GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



Jan. 1 



Stray Straws 



By De. C. C. Miller, MareDgo, 111. 



As POSTSCRIPT to that entirely correct 

 answer, p. 769, to Mr. Hansen, let me add 

 that a queenless colony is just the one with 

 the most pollen, because for a time the bees 

 continue to carry in pollen for which there 

 is no market. 



Mrs. Acklin does well to urge State laws 

 against adulteration, p. 749. The United 

 States laws come in only when bogus goods 

 go from one State to another. A man can 

 mix glucose and honey, and sell all he likes 

 in his own town, and no law can touch him 

 if there is no State law to do it. 



G. M. DoOLiTTLB, p. 788, if you think the 

 hexagonal plan for an apiary the best, you 

 might change your laying-out a little and 

 make it hexagonal. Instead of moving 

 your line ahead ten feet each time, move it 

 8 feet 8 inches. You will get more hives on 

 the same area, and no hive will be less than 

 10 feet from any other hive. 



My humble apologies to E. M. Gibson 

 and N. M. Chap, p. 754. If I lived where 

 there is cold weather every night, I don't 

 suppose I should want the big entrances 

 that are all right here. Every now and then 

 I wake up to the idea that the whole world 

 is not located within lyi, miles of Marengo. 

 But now, after eating this much hiimble 

 pie, I want to say to you, E. M. G., if you 

 ever meet me out on the desert in a dark 

 night, don't you dare speak to me in a 

 friendly way. I have it in for you on anoth- 

 er score. 



"The size of entrances will depend on 

 the character of the cellar" leaves one 

 guessing. In what character of cellar is 

 there danger from too large entrances ? 

 [Say, doctor, you should not ask such 

 questions. Frankly, we do not know; but 

 we do know that the cellar or the means of 

 ventilation have something to do with the 

 size of the entrances. We observe this, that 

 authoritiesditfergreatly in their recommend- 

 ations. You belong to the large-entrance 

 crowd. We belong to the school that favors 

 a smaller entrance. At all events, we have 

 secured better results in a better-ventilated 

 cellar where the entrances are about the 

 size they are in the spring or late fall. — Ed.] 



W. H. ISIessenger says. Review, B(i5, 

 "When you air-slack liriie in a bee-cellar 

 you ventilate.'" Chemical action sets free a 

 lot of oxygen. [Is there not some mistake 

 here? The chemical name for common 

 lime is calcium oxide, with the symbol 

 CaO. When it is air-slacked, as, for exam- 

 ple, in a damp cellar, it will take on or ab- 

 sorb water from the air in the cellar, and 

 any carbonic-acid gas that may be present. 

 We then have the symbol CaCO'. If we 

 understand the chemistry of the proposi- 



tion, no oxygen is given off; but when lime 

 is put into a bee-cellar, in the process of 

 air-slacking, moisture and carbonic-acid 

 gas are absorbed. While this of course pu- 

 rifies the air it does not do it by adding 

 oxygen, but by removing the products of 

 corobustion — that is, carbonic-acid gas from 

 the breath of the bees. If we are wrong in 

 our chemistry we should be glad to be set 

 right. — Ed.] 



Whenever improvement in bees is sug- 

 gested, such as breeding for non-swarming, 

 the cry comes, "Oh! you can't control the 

 drones." Isn't that objection a little over- 

 worked? True, drones can not be directly 

 controlled. Indirectly they can be and have 

 been. I grant you, much quicker work 

 could be made with direct control of drones; 

 but do you believe that you can persistent- 

 ly select queens with any one object in 

 view and not in time have the drones af- 

 fected thereby? Look at color. Couldn't 

 control drones; but there are your bees, 

 golden from tip to tip. I can't directly con- 

 trol drones; but I have bred from biggest 

 yielders, and have thereby bigger crops. 

 Do you think my drones are not improved? 

 "They'll revert." Let 'em revert. Keep 

 breeding against reversion. A perfect non- 

 swarming bee may never be; but a practi- 

 cal non-swarmer, just as well as a practical 

 non-swarming hen. So long as my record- 

 yields come from colonies that make no at- 

 tempt at swarming, I'm going to keep up 

 the chase. [Good for you! We grant that 

 something can be accomplished; but a strict- 

 ly noQ-swarming strain — well, we will wait 

 for it. — Ed.] 



Mr. Editor, you've made a good job of 

 your "tentative propositions," page 779 — 

 might put more emphasis on pure air. Ev- 

 ery year I think more of it, and am begin- 

 ning to think almost any thing else may 

 be wrong if the bees only have good food 

 and good air. — [We submitted these propo- 

 sitions with the idea of having them criti- 

 cised, so that, if they are accepted as cor- 

 rect by bee-keepers generally who winter 

 their bees in the cellar, we may put them 

 in p?>rmanent form in our ABC and X Y Z 

 of Bee Culture and other literature. Per- 

 haps some of our readers can add some oth- 

 er propositions to the list. More and more 

 as time goes on it is being demonstrated 

 that pure air is very important in winter- 

 ing, either outdoors or in. At one time the 

 whole fraternity went to the other extreme 

 of putting in too much fresh air, or, rather, 

 cold air, in a way that disturbed the bees. 

 Then there came a time when it seemed to 

 be accepted that bees did not need any air 

 in the cellar — at least no more than would 

 percolate through the walls; but the fallacy 

 of that has now been shown up conclusive- 

 ly. While bees can be wintered in a good 

 cellar where the temperature is maintained 

 imiformly at 45, they will come out in much 

 better condition if, with that uniform tem- 

 ]ierature, they can have plenty of fresh air. 

 —Ed.] 



