1899 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



757 



he made me a hive about 12X 11 X 10 in. deep ; 

 and in the early part of June my sister and I, 

 while hoeing sugar-cane, caught a swarm com- 

 ing out of the woods, and placed them in the 

 new hive. Now for a point. This swarm 

 filled the brood-chamber and gave me 50 lbs. 

 of surplus, while my father's bees, on the 

 same platform, gave not a pound. They were 

 in hives more than twice as large as mine. 

 Year after year we had the same experience. 



Again, there lives a man, a bee-keeper, near 

 Hanover, who has his bees in boxes that will 

 hold about eight or ten bushels, and they 

 swarm, and give surplus honey only once in 

 five or six years. Here is a point I wish to 

 have you notice : While I was there, fifteen 

 years, only once in all that time did the large 

 swarms, which came from those boxes, gather 

 a sufficient amount of stores to winter on. 

 When spring came they would have a lot of 

 empty comb and dead bees. Again, in 1894 I 

 bought three hives of bees of a man, and he 

 told me he had not got a pound of honey from 

 them in ten years. I took them home and 

 put them into a hive half the size that they 

 had occupied, and that same year they gave 

 me over 100 lbs. per colony. When I saw the 

 man, and told him what the bees had done, he 

 held up both hands, and exclaimed, " My 

 goodness ! how did you do it ? " 



I can give you many instances just as good 

 as this. During the last few days men have 

 been coming to me for sections and founda- 

 tion, saying they have hives with brood-cham- 

 bers 12x12x8 inches deep that have their su- 

 pers filled, while they have other hives 16X19 

 Xl5 inches deep, with no surplus. Are not 

 these good reasons for advocating small hives? 



Again, this spring I saw which will swarm 

 first. The nine-frame cast the first swarm by 

 12 days. The large hive swarmed without a 

 pound of honey in the super ; the small one, 

 with 24 well-filled sections. Again, neither 

 Mr. Dadant nor any other man can possibly 

 get the bees in a large hive to re-enter the sur- 

 plus-apartment as soon after taking off the 

 sections as he can with a small hive. In a 

 small hive, if properly ventilated, the bees are 

 compelled to go above for room, while in a 

 large hive they have plenty of room below. I 

 do not see how any one living in a latitude 

 like this, where honey-flows are of such short 

 duration, can advocate a large hive. It is 

 simply impossible to be successful. 



As my article is too long I must describe the 

 size and kind of hive some future day. We 

 know the farmer bee-keeper can not use the 

 same kind of hive that the man does who 

 makes the bee-business a specialty ; and the 

 point of locality must not be lost sight of. 



Granville, O., July 3. 



[In Gleanings for Aug. 15, page 611, you 

 will find that we have summed up this whole 

 hive question. In a word, the size of the 

 brood- chamber depends largely upon the lo- 

 cality, and, secondarily, upon the bee-keeper's 

 peculiar notions. From the mass of evidence 

 that has been produced, I believe large hives 

 are not practical in some localities, in the same 

 way that small ones are not adapted for others. 



Manufacturers might as well give up the notion 

 that bee-keepers can be driven like a flock of 

 sheep over one road — the road denominated 

 the eight-frame Langstroth hive pure and 

 simple. 



The proof of the pudding is in the eating ; 

 and where large hives give big results in dol- 

 lars and cents, it is folly to talk small hives ; 

 but when the small hives will outstrip the big 

 ones, as seems to be the case in your locality, 

 it is penny wise and pound foolish to discard 

 small for large hives. — Ed.] 



BEES IN THE -SANTA LUCIA MOUNTAINS, CAL. 



A Splendid Location for Bees. 



BY C. M. DRAKE. 



My school trustees have the bee fever. They 

 caught it late last season, and have not yet re- 

 covered from it. We live near the Pacific 

 Ocean, in Monterey Co., where is one of the 

 grand bee-places in California. There were no 

 bee men here when I came to take the school 

 in April ; but by silver speech and golden ar- 

 guments about what bees must do in such a 

 range I got my trustees to making Langstroth 

 hives and taking wild bees. They had never 

 seen a Langstroth hive, but they knew bee- 

 trees. It is hard to say whether they believed 

 less of my tales of immense crops in Southern 

 California or I their stories of bee-trees. But 

 when I saw five colonies in one big redwood, I 

 was forced to believe that a story of robbing 

 seven colonies in one tree, and taking out boil- 

 ers and wash-tubs and coal-oil cans full of 

 honey from one tree, and leaving lots they did 

 not care to take, might be true. And there 

 are bee-caves in solid marble homes, from 

 which come streams of bees — well, somewhat 

 less than the Mississippi in size. 



" I suspect your honey season may run into 

 July here," I remarked. 



" August is our best honey month," was the 

 astounding answer ; and, though I have not 

 found it quite so, the bees at this date, Sept. 

 13, are rapidly building combs, and making 

 honey fast. They could be extracted now, 

 and would fill up. Last Saturday I took a 

 swarm from a white-oak stump. Two months 

 before, we had taken from that stump the 

 worst stingers I ever saw. We got the queen, 

 two cans of honey, a hiveful of bees and comb, 

 and brought them home. Far in a root were 

 a few little patches of brood, a handful of 

 bees, and no honey except what we left on the 

 sides of the sawed-off stump. 



They raised a queen whose bees are very 

 gentle. I went there last Saturday with a five- 

 frame hive, took out the bees, and brood 

 enough to fill one frame (the rest was in too 

 broken pieces), to carry three miles, and I 

 carried them to my schoolhouse. In an hour 

 they were flying out to work. In a week the 

 quart of bees have built nearly two frames of 

 comb, and filled them with eggs. They will, 

 I doubt not, live through the winter, and be a 

 fair colony next spring. We had to put su- 

 pers on three of our hives within this week. 



