February, 1917 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



125 



much of tlie honey sold as sage is not pure 

 sage by any means. Pure well-ripened 

 sage honey will not granulate. 



There is nothing that adds so much to 

 (he sale of an article as the looks. Some 

 years ago there was a ear of very fine 

 honey being loaded at our local station. 

 One party, in order to save a few cents, 

 was permitted to put an old weather-stained 

 case in the car, all the rest being new and 

 bright. The sight of this one detracted 

 from the entire car and cheapened its 

 looks dollars where it saved the sliipper 

 cents. 



Much better combs can be secured by 

 using medium brood foundation than light 

 brood, and it is really no saving to use 

 light in preference to medium. With 

 plenty of wax on hand to turn into founda- 

 tion I would prefer heavy brood to either. 

 It veiy often happens that when foundation 

 is given a colony they are not prepared with 

 wax scales to start drawing it at once, 

 and in consequence the foundation is pull- 

 ed loose from the wires, buckled with heat, 

 or sagged by the continual weight of bees 

 hanging on it. With medium or heavy 

 foundation there is plenty of available wax 

 in the foundation to start the comb without 

 additional wax, and the foundation is 

 quickly drawn and the wires fixed into the 



comb at once. 



* * * 



If short of combs in the extracting season, 

 go to the brood-chamber and remove a 

 frame from each ten-frame colony. By 

 the time the brood hatches from them they 

 would be of little value as brood-combs 

 unless the flow were exceptionally long. 

 Moreover, nine frames in a ten-frame body 

 will often produce more brood than ten 

 frames; for unless they are all perfectly 

 straight and evenly spaced there is often 

 a crowded comb that will not be used for 

 brood anyway. Self-spacing frames are an 

 exception ; but the majority of the frames 

 in this state are not self-spacing. When 

 the flow is on, combs are. a great asset, 

 and add materially to the honey crop if 

 they are needed badly. 



* * * 



After two years of careful obsei'vation 

 I am ready to state positively that the 

 pepper-trees bloom during every month of 

 the year. - I do not mean by this that 

 every tree blooms continuously, but that 

 there are some of these trees in bloom dur- 

 ing the entire year. The period of heaviest 

 blooming and heaviest yielding of nectar is 

 during June with a little diminution during 



July. The amount stored from this source 

 often reaches to thirty or forty pounds. 

 The honey is dark, rank, and but little 

 superior to honey-dew. The commercial 

 importance is not large, as the trees are 

 found mostly in our cities as shade and 

 street trees. They are very beautiful. 

 * * * 



To those who may be interested in the 

 controversy over the distance bees will fly 

 for nectar I offer this. I have secured 

 orange honey in quantities for twelve years, 

 there being only three years in that time 

 when I secured none. One year was a fail- 

 ure; and during the other two the flow 

 came at the same period the button sage 

 was blooming and yielding profusely, and 

 the bees did not leave the sage for the 

 orange. The orange-tree nearest to this 

 apiary is three miles in a direct line. The 

 bees that went tliis distance have been of the 

 best-known strains in Amei^ica, and thei'e 

 was no visible difference in the distance 

 any of them would go, all appearing equal 

 to the task. 



One of the oldest and foremost bee- 

 keepers in the state, a man who has been 

 successful in the bee business for nearly 

 forty years, recently wrote me in favor (if 

 chaff hives for wintering. This may seem 

 foolish to many of my readers ; but a careful 

 diagnosing of the facts substantiates his 

 ideas. There is a great variation of tem- 

 perature between day and night, and then 

 we often have a long spell in winter that 

 is very different from the balmy days 

 often pictured. To illustrate, I am citing 

 some facts given by the local weatUer 

 bureau, of the temperatures at this station ; 

 and it should be remembered that here the 

 weather bureau is located in what is known 

 as the frostless btlt of the orange district. 

 There were 23 days in December Avhen the 

 minimum temperature reached a point be- 

 low 40 degrees; 15 days wlien the minimum 

 reached below 35, and 11 days when it 

 reached below the freezing-point. The 

 highest maximum for the month was 78; 

 the minimum for the same day, 36. The 

 lowest maximum was 38 degrees, and there 

 were only 8 days when the maximum reach- 

 ed 70. By this it may be seen that, while 

 the temperatures are not exceptionally 

 low, yet the long period of continued cold, 

 and changes, retard tlie progress of the 

 colony that should be breeding rapidly as 

 early as February. The necessity of liaving 

 the colony in a warm liive to meet these 

 changes is apparent, and I am inclined to 

 believe that my correspondent is in posi- 

 tion to be an excellent judge of the matter. 



