52 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Jan. 15. 



is but little sale for honey, and at a low figure, 

 the tendency of the corner of the mouth is to 

 drop. This indication is very strong on the 

 faces of bee-keepers just now. The mouth- 

 corner drop, as we may term it, is intensified 

 by continued dry weather — only two inches of 

 rain, and now it is the first of January. In 

 addition to the drop, a sad look takes posses- 

 sion of the eye. No rain means no honey and 

 no money. Some of the most sad are predict- 

 ing another no-crop season. There are still some 

 hopes of a generous honey crop, even though 

 we do not get the rains until February or 

 March. Our hopes will be strong until that 

 date. We wish to say, however, that parties 

 who contemplate coming to this State had bet- 

 ter wait until they hear that we have had sev- 

 eral inches of rain. 



PERSECUTED. 



A bee-keeper in Redlands, Cal., has for sev- 

 eral years been located at the entrance of a 

 small canyon near Redlands Junction. The 

 apiary is upon land he has taken i;p under 

 government claim. Below the canyon and 

 apiary is a wide stretch of land suitable for 

 the cultivation of the orange, and many 

 orange-groves and residences are there located. 

 A reservoir for irrigation purposes is located 

 not far from the apiary, and has done service 

 for all concerned for years, and no complaints 

 made about the bees getting into and fouling 

 the water, or of disturbing the peace of the 

 residents. Recently a millionaire ( so reputed ) 

 has purchased a residence and an orange-grove 

 near this apiary, and straightway there is trou- 

 ble aboiit the bees. It has just been discover- 

 ed that they are a nuisance in many ways. 

 They sting the men at work in the orchard ; 

 they foul the reservoir; gather in multitudes at 

 the watering-trough, and sting horses. Mil- 

 lionaire has connnenced . suit against the bee- 

 keeper ; demands a removal of the bees, and, 

 in addition to this, he wants -SIOOO damages. 

 The bee-keeper is a man of peace, and has 

 done every thing in his power to pacify his 

 wealthy neighbor. He has even agreed to 

 move his bees back an eighth of a mile into 

 the canyon; but millionaire says, "No, sir, 

 you just get out, I own this whole country." 

 This would be an excellent case for the Union 

 to try, but, unfortunately, the bee-keeper is 

 not a member. We shall keep watch of this 

 case, and hope the bee-keeper will win the 

 suit. The case, however, should admonish 

 every bee-keeper to become a member of the 

 Union. 



A GREAT amount of correspondence has 

 come in within the last month regarding the 

 fence (cleated separator) and the plain section 

 (no-bee- way) — so much, in fact, that it is sim- 

 ply voluminous. We have been almost buried 

 up with correspondence, and it has been al- 

 most impossible for me, at least, to give 

 prompt replies. I beg of my friends to make 

 their letters as brief as possible, and forbear if 

 I do not answer at once. I hope to be caught 

 up in a few days. 



CAUSE OF SOUR HONEY. 



Question. — What is the cause of uncapped 

 cells of honey soviring and running out of the 

 cells ? When I took the sections off the hive 

 I spread them on the floor in a low room next 

 a roof, which had one low window toward the 

 west, and a door opposite the window, which 

 opened into another room. I thought I had a 

 nice room in which to keep my honey, but it 

 did not keep. Was the trouble with the room 

 or with the honey ? What can be done with 

 the sections to make them salable ? 



Attszuer. — In the first place, sections having 

 many unsealed cells can not be called " sala- 

 ble ' ' as compared with nicely capped honey 

 of the same qualitj- or kind, and such unseal- 

 ed honey should have been allowed to stay on 

 the hive till all of the cells were sealed, ex- 

 cept perhaps a few bordering on the wood 

 around the outside of the section. When thus 

 capped, honey is not as liable to sour as is that 

 which is unsealed. Thus it will be seen that a 

 part of the trouble came from taking the hon- 

 ey from the hive before it was ready, or 

 "ripe." Then there might have been some 

 trouble with the honey, for I have noticed that 

 certain kinds of honey, like apple-blossom and 

 dandelion honey, will not ripen up in the same 

 room in which clover and basswood honey will 

 grow better all the time. Then in certain sea- 

 sons the bees will seal up honey very much 

 more unripe and thin than they do in other 

 seasons ; and the more unripe honey is, when 

 capped over, the more liable it is to deterio- 

 rate in a room in which thoroughly ripe hon- 

 ey would keep in comparatively perfect con- 

 dition for some length of time. But all 

 honey will usually ferment, become sour, and 

 eventually run out of the cells, if kept in a 

 damp cool room like a cellar. Any room, or 

 article in such room, will draw or take on 

 moisture rapidly if allowed to become much 

 colder than the surrounding air at any time, 

 and this room might have been colder than the 

 surrounding rooms, hence attracted moisture 

 to it. If the room had been well ventilated it 

 would have helped much ; and had it been 

 thus, coupled with the suitable warmth, I can 

 not see what hindered the honey from evaporat- 

 ing all right. I have found that a high tem- 

 perature in a room is of verj- little service if 

 said room is so tight and close that no draft of 

 air can carry off the moisture. Consequently 

 honey should not only be kept in a dry warm 

 room, but there should be enough ventilation 

 in and about said room to carry off all moist- 

 ure which evaporates from the honey ; and 

 the larger the pile of honey stored in the room 

 the greater should be the draft or ventilation. 

 If you had such a warm, dry, well-ventilated 

 room to store your soured honey in, it would 

 in all probability thicken the honey again, 

 but would hardly make it salable ; for honey 



