1899 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



539 



in the discussion going on between the Da- 

 dants, Doolittle, and others; and I was pleas- 

 ed in reading that article by A. N. Draper, in 

 Gleanings for May 1, to see that you had 

 consented to test the large hive side by side 

 with the Langstroth. I suppose the hive ques- 

 tion has been more discussed than almost any 

 other question pertaining to bees, and is as far 

 from being settled to the satisfaction of every 

 one as it ever was. I believe, as you stated in 

 Gleanings a short time ago, that the majori- 

 ty of our great honey-producers use a large 

 brood-chamber; still it is a fact that nearly all 

 the writers for the different bee-journals are 

 advocates of a small hive. Perhaps the other 

 fellows are too busy, or else think it is no use 

 to say any thing in the face of so much oppo- 

 sition. Be that as it may, it is refreshing to 

 see that there are some few who are not afraid 

 to tell of the superiority of the large hive. 

 Most prominent among these, of course, are 

 the Dadants, who have so persistently cham- 

 pioned the large hive that I suppose that, in 

 the eyes of the small-hive user, they appear 

 something like the man who said that he nev- 

 er knew there were so many stubborn men in 

 the world until he had served as juror. He 

 had been on fourteen different cases, and the 

 other eleven had held out against him every 

 time. 



I suppose I should not speculate as to what 

 the results of your test will be ; but I can not 

 help thinking (perhaps the wish is father to 

 the thought) that you will get positive proof 

 that the large hive is away head for the pro- 

 duction of honey. 



There is one thing I wish to suggest to you, 

 Mr. Root ; and that is, don't put colonies into 

 the large hives with queens that have been 

 bred in little bits of hives for generations past. 

 Some may laugh at this ; but I know from ex- 

 perience that there is a good deal in it. I be- 

 come disgusted in reading articles by promi- 

 nent queen breeders, stating that good queens 

 should fill eight L. frames with brood before 

 the main honey-flow starts. Why, Mr. Edi- 

 tor, at this date, May 9, I can show you lots 

 of colonies in "barns" with nine and ten 

 frames filled with brood from one end to the 

 other ( frames considerably larger than the 

 Dadant-Quinby), and the hive boiling over 

 with bees, and we have had a very backward 

 spring — first pollen noticed Apr. 18, and fruit- 

 bloom just beginning to open. 



As you are aware, our honey-flow does not 

 start for nearly a month, so you can see what, 

 in my opinion, constitutes a good queen. 



I have received several tested queens from 

 one of the most noted breeders across the line, 

 and not one of them was any good in my esti- 

 mation. I have found that this breeder uses 

 a very small hive, hence I draw my own con- 

 clusions as to why queens were not up to ex- 

 pectation. I trust you will give the " big fel- 

 lows " a fair and thorough test ; and it would 

 be fine if we could have the satisfaction of 

 having at least one editor on our side of the 

 fence. 



Hoodstown, Ont., Can. 



[We are testing the Draper barns ; but the 

 season has been particularly unfavorable; and 



another thing, our eight-frame colonies could 

 not, of course, begin to fill them. A little 

 later, and we shall be able to render a report 

 of them, I think.— Ed.] 



RAMBLE 171. 



Palo Alto: Bees, Chickens, and Pigs; a Temper- 

 ance Lesson. 



BY RAMBLER. 



My next halt was at Palo Alto. The reason 

 for the existence of this town is its nearness to 

 the Stanford University ; in fact, it exists upon 

 the Stanford estate and upon the students of 

 the University, for many of them have their 

 lodgings here. Palo Alto is just the sort of 

 town into which a temperance man loves to 

 circulate. It is a town in which prohibition 

 prohibits. The foundation of the town is laid 

 upon the following corner-stone : "All persons 

 who sell or allow intoxicants to be sold on 

 their property forfeit said property." Every 

 person who buys a town lot here receives a 

 deed with the above provision. If he doesn't 

 like the provision he can pass along to the 

 next town. The result is a good class of peo- 

 ple in the town, and the provision works like 

 a charm. There are no saloons in Palo Alto. 

 It is a clean town ; and the faculty of the 

 University, from President Jordan down, are 

 pronounced temperance men. 



I rambled into this delightful town, owing 

 to the fact that one of my bee-keeping stu- 

 dents was there. The editor of Gleanings 

 will remember the bee-keepers' picnic that 

 was held on the borders of Lake George, in 

 New York, in 1890, and that the boy bee- 

 keeper of the crowd was Brodie Higley. Well, 

 here, after these many years, and after a 

 three-years' course of instruction, he was ready 

 to graduate, a full-fledged lawyer, at the time 

 I found him. The bees he had learned to 

 handle so successfully away back in York 

 State had been something of a factor that had 

 enabled him to finish his education. 



The University is very progressive, but it 

 has not made such progress as to establish an 

 experiment apiary. I suggested to Brodie 

 that the quadrangle around which the main 

 buildings are located (the students call it the 

 quad), with its smooth asphalt pavement and 

 palm-trees, would be an excellent place to es- 

 tablish an apiary, and proposed to present the 

 case to Pres. Jordan ; but Brodie thought that 

 would do no good, for the president" always 

 referred such matters to Mrs. Stanford ; and 

 as she was not interested in such small mat- 

 ters as bee culture she would be sure to sit 

 down upon the proposition. Mrs. Stanford is 

 a very large woman, and also very wealthy ; 

 and when she sits down upon a proposition 

 that is the last of it. I do not like the idea of 

 so much woman government ; but as she up- 

 holds the temperance cause on her farm I have 

 it not in my heart to find much fault. 



If, some time in the future, the University 

 should progress so far as to establish an apia- 

 ry I hope they will not select a professor who 

 will try to invent a new hive. For instance, a 



