776 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Nov. \. 



lbs. to my one ? Will some one who opposes 

 the new drawn foundation answer this ques- 

 tion? F. D. Lowu. 

 Rosedale, Cal., Oct. 8, 1897. 



[While we are glad to get such reports, we 

 do not want those who have had adverse expe- 

 rience to keep still. We have just as much 

 room for one kind of testimony as the other. 

 If flat-base deep-cell foundation shall prove to 

 be a good thing in the majorit}^ of instances, 

 what shall we say of the same product with 

 natural base? This is what we expect to 

 make ; and, if we do not miss our calculations, 

 we shall have it next season. — Ed.] 



A CHEAP HOME-MADE UNCAPPING-DEVICE. 



Let me suggest a cappings-drainer that is 

 inexpensive, and a complete success as we use 

 it. I will commence to describe it from the 

 bottom. 



First a tin pan I I 



just large enough » , ^ I 



for an ordinary §, I 



super to rest in. 



The one we use is 4 inches deep, and provided 

 with a screw-cap honey-gate. Set the super 

 on it. Next take a tin-bound sheet of wire- 

 strainer cloth, just large enough to drop inside 

 the super and rest on the tin strips provided 

 for the section-holders to rest on. Then we 

 want a frame to rest on the top of the super 

 (as on the Dadant can), to rest the comb on 

 while uncapping. 



Now we will imcap till our strainer cloth is 

 covered to a suiTuient depth, when we will 

 lay on a shallnv tin pan — -say >< inch deep on 

 one en 1 and the sides, and at the other end 

 enough deeper to give the pan quite a pitch 

 — I - — (the projection, you will 



I I notice, will hang in the 



'^ rabbets at the end of the 



super). The pan has a 3^^'-inch hole punched 

 in it at "A." 



Next put on another super with wire strain- 

 er, and continue your work, when the honey 

 will drip through on the shallow pan, and, 

 passing down to its lower end, will run through 

 the hole "A" into the pan below. This, you 

 see, can be carried on indefinitely, adding a 

 shallow pan, super, and strainer,- as needed, 

 giving the maximum amount of strainer room 

 at small cost, and in very compact form. The 

 holes "A," you see, will come over each other 

 if the precaution is taken to hang all the 

 shallow pans the same way. 



We were unable to get wire strainer on short 

 notice, and for a makeshift made sieves of the 

 ordinary window-curtain strips that would 

 just fit inside the super, then stuck 4-ounce 

 tacks ji inch apart all round the lower edges, 

 wound twine around them, joining a warp 

 the longer way, next wove it across by the 

 aid of a wire hook ; drove the tacks home on 

 the string, and then covered the tack-heads 

 with a >( -inch-stick strip. This makes a good 

 substitute for the wire strainers, but is quite a 

 job, and I imagine you could furnish the tin 

 and wire strainers just as cheaply as these 

 substitutes can be made. 



I don't know that I have made the idea 



clear. If you catch it I think you will see the 

 utility of it, as it gives so much strainer sur- 

 face with so little exposure of the cappings to 

 flies or dust, and at so little expense to any 

 one who already has the supers. 



Emmetsburg, la. J. C. Benxett. 



[I can't S2e the need of so many extra 

 strainers and pans. One pan and strainer 

 ought to be enough. Sufficient room for the 

 cappings could be obtained by putting on ex- 

 tra supers. — Ed.] 



THOSE NAUGHTY farmer BEE-KEEPERS ; 



AN EXPERIENCE DIFFERENT FROM 



ABBOTT'S. 



Dr. Miller, in Straws for Oct. 1, asks all 

 those who have had to sell their comb honey 

 at low prices on account of farmers and small 

 bee-keepers bringing in their sickly-looking 

 honey, to hold up their hand. Here is mine. 

 Mr. Abbott's friends are not the kind I am 

 looking for. Those farmer bee-keepers who 

 put on sections one year and take them off 

 the year following, and then take them to 

 town and sell for what the}' can get, are sure- 

 ly enemies to the bee-keeper who tries to pro- 

 duce only a first-class article. It not only 

 lowers prices for the good honey, but I have 

 found some stores that will not handle honey, 

 because they had got some of this leaky 

 hone}', and it ran all over their showcases, 

 and smeared every thing up, and only a bee- 

 keeper of experience knows it is not very easy 

 to clean it up; and this is enough to put al- 

 most any store against handling honey at a 

 small profit. I have sold all my honey at 10 

 cts., nice comb honey at that; but this is bet- 

 ter than shipping to commission houses and 

 receiving 7 or 8 cts. per lb. for, it. My crop 

 was about 2000 lbs. this year — about half clo- 

 ver and heartsease. Sweet clover did not 

 yield nmch this year, as it was pastured too 

 closelv. ' G. E. Nelson. 



Bishop Hill, 111., Oct. 15. 



overstocking in YORK STATE. 



7)/r. E. R. Root: — In your editorial on page 

 672, under the heading " What I saw in York 

 State," you give us to understand that the 

 portion of the State visited by you seemed to 

 be overstocked with bees, which is undoubt- 

 edly true ; but in this part of the State just the 

 opposite is true. To illustrate : In driving re- 

 cently a distance of twenty miles from my 

 place, and the same back, by another road, I 

 think I did not pass more than a dozen hives, 

 and they were box hives. The trip was near 

 the St. Lawrence River and Thousand Isles, 

 where honey has re tidied at from 12^ to 18 

 cts. per 1-lb. section. I have wholesaled ex- 

 tracted honey in this market this season at not 

 less than 40 cts. per quart, including can. I 

 bought the honey of The A. I. Root Co. You 

 may conclude that bees do not do well here ; 

 but a woman living near tells me that she had 

 one colony increase to nine, in a single sea- 

 son, by natural swarming. 



I keep only a few bees, but have taken 128 

 4X X \% sections from a single hive in a sea- 

 son, and allowed them to cast one swarm. In 



