DECEMBER 15, 1916 



1161 



E.G.Baldwin 



FLORIDA SUNSHINE 



Deland, Fla. 



B PIONEER PATENTS. 

 A friend and neighbor beetnan 

 of mine, at Glenwood, Fla., has 

 shown me an ancient certificate 

 that will elicit a smile from the 

 modern apiarist. It reads as fol- 

 lows: 

 "To all whom it may conceni: This cer- 

 tificate entitles R. B. Sproul, of Lee Co., 

 Illinois, to malse and use W. A. Flanders' 

 semi-circle and Book Bee-hives, patented 

 July 14, 1863, and April 5, 1865, upon one 

 farm only. Elijah Benner & Co." 



Can you beat it? How many of the fra- 

 ternity know anything- of W. A. Flanders? 

 Hands up — but remember you will be giv- 

 ing your age away. 



* * * 



THE HONEY METHOD AGAIN. 



Many times the omission of some ap- 

 parently simple factor of a manipulation 

 will spell failure. Practically all reports 

 from beemen who have tried the honey 

 method of introducing queens have been 

 favorable. But one report from Arkansas 

 is so distinctly dismal that we cannot re- 

 frain from quoting it in full here, as a 

 warning to others " how not to do !" It is 

 as follows : 



Mr. E. G. Baldwin: — I have tried your 

 method of introducing queens as stated in 

 Gleanings, July 1, page 525, to my sorrow. 

 It did not work for me. I ordered a queen 

 by mail, and thought I would introduce by 

 the honey method (as I had lost the last 

 q-ueen I tried to introduce by the cage 

 method). It seemed easy. I therefore re- 

 moved the old queen and took about half a 

 cup of honey and soused the new queen iji 

 it, and poured it into the hive. It wasn 't 

 fifteen minutes before the bees began to 

 get in an uproar. Whether the queen left 

 and came back I don't know; but anyway 

 this morning the bees were all excited. Af- 

 ter awhile I noticed them dragging her out 

 dead. Wm. R. Lindsey. 



Buckner, Ark., Aug. 30. 



In the first report we gave in these col- 

 umns (June 1, p. 525) we omitted to em- 

 phasize the fact that the entrance should be 

 contracted during the operation, and remain 

 so for a day after it. But in the i-ecapit il- 

 lation, p. 845, we did emphasize this essen- 

 tial feature as follows : "Then close the 

 hive-top, and see that the entrance is nar- 

 rowed to a point where robbers can be kept 

 out according to the strength of the colony." 



Without doubt our correspondent from 

 Ai'kansas had a full-sized case of robbing 

 on hand in about ten minutes after the op- 



eration. Of course the queen was killed. 

 Odd if even the colony escaped. We are 

 sorry we omitted the entrance-contraction 

 clause in the former article. It is an essen- 

 tial to success with the method. An ex- 

 perienced beeman might have thought of it 

 anyhow, but not so an amateur. We sin- 

 cerely hope that our correspondent will 

 give the method another thoro trial, and re- 

 port. We feel sure the method will work 

 all right if performed all right. 

 * * ■* 



ANOTHER HONEY-PLANT REPORTED. 



Recently a specimen plant was mailed 

 as from southwest Florida- to which the lo- 

 cal name " minkweed " had been given. 

 We have never before heard that particular 

 local name. The sender declared it is a 

 splendid nectar-yielder, and that there were 

 hundreds of acres of it near him. He add- 

 ed that ho had been told it was the bone- 

 set of the North (Eupatorium perfoliatum). 

 The plant is not the boneset at all. It is the 

 vanilla plant, or deertongue {Trilisa odora- 

 tissima), one of the numerous and widely 

 differing members of the great thistle fam- 

 ily. The stem is smooth, the lower leaves 

 are spatulate, the upper are oval or oblong, 

 and smaller. Tlie heads have about 7 or 8 

 flowers that form a convex cluster, each 

 flower on its own stalk, and rising from its 

 own stem. The blossoms are purplish, verg- 

 ing on white. It grows in the flatwoods 

 pretty generally over the state. The thistle 

 family is pretty widely represented in east- 

 ern-central Florida, there being no fewer 

 than 147 genera and species in Volusia Co. 

 alone. Of these tlie following are among 

 the honey-bearing i^lants : Thistle, three 

 species: ironweed, Liatris (or blazing- 

 star) ; Chrysopsis (golden aster). We have 

 six species of the golden aster. Of golden- 

 rod we Have 7 species in the county. Of 

 asters proper we have 7 species ; sunflower, 

 five species; and cosmos, cultivated. Just 

 now the bees are working vigorously on the 

 asters, the wild-sunflowers, and the Spanish 

 vines (Antigonon.) Oddly enough the bees 

 never soera to work on the goldcnrod here- 

 about, tho we have made special examina- 

 tion many times. Goldenrod seems to vary 

 thus in different parts of the country. Dr. 

 Phillips, we recall, told us a year ago that 

 ihe bees never touch the goldenrod in the 

 region of his home near Washington, D. C. 

 We wish otlior beemen all over Florida 

 would r(!port whetlier the bees in their lo- 

 calities work on tliis plant. 



