AUGUST 15, 1916 



731 



Apalachicola River and its tributaries. This 

 region is tlie lieart of the great tu'pelo-gum 

 belt from wliicli thousands of barrels of this 

 fine honey are shipped each season. Some 

 beekeepers sustained a total loss of both 

 bees and equipment, while many suffered 

 partial losses. All told, thousands of dol- 

 lars' damage have been done to the industry 

 from which we can perhaps never fully 

 recover. 



I have not yet learned the names of all 

 beekeepers who were heavy losers. Messrs. 

 Tucker, Freem.an, Lanier, Edwards, Alder- 

 mann, and Humes are reported aniong those 



who lost heavily. I shall make a further 

 I'eport later on. 



I lost only one apiaiy which I supposed 

 was several feet above the high-water mark. 

 We could not i"each it in time to save it ; 

 but when the water goes down we hope to 

 recover a part of the equipment, especially 

 the supers and hives. However, as all of 

 the combs were full of brood and honey this 

 will be a complete loss. 



One very fortunate feature is that most 

 of the honey had been shipped out before 

 the flood came. Otherwise the loss would 

 have been much heavier. 



Cordele, Ga. 



SOME MISHAPS AND BLUNDERS OF LAST SEASON 



BY ,T. Tj. BYER 



Fire is a good servant, hut a bad master. 

 This proverb is familiar to all, but never so 

 fully realized as when the time comes that 

 we have actual experience with this dread 

 element. Our apiaries are not pretty to 

 look at, and in many ways our management 

 is rather rough and slipshod, I am afraid, as 

 compared with some of our very careful 

 men; but one thing I have always been 

 careful of is to warn all working in the 

 yards, and to try to show by example as 

 well, the necessity of being very careful to 

 take no chances so far as danger from fire 

 is concerned. 



Up to September, 1915, we never had the 

 slightest accident with smokers in any way, 

 and in no other way did we have any ex- 

 periences with fire where it was not wanted. 

 Working at the home yard in September 

 nay son and I were going rapidly thru some 

 90 colonies taking out filled or partially 

 filled combs of buckwheat honey. The sea- 

 son had been so poor that no filled supers 

 were in evidence. We started in the morn- 

 ing in the northwest corner of the yard, and 

 along toward noon we saw that, by stopping 

 extracting and both taking in combs, all 

 hives could be cleared before dinner, and 

 then Edwin could extract the rest in the 

 afternoon while I went to another apiary to 

 do some necessary work. We finished in 

 the southwest corner of the apiary, and left 

 the yard exactly at 12 o'clock, going to the 

 house for dinner, a walk of about 40 rods. 

 Edwin left our place promptly at 1, and 

 went up to the apiaiy, intending to finish 

 the extracting. About the time he got there 

 our telephone rang furiously; and on an- 

 swering the same I was told to come at once 

 as the beeyard was on fire. The bees are 

 on our old homestead, while we now live a 

 short distance from the old place. Needless 



to saj;^, I covered the distance from home to 

 the apiary in record time ; but I found on 

 arrival that Edwin and the farmer on the 

 place had isolated the fire to those hives 

 burning when they arrived there after din- 

 ner. My ! what a fire eight large hives filled 

 with combs, bees, and honey do make! 

 In some way that will never be explained, 

 a spark from the smoker, we suppose, had 

 ignited shavings or something in one of the 

 packed hives, and the' fire had, no doubt, 

 been about ready to go nicely when we left 

 the yard. The eight hives were alongside of 

 one another in the southwest corner of the 

 yard where we finished taking off the honey 

 before dinner, and that explains how we left 

 the yai'd without noticing the trouble; but it 

 does not explain how we hapj^ened to do 

 the mischief. Both of us had used the 

 smoker by turns, so neither one could blame 

 the other. That was one fortunate factor in 

 the situation. It was a sorry sight indeed 

 to see the bees of the eight powerful colo- 

 nies going up in smoke ; but I was glad that 

 the fire was in the south corner of the yard 

 instead of the north, as a strong north wind 

 was blowing at the time. The colonies were 

 nearly all heavy enough for winter, as they 

 were of the Quinby dimensions. In addi- 

 tion they had most of the super combs on, 

 as this particular lot of colonies had very 

 little buckwheat honey in supers, and con- 

 sequently the combs were not taken off. 



iSTaturally we both felt like reproaching 

 ourselves for carelessness in some way ; but 

 as we had taken all precautions, and used 

 the smoker as at otlier times, we did not see 

 how the accident could have been avoided. 

 For fuel we were using' cliips from a wood- 

 yard, our favorite variety for steady work. 

 Years ago T used to put a handful of green 

 grass on to)> of fuel when i-efilling; but of 



