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•andHoNE-Y 

 •AMD home: 



•1NTEKEST6 



Vol. XXV. 



DEC. 15, 1897. 



s.is^ptRVtAR '\@ "Medina-Ohio- 



No. 24. 



" \'iR(;ixiA "' might have the additional in- 

 formation, p 849, that two queens could be 

 wintered in one hive with a thin wood parti- 

 tion between them. A strong colony and a 

 nucleus could thus pass the winter in one hive. 



Herr Andreas Abend asserts that a 

 virgin queen may be fertilized, even after be- 

 ginning to lay drone eggs. Three separate 

 queens, prevented from flying by bad weather, 

 were afterward fertilized, although ''buckel- 

 brut " was already in the hive. — Bieiien- 1 'ater. 



A DISCUSSION is on across the sea as to 

 whether bees creep into the cells in winter. 

 So good authority as Rauschenfels and I_,'.h- 

 zen insist that they occupy only the spaces be- 

 tween the combs, constantly changing posi- 

 tion, and bees found in cells are either dead 

 bees or those that have gone there for food or 

 else because disturbed. 



If it is true, as some good authorities in- 

 sist, that in winter bees don't stay in the cells, 

 then it is easy to believe that Gemmill is 

 right, p. S45, that sealed combs are better than 

 empty ones in the cluster. [I know we h ive 

 used sealed combs — yes, stuck them right 

 down into the cluster — during cold weather, 

 and have secured good results. — Ed.] 



A REMARKABLE CASE is given b}' Dr. Gal- 

 lup, in Am. Bee Journal, which he calls "a 

 case where a queen was compelled to leave for 

 want of room " The colony swarmed and 

 left, leaving a pint of bees, sealed brood the 

 size of the hand, the rest of the combs solid 

 honey — no quccn-cell or unsealed brood. Has 

 a similar case ever been recorded? [I do not 

 remember any. — Ed.] 



The question is asked in A. B. J., "Is 

 honey more liable to granulate or ferment in 

 leveled-down sections than with foundation? " 

 Of those trying it, two say yes, seven no; one 

 thinks yes and one thinks no. Three would 

 have cells \ inch deep; one, yi\ three, >^, and 

 three full depth. [As there is such a diversity 

 of answers it would appear that there is no 

 practical difference. — Ed.] 



I jrsT BEI.IEVK it will be a good thing to 

 have the Pettit idea in the super carried out 

 with the fence. Still, with perfectly straight 

 separators it isn't any great trick to take the 

 unfinished sections fn m the outside rows of 

 half a dozen supers, mf-.ss them in a single 

 super, and have the bees make a nice job fin- 

 ishing them. [Yes, we expect to have that 

 idea carried out in all our 189S supers. The 

 fence makes its application very simple. — Ed.] 



One man used queen -excluding zinc in 

 half his apiary, and ran all lor extracted hon- 

 ey. He weighed the honey of the two lots 

 separately, and claimed favor for the zinc. — 

 A^. E. France, in A. B. J. [And yet there 

 are some who are foolish enough to assert — 

 and I must think they do so without experi- 

 ence to back them up— that perforated zinc 

 should never be used in the hive. Such kind 

 of talk is about as foolish as to say that foun- 

 dation is a curse to the bee-keeping world. 

 —Ed.] 



Herr Gravenhorst quotes what has been 

 said by Gleanings about bees hanging out, 

 and says that for years he has avoided it by 

 timely removal of sealed brood to prevent 

 over-populousness, and b}' wedging up the 

 hive and giving the fullest ventilation. [Giv- 

 ing the fullest ventilation, I am sure, -is all 

 right; but I should question very much the 

 desirability of reducing the working force at 

 a time when it may be most needed a little 

 later on. It is the big colonies that get the 

 hone}- — at least around Medina. —Ed.] 



You'll laugh at me, perhaps, but one of 

 the things I enjoyed most at Buffalo was hear- 

 ing Dooiittle cry'" ' Tatoes ! ' tatoes ! " in im- 

 itation of the potato-vender. It wasn't the 

 fun of the story, although that was good; it 

 was the clear musical ring of his voice. [Yes, 

 I lo > enjoyed the intonation Dooiittle gave to 

 ' tatoes; but " you will laugh at me," perhaps, 

 w^hen I tell you I have forgotten both the ap- 

 plication and the story. Will friend Dooiittle 

 please tell it to the readers of GLEANINGS 

 whenever an opportunity presents? — Ed.] 



Replying to your question p. S3S, Mr. 

 Editor, I've a staggering notion that, after a 

 queen stop-i laying in the fall, and through 

 winter, she sort of abdicates the throne; and 

 while her royalty i-« laid aside the bees are 

 somewhat indifferent to her ; and a strange 



