434 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Mav I 



It would seem from the above notice that, 

 even though General Adair did die of heart 

 failure, he lived to a good old age. During 

 the time he was actively engaged in apicul- 

 ture, and writing for the journals, he did 

 much to stir up an interest in apiculture, 

 and to turn deep thinkers and experimen- 

 ters into channels that might not otherwise 

 have been explored. It was his (or his an- 

 cestors') name, if I am not mistaken, that 

 gave the town of Adair, where the above 

 postal card was written, its name. 



About the time Gleanings was started, 

 I had a chromo made of a hexagonal api- 

 ary, each hive being shaded by a grape- 

 vine. At that time I planned a standard 

 extractor, a standard hive, and a standard 

 frame. My standard frame at that date 

 was the Adair, ll^XlS^; and the stan- 

 dard hive was made long enough to hold 20 

 frames, one story high, the entrance being 

 at one end. At that time I endeavored to 

 get the bee-keepers of the world united on a 

 standard frame, and suggested the above 

 dimensions. Very soon I found out, how- 

 ever, I had made a mistake. There were 

 not only more frames of the Langstroth di- 

 mensions in common use than any other, 

 but the majority of the bee-keepers preferred 

 the Langstroth size to any other; and, if I 

 am not mistaken, the same has held good 

 during all the thirty or moie years since 

 then. 



Another of the veteran bee-keepers and 

 writers has been called to his long home — 

 another reminder to those of us who are 

 getting well along in years that our stay 

 in this world is coming to a close. Peace 

 to the ashes of Bro. Adair. — A. I. R. 



THE GROWING POPULARITY OF THE FENCE 



SYSTEM. 



Very recently I had occasion to go over 

 some of our back volumes, and also some 

 other periodicals devoted to bee-keeping. 

 Some things interested me, especially in 

 the light of the present. When I first in- 

 troduced* the fence and plain- separator 

 system I was enthusiastic in its praise. 

 But very soon there began to be doubting 

 Thomases. The new thing was declared 

 to be a doubtful innovation, a silly fad, 

 notwithstanding it had up to that time been 

 used by various persons for eight or ten 

 years with a good deal of success. It is 

 somewhat interesting noiv to read over the 

 prophecies of failure that were made then. 

 It was declared that the plain sections 

 would not crate, and that the whole system 

 was a fraud on the public. The condemna- 

 tion that was heaped on it reached the point 

 of personal abuse. Now what are the re- 

 sults? In spite of this opposition it has 

 steadily worked itself into favor among bee- 

 keepers, until the fences are now made in 

 one factory alone at the rate of half a mil- 

 lion a year — enough to super twro million 

 plain sections at a time. Honey in plain 



* By this I do not mean "invent" or "originate," for 

 I did neither. I simply brought before the public an 

 old thing which I thought had great merit. 



sections has come to be very common on the 

 market; and the idea that it won't crate is 

 exploded long ago. 



There is no feeling of pride on my part 

 because that system as a whole has been 

 vindicated away beyond my expectations, 

 nor, on the other hand, any feeling of re- 

 sentment. When a new thing is introduced, 

 especially if it has any merit, there is al- 

 ways bound to be, if the past is any criteri- 

 on, more or less opposition, even from good 

 men. This is but natural, for it is a fact 

 that many things are foisted on the public 

 before they have been carefully tried. Very 

 often the public and not the manufacturer 

 is the sufferer. 



The following is a sample of the letters 

 that now come in. Contrast this with the 

 utterances of a few years ago. 



NO BRACE-COMBS WITH FENCE SEPARATORS. 



Mr. Dibbern says he has had trouble with bract- 

 combs where fence separators are used. I use the ten- 

 frame Langstroth hive and Danzenbaker super, and 

 have had no trouble with brace-combs. I have used 

 solid board separators, but I have had more trouble 

 with brace-combs than with the plain tall section and 

 fence separators; in fact. I do not remember having 

 brace-combs attached to slat separators. 



Almost all of my comb honey this year was in tall 

 plain sections, and you would think that it had been 

 made by machinery. I sent some to a retired comb- 

 honey producer, and he pronounced it the finest comb 

 honey lie had ever seen. 



I use full sheets of foundation in sections, and would 

 not think of using starters, as I get, I think, a fourth 

 more honey or more by using full sheets. 



I consider the fence separators and tall plain sections 

 the greatest boon to comb-honey producers ever intro- 

 duced. Walter M. Parrisa. 



Lawrence, Kan. 



michigan's last pines; their awful 

 slaughter; is there a substitute 



for white pine for hives? 

 There is something grand and majestic 

 in the half tone of those pines shown else- 

 where, and at the same time something aw- 

 ful and melancholy too — grand and majes- 

 tic because of their stately dignity and the 

 utter stillness that breathes through their 

 very atmosphere; a-vful and melancholy be- 

 cause of the ax and the forest- fires of man. 

 When I last went through Michigan, 

 spinnmg by vast areas of devastated coun- 

 try blackened by fires showing only here 

 and there black shafts of the once noble 

 pine in all its primeval glory, there was a 

 feeling of sadness that came over me. The 

 land was unproductive for agricultural 

 purposes, and, contrary to what we might 

 naturally suppose, instead of new pines 

 springing up to replace those cut away, 

 worthless scraggly scrub oaks dotted the 

 ground here and there, with here and there 

 a hovel where dwelt some man and his fam- 

 ily too poor to move to better soil. When I 

 made the inquiry whether the pine could 

 not be made to grow on land where they 

 once grew, I received doubtful responses. 

 Pines, it was said, would not spring up 

 spontaneously like other forest-trees; and 

 even if they did, the hunters with their 

 campfires would soon make short work of 

 them. Have there been no attempts made 

 on the part of the State to reseed or replant 



