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GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



Deckmber, 1920 



FROM THE FIELD OF EXPERIENCE 



drones trying to get thru. We were suc- 

 cessful in finding queens right along. Those 

 we did not find, no doubt, were left on the 

 wall of the hive, or else on the frames we 

 did not shake. However to make sure not 

 to lose the queen after a good look in the 

 funnel (you can find queens among drones 

 better than bees) we would dump the drones 

 out in front of their hives after shaking each 

 colony, so if the queen was overlooked she 

 would run back into her own hive. 



This excluder funnel is not the dream of 

 a night, but was thought of and worked out 

 together with perspiration and bee-stings. It 

 has now been used with success two years. 



Mathis, Tex. Pressly S. Brown. 



MY FIRST YEAR WITH BEES 



The funnel shown in the pictures elimi- 

 nates all drones and queens. Therefore the 

 purchaser gets only workers. The men look 



Transferring from the funnel to the shipping cage. 



the frames over as they shake them in, and 

 if they see the queen they put her back in 

 the hive and continue to shake until some- 

 times they have from six to ten pounds in 

 the large funnel. Of course, if they do not 

 see the queen on the frames, all there is to 

 do is to peep into the funnel and almost al- 

 ways she is seen with the drones and can be 

 put back into the hive. 



Mr. Brown made a round strainer for his 

 funnel; but I like the one with square cor- 

 ners better than the round one, as the bees 

 run to the corners and pass thru faster. 



Waxahachie, Tex. T. W. Burleson. 



Three Colonies and 249 Pounds of Honey From a 

 Four-pound Nucleus 



When I decided to keep bees I began by 

 talking with a farmer neighbor who had 

 raised bees all his life, but who had recently 

 lost them. I asked, "What method did you 

 use in wintering?" "Oh, I just left them on 

 their summer stands. You know bees don't 

 need any protection. They can stand a ter- 

 rible lot of cold; but the trouble was the 

 winter was so long and cold that the mois- 

 ture from them just froze in the hives and 

 killed them off," was his reply. Eight there 

 I made the decision that I had this much 

 the best of that fellow. I did not know any- 

 thing about bees and knew it; he did not 

 know any more but considered himself a 

 connoisseur. 



I immediately ordered a bee book and the 

 night that it came midnight found me fin- 

 ishing that book. I put in the rest of the 

 night lying awake to digest it. The next 

 morning before doing chores I re-read the 

 chapters on ' ' Feeding and Making In- 

 crease." My tliirst for knowledge was just 

 aroused, and so I wrote for a sample copy of 

 Gleanings, and also a catalog. I next sub- 

 scribed to Gleanings and ordered a bee book, 

 14 pounds of bees, and supplies for five colo- 

 nies. 



The express company smothered eight 

 pounds of these so that I received, on May 

 21, only a two-pound and a four-pound pack- 

 age. The weather turned too hot to refill the 

 order, and the breeder returned the money 

 for those lost, also express charges. By the 

 time the bees had arrived, I had the hives 

 on their stands in the orchard with full 

 sheets of foundation, and the feeders in 

 place ready for business. 



Foundation being used, it was necessary 

 to keep the bees pulling it out in order that 

 the queen could be kept as busy as possible. 

 Therefore as soon as the bees had drawn out 

 the four central frames, the first part of 

 June, I would take a frame of foundation 

 from the outside and place it in the center 

 of the brood-nest. As soon as this one was 

 well drawn I would again spread by placing 

 a frame of foundation on each side of the 

 middle one, thus leaving two frames of comb 

 and bees on the outside of each and a comb 

 of bees between. This leaves comb and bees 

 on both sides of the two sheets of founda- 

 tion. In one day the bees would have these 

 sheets well started, and the rapidity with 

 which I could spread my brood-nest was lim- 

 ited only by the number of frames the bees 

 were able to cover. 



The next problem was to get the bees 

 started to storing in the supers. I had or- 

 dered the shallow extracting supers, but 

 after keeping one of these on for a week 



