430 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



May 1 



honey, but "it consists of a mixture of 

 cane sugar syrup and Chili honey, rendered 

 agreeable to the nose by means of a lot of 

 aromatic substances. These worthless and 

 adulterated goods, not safe for the stomach 

 of even a well man, are dangerous to the 

 sick, and so adulteration finds a new vic- 

 tim. What avails medical skill with the 

 best means at command when it has no 

 guarantee that drugs and liquors are not 

 adulterated? Even the infaut in its cra- 

 dle, as soon as it is weaned, is threatened 

 with adulteration " However it may be 

 with drugs, there certainly is no trouble in 

 'getting pure honey in this country. It is 

 probable, however, that most groceries fur- 

 nish a ready means for adulterators to un- 

 load Iheir goods on the public 



7^ ^ 



HOW TO GET WORKER COMB BUILT. 



"Are you verj' busy this afternoon, Mr. 

 Doolittle?" 



■'Not extremely so, Mr. Baker. What 

 can. I do for you?" 



•'I wish to have my bees build their own 

 combs this summer; and whenever I try to 

 have them do this, they seem bent on build- 

 ing drone comb. How can I prevent this?" 



■' When any colony is so weak that it has 

 no desire to swarm, during or preceding 

 the swarming or honey- flow, such a colony 

 will invariably build worker comb, so that 

 worker brood may be reared till the colony 

 comes into a prosperous condition, provid- 

 ing they do not have sufficient comb already 

 built." 



■'Why can I not use some of the weak 

 colonies I often have in the spring in that 

 way?" 



■'You can. Taking advantage of this 

 tact I use all colonies which are too weak 

 to store honey to advantage, at the begin- 

 ning of the honey-flow, or as many as I 

 wish to use for this purpose, treating them 

 thus: Their combs are generally all taken 

 rrom them excepting two, one having a 

 little brood and considerable honey in it, 

 and the other one being as nearly full of 

 honey as possible, giving all the other combs 

 having brood in them to other colonies so 

 that they will be still stronger for the honey 

 harvest. ' 



■'Don't you leave any of the ccmbs which 

 they may have, having neither honey nor 

 brood in them for their use?" 



"No. If I did it would defeat my object, 

 for the bees would clean up such combs, 

 and the queen lay in them, instead of the 

 bees building any comb at all." 



"I see. But excuse my interrupting. 

 Go on with what you do with the colony 

 after you have taken all away but the two 

 combs." 



"I now put in one, two, and sometimes 

 three frames having starters in them or 

 frames which are partly filled with comb, 

 just according to the size of the little colony 

 after having taken their combs away." 



"Excuse my breaking in again; but 

 what do you mean by starters?" 



"Take a strip of comb foundation one- 

 half inch wide and as long as your frame 

 is wide between the end-bars, and with 

 melted wax stick this along the center of 

 the under side of the top-bar of your frame, 

 and you have a starter that will beat any 

 other which I know of." 



"And what did you mean by frames 

 partly filled with comb? Where do you 

 get these?" 



"These are any combs which any colony 

 of bees may have started at any time and 

 not completely filled the frames with the 

 same. Or they may be frames once filled 

 with comb, a part of which may be drone 

 comb, which I have cut out, or holes, which 

 have come about by some accident to the 

 combs, such as mice gnawing them, or the 

 bees tearing them down to get out moldy 

 pollen or something of that sort; or I may 

 have allowed the bees to build comb when 

 they were not in the condition to build 

 worker comb exclusively." 



"And will the bees patch up such combs 

 as these, filling out with worker comb?" 



" .VTost assuredly they will if the colony 

 is in the right condition." 



" Well, that will be lots of help to me, for 

 I have many combs partly drone and partly 

 worker that I did not know what to do with, 

 and now I will make the bees patch them. 

 But go on or I may not know how after all. ' ' 



"In all this work I alwaj's see that each 

 little colony has a frame well filled with 

 honey; for, should storms or cloudy windy 

 weather come on at this time, they would 

 build no comb of any amount, and might 

 starve; while with the frame of honey they 

 will go right on converting that honey into 

 comb, storm or no storm. If the right 

 number of frames is given to suit the size of 

 the little colony they will fill them quickly, 

 especially when honey is coming in from 

 the fields; and each comb will be filled with 

 worker brood as fast as built." 



"How long will they build worker comb?" 



"If not too strong they will generally 

 build comb of the worker size of cells till 

 the brood begins to emerge from the eggs 

 first laid in the newly built combs by the 

 queen; but as soon as many bees emerge 

 they are liable to change to the drone size 

 of cells; or if the little colony is quite strong 

 in bees the}' may change the size of cells 

 sooner than this if honey is coming in very 

 rapidly." 



"What is to be done then?" 



"As soon as the first frames I gave them 

 are fil'ed with comb I look to see about how 

 many bees they have; and if they are still 



