502 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



July 1. 



by the report of Wm. Stolley for 17 years, in 

 American Bee Journal. His spring count, 

 running from 6 to 48, averaged 24.7 colonies. 

 His average per colony of extracted ran from 

 1^'3 to 170'^, the average for the whole 17 

 years being 53.6 lbs. The net income per 

 year was $218, or $8 86 per colony. A poorer 

 region, or a larger number of colonies would 

 hardly make such a showing. And not every 

 one could get such a big price for honey. 



Come to get right down to it, bees do 

 about the same in Medina as Marengo. Six- 

 teen combs, or as many as they'll use up to 

 the time of putting on section supers, then 

 reduce to one story. Say, isn't that about as 

 near contraction as you can come to it ? [No, 

 I do not call it contraction. I call it substi- 

 tution. Why, I do not reduce the hive capaci- 

 ty at all, do I, doctor ? I simply give them 

 the same room in a little different shape. See 

 my reply to R. L. Taylor, elsewhere in this 

 issue. — Ed.] 



If honey is extracted from sealed combs, 

 part starting with foundation and part with 

 full-drawn combs that have never had brood 

 in, which will be best? is a question in Amer- 

 ican Bee Journal. About a fourth of the 

 repliers think the foundation will have the 

 advantage, the others think there will be no 

 difference. [I suspect that, if the truth were 

 really known, there would be no noticeable 

 difference. I doubt whether any connoisseur 

 having two samples placed side by side could 

 tell the difference. — Ed.] 



Instructions for treating swarming colony 

 with clipped queen, p. 477, are all right; but 

 as a precaution the novice should be told that 

 he must see the queen , for in a good many 

 cases the clipped queen doesn't get back in 

 the hive after swarming. [That is true; and 

 that is all the more reason why perforated 

 zinc with ample passagewaj-s should be used 

 in connection with clipping. R. L. Taylor 

 uses the zinc, and at the same time clips the 

 wings of his queens. I wonder if it is not to 

 prevent the queen from getting lost. — Ed.] 



Like other things in bee-keeping, facing 

 honey seems to be a matter of "locality." 

 In St. Paul the commission men believe in 

 facing. (See p. 469. ) But in ten other cities, 

 according to replies given in American Bee 

 Journal^ commission men set their faces 

 against facing. [When I looked over the 

 replies in the A. B.J. it seemed to me it was 

 a little one-sided — that is, I did not notice any 

 commission man who favored facing. Now, 

 I wonder how many of the bee-keepers this 

 year, if they get any honey, will take pains to 

 put the combs in the shipping-cases at ran- 

 dom. — Ed.] 



D. N. RiTCHEY writes me he got 400 pounds 

 of the most beautiful honey last year when 

 his bees had nothing to work on but red 

 clover. Any doubting Thomas at Medina can 

 at any time see the long-tongued bees three 

 miles west of Granville, Ohio. [Why, doctor, 

 our bees work on red clover more or less every 

 season. I will wager that Ritchey's bees have 

 not any longer tongues than ours ; or, to put 



the proposition another way, all Italians will 

 work on red clover to quite a great extent. 

 Are you really sure, doctor, that some Italians 

 have longer tongues than others? Trot out 

 your evidence. — Ed.] 



A footnote, page 471, asks me to notice 

 what Harry Howe says about metal spacers 

 and the uncapping-knife. Yes, I notice. If 

 I were a manufacturer I might insist all frames 

 should be alike ; but as it is, I don't care a 

 blue bean whether my frames give trouble in 

 uncapping or not so long as an uncapping- 

 knife will never touch them. Now, honest, 

 do you think I really should use a frame I 

 don't like, just because of the danger that 

 Harry Howe might not like it for uncapping ? 

 [Your question is a very hard one to answer. 

 If I were in your position I should not know 

 but that some time I might wish to run for 

 extracted honey exclusively, or very largely, 

 at least. Then how about those metal spacers 

 on the uncapping-knife? — Ed.] 



Handholes or cleats — WHICH ? is asked 

 in American Bee Journal. Nearly all agree 

 on handholes for shipping-cases. Most of 

 them want handholes for supers. As to hives, 

 10 stand for handholes, 1 1 for cleats. This, 

 in the face of the almost universal sending-out 

 of handholes, is somewhat significant. G. M. 

 Doolittle makes a point by saying, "The 

 cleats save time in handling." Better give 

 the option of cleats where purchasers are will- 

 ing to pay for them. [Yes, our customers 

 can have cleats any time in addition to the 

 handholes if they will only ask for them, and 

 will be willing to pay slight additional cost. 

 But there has been no call for cleats on hives. 

 Or do you mean to say that we should try to 

 create a call for something that has real merit 

 in the estimation of a few good bee-keepers 

 like yourself? — Ed.] 



A VENTILATED cover is cooler than dead 

 air in summer, and dead air is warmer in win- 

 ter. Why not have a hole in each end of 

 cover to make the air live in summer, then 

 cork up to make it dead in winter? [John B. 

 Gough used to tell of a new kind of alarm- 

 clock. When one wanted to get up all he 

 had to do was to arise and pull a string, and 

 the clock would ring a bell. I do not know, 

 but it seems to me that, if a bee-keeper had to 

 insert corks at a certain season of the year, 

 and take them out again — well, he wouldn't 

 do it, like the man who would lie abed and 

 neglect to pull the string when he wanted to 

 get up. But, seriously, there is something in 

 your point that a dead-air space might be a 

 compromise for both summer and winter, even 

 if it were a little warmer than necessary in 

 summer. This slight disadvantage might be 

 more than made up by the extra protection in 

 winter. — Ed.] 



A REMARK, p. 480, about getting tired of 

 standing reminds me that there are three 

 classes of bee-keepers — standers, kneelers, and 

 sitters. You start out doing every thing 

 standing or stooping. Then you sit or kneel 

 a small part of the time when you have much 

 to do. Sooner or later you settle down that, 



