadside at top and on the bottom. The most of 

 our foundation manufacturers work their founda- 

 tion in such a way that it can be fastened in the 



