452 



GLEAJSriNGS IN BEE CULTURE 



A little group of bees in the last stages of Isle of Wight disease. 



of bees in the colony are old ones, having 

 the disease in a more advanced stage. 



One stock is especially worth mentioning. 

 It consisted of Italian bees, did extremely 

 well, giving me an 8-lb. swarm and over 100 

 lbs. of honey (which is good here), and did 

 not show a sign of disease all thru the year. 

 I began to think that there must be some- 

 thing in the immune theory, for here, sure- 

 ly, was an immune stock. I took care to 

 tell my beekeeping friends all about it. 

 Alas for my hopes! late in the autumn I 

 lifted the quilt and found not a handful of 

 bees left. There were just a few with the 

 queen clustered on one frame, similar to 

 those in the photo. 



As I expected to be leaving the country 

 before the spring, and most of the stocks 

 appeared too weak to winter, while it was 



out of the question to sell them, I sulphured 

 all except three of the strongest. One of 

 these to which I had introduced an Italian 

 queen is still alive, but diseased, and this 

 will have to go the same way as the others. 



I may say that I have tried some of the 

 so-called cures, but have no faith in medic-' 

 inal treatment. Those who are investigat- 

 ing the disease on behalf of the Board of 

 Agriculture believe that they have discover- 

 ed a drug that will cure the trouble, and are 

 to experiment this year with 40 hives. If it 

 were possible to treat all the bees in the 

 country at one and the same time there 

 might be some hope of success; but even 

 supposing some stocks are cured, what is to 

 prevent them becoming reinfected as soon 

 as the treatment is stopped? One cannot 

 always be feeding bees. 



Ramsgate, England. 



THE PORTABLE EXTRACTING-OUTFIT VS. THE CENTRAL PLANT 



BY J. F. ARCHDEKIN 



It was our intention at first to do all our 

 extracting at home, using a car to move 

 the honey home and take the combs back. 

 After we arrived here and considered the 

 problem very thoroly we changed to a port- 

 able outfit. We run a six-frame power ex- 

 tractor, and use a sectional wire-cloth house, 

 6x8 feet, with a canvas cover to work in. 

 It is very cool; and all the machinery, in- 

 cluding the house, is moved in three loads 



on the Ford. The outfit can all be set up 

 and made ready to run in less than half an 

 hour, and then all our work is right at 

 hand, nothing depending on what two or 

 three men several miles away do or don't 

 do. The honey is run into barrels, and 

 these are taken along on trips home from 

 work. Of course we have some exasperat- 

 ing delays when some necessary article is 

 left at home, or when something gets out of 



