GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



September, 1917 



FROM THE FIELD OF EXPERIENCE 



Tapping a Bee-tree in Australia 



One morning, knowing of a swarm of bees 

 that were in a gum tree, a friend and I 

 started out to get them, armed with smoker, 

 hidder, vope, and kerosene-tin. Tlie kiddi'r 

 being barely long enough, we secured the top 

 by passing the rope around the tr63 and then 

 proceeded to cut the combs out one by one. 

 In the early part of the previous year my 

 friend had removed some bees from this 

 hole, and in doing so had cut an entrance 

 almost as big as the hole itself. Later in the 

 year this swarm had taken possession and 

 bufilt comb right across the large entrance, 

 and there they had been all the winter, witli 

 the wind blowing directly on to the combs. 

 It speaks well for the mildness of the Aus- 

 tralian winter and the hardiness of the bees 

 lliat they should have survived such an ex- 

 pei'ience. Unfortunately we found them 

 suffering from foul brood. The open-air 

 life had evidently not made them disease- 

 proof. 



Having placed the combs in the kerosene- 

 tin, the next problem was to get the flying 

 bees into it, as, after driving them from 

 [he hols with smoke, they clustered on the 

 tree-trunk at the tojj of the ladder. I held 

 the corner of the tin containing the combs 

 close to the bees, and the bulk of them 

 marched right in. We left the tin with 

 combs at the bottom of the tree so as to 

 collect the flying bees. Later we destroyed 

 the combs and ran the bees into a clean hive. 



Melbourne, Australia. B. Blackbourn. 



Is Honey a Luxury? 



The honey salesman occasionally hears 

 that "honey is a luxury which ordinary peo- 

 ple should use very sparingly, especially in 

 times of high prices." If this were true, 

 there would be reason in the argument. But 

 honey is not a luxury, and it should he the 

 business of all those interested in real food 

 economy, as well as those engaged in the 

 honey business to make known the truth. 



According to modern standards of effi- 

 ciency, two factors enter into the classifica- 

 tion of an article of diet as a luxury — viz , 

 price and food value. However low the 

 price, if there is little or no food value, any 

 article is a luxui-y. Probably the average 

 person would hardly think it possible for 

 cabbage to be called a luxury ; but one of the 

 recent prominent writers on the subject of 

 food values says, "Only the rich and im- 

 ])rovident can afford to pay more than a 

 cent and a half a pound for carrots, turnips, 

 cabbages, and squash." That statement was 

 published in a book two years before 

 the time when ^cabbage rose to the sublime 

 height of fifteen or twenty cents, so that 

 it was under perfectly normal conditions, 

 that this conclusion was reached. What is 

 the truth, then, about honey"? 



1. Price. Not long ago I was confronted 

 Avith the statement that a few years ago the 

 father of a certain merchant sold honey at 

 ten cents a pound, retail (at the time in 

 question it was selling at twenty-five cents). 

 I simply cited the fact that less than twenty 



Taking bees from a gum-tree in Australia. 



