586 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Aug. 15. 



strawberries. Others stated just as emphati- 

 cally that they did. The truth of the matter 

 is, some years bees do visit strawberry-blos- 

 soms, and some years they do not. — Ed. ] 



GivASS COVERS for hives seem to have gone 

 •out of use at Medina ; but at least two corre- 

 spondents of the Briiish B.J. like them after 

 four years' trial. [Glass covers ! I hardly 

 know to what you refer unless you mean two 

 that we used during winter, sealed down over 

 the brood-nest, and covered with packing for 

 experimental purposes. The result of the ex- 

 periment that season seemed to show that 

 bees did better under absorbents than under 

 sealed covers. The glass was simply a matter 

 of convenience. — Ed.] 



C. P. DadanT says, in American Bee Jour- 

 nal, " Why two Unions? Can't we lay aside 

 all disputes and come together ? I belong to 

 both, and am %villing to help both; but how 

 much stronger we should be if we stood to- 

 gether as one man ! " Vous avez raison, mon 

 cher ami. [Just so ; and I believe that nine- 

 tenths of both organizations are wth friend 

 Dadant. Amalgamation is not given up by 

 any means ; and I hope the new constitution, 

 at the next convention in Buffalo, may be so 

 worded as to suit the most fastidious. — Ed.] 



Sweet clover, it has been said, Avill drive 

 out flies if the stalks are hung up in a house. 

 Big bunches are hung in our honey- room, and 

 the flies seem to enjoy roosting on it. [I do 

 not see how sweet clover could drive flies out 

 of the house ; but I can readily imagine how 

 the flies would like to roost on it. But why 

 have flies in the honey-room at all ? Why not 

 have screens and screen doors ? If you send 

 one of your women-folks out to the house 

 properly screened (house screened, not the 

 woman), I will warrant she will bat the flies 

 to death in very short order. I judge your 

 women-folks by ours, for tliev are sure death 

 to flies.— Ed.] 



Honey is quoted by the gallon, p. 547, in 

 the New York quotations. Wouldn't it be just 

 as well to have nothing'but pounds ? [When 

 honey is quoted by the gallon it usually means 

 southern honey, or an inferior quality, for 

 such honey usually sells in the South by the 

 gallon. I believe wth you that it would be 

 better if it could always be sold by the pound, 

 for on that plan the producer is paid just as 

 much for thick honey as for thin. Or, to look 

 at it in another way, a premium is put upon 

 thick honey — the only kind that ought to be 

 put on the market. — Ed.] 



I don't wonder, Ernest, that you have 

 come to the conclusion that you want all your 

 queens clipped. So far as looks are concern- 

 ed, it need make but little difference. Cut 

 the big wing on one side, leaving the little 

 one intact, and you'll have to look pretty 

 closely to see that a queen is clipped. [Yes, 

 I am thoroughly converted to your way of 

 looking at the matter. Say, doctor, is it 

 wrong for one to change his mind ? or should 

 he stick and hang to his originally published 

 opinion, right or wrong? There are some 

 people I know, and editors too, who appear to 

 feel that the latter policy' is the better one. 



As for myself, even if it is a little humiliating 

 once in a while, I expect to right aboiit face 

 just as soon as I know that the other fellow is 

 right and I wrong. I really do not mean to 

 give anybody a rap on the head ; but it would 

 be better for bee culture if there were more 

 who are willing to change front. — After read- 

 ing the foregoing it sounded very "goody- 

 goody" — a little too much so, perphaps. 

 Can't help it. I believe in the doctrine of 

 conversion from the error of one's ways. — 

 Ed.] 



Is THE ABILITY to build comb inborn, or do 

 the young bees learn it from the older ones ? 

 Kokevnikow, a Russian, secured a lot of 

 young bees that could never have seen comb 

 built, and they made a finished job of comb- 

 building the first time trying. — Bienen-Vaier. 

 [Exactly. The young bees will build just as 

 good combs as the older bees, just the same 

 as young cats and dogs can swim as well as 

 old cats and dogs. The puppy spaniel that I 

 had swam just as well the first day I threw 

 him into the water as he did on other days 

 months afterward when he swam out into tlie 

 lake for his own pleasure after blocks of wood 

 had been thrown out for him to bring- in.^ 

 Ed.] 



Thick top-bars and '4 -inch bee-space do 

 well as regards burr-combs; but brace-combs 

 between top-bars are plentiful. [As a general 

 rule, there are comparatively few burr-combs 

 over thick top-bars; and there are practically 

 none when the spaces between them are % 

 inch. But our friends and patrons do not 

 seem to like to have the top-bars quite as wide 

 as you do, and accordingly there are occasion- 

 ally burr-combs as well as brace-combs. There 

 is a great difference in colonies. We have one 

 at our out-yard that sprinkled the burr and 

 brace combs in pretty thickly between the sets 

 of extracting-supers, but they are as one in 

 five hundred. It is the exception that proves 

 the rule. — Ed.] 



Almost surely, Mr. Editor, you are right 

 in thinking your home apiary overstocked 

 with 300 colonies and nuclei; but a compari- 

 son with the out-yard doesn't prove it, for a 

 like comparison of my home apiary with the 

 north apiary would prove the first overstocked, 

 although the two are about equal. A short 

 distance often makes a big difference. [What 

 you say is true. During the early part of the 

 honey-flow I was called to hive a swarm half 

 a mile from our home yard. I then observed 

 that our neighbor's bees, some two or three 

 colonies, while only half a mile away, had 

 about three times as much honey per hive as 

 colonies of equal strenglh in our large home 

 apiary. This led me to believe that two 

 things were true: First, that the home yard 

 was overstocked ; second, that bees do not 

 usually fly much over half a mile in quest of 

 stores ; and it is only when they can not get 

 honey within this range that they will go 

 further. So long as there is a little to be had 

 near home, so long are they content with 

 that little. But, "all the samee," I do not 

 believe it is wise to put out-apiaries much 

 nearer than two miles. — Ed.] 



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