1906 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



205 



In my article on foul brood in apiaries run 

 for extracted honey, on page 1299, a mistake 

 occurs that reverses my meaning. I meant 

 to write that, in extracting an apiary, any 

 colonies showing any trace of disease should 

 be extracted from last, with proper precau- 

 tions about cleaning up the extractor after- 

 ward. But by some slip, either of myself 

 or the compositor, I am made to say that 

 they should be extracted from first. This 

 would not be good practice. 



We have had warm weather here for some 

 days, and the bees have had good flights. 

 Most of them are alive so far, but I look for 

 a heavy loss in the spring. Many bee-keep- 

 ers did not feed their bees any thing in the 

 fall, although they knew they were light, 

 and a great many will not have honey enough 

 to carry them through. Many others went 

 into winter quarters so few in numbers, and 

 with so large a proportion of old bees, that, 

 even if they survive the winter, they are 

 likely to dwindle in the spring. 



Most of the Colorado honey exhibited at 

 the St. Louis World's Fair came from the 

 counties of Mesa and Otero. A rather 

 laughable result of this was the awarding of 

 a gold medal jointly to these two counties 

 for their honey exhibit. Some of you may 

 appreciate the joke better if I remind you 

 that Mesa and Otero counties are separated 

 by over two hundred miles of mountains as 

 the crow flies, and by about fifteen hours of 

 travel by rail in as straight a line as the 

 aforesaid mountains will permit. Conse- 

 quently a joint award is very much like mak- 

 ing an award jointly to Massachusetts and 

 Maryland. How that medal is going to be 

 divided up is a conundrum that I believe has 

 not yet been answered. As the Superior 

 Jury of Awards has gone out of existence, 

 there seems to be no way to have the blun- 

 der corrected. 



Some time ago I made the statement that 

 making a section larger, either by making 

 it higher or wider, or by making it thicker, 

 would make greater the difference in weight 

 between the lightest and heaviest sections. 

 Dr. Miller challenged the truth of this; and, 

 though I showed that I was correct in the 

 latter part of the statement, I must admit 

 that, theoretically, I was wrong in the for- 

 mer. I delayed saying any thing more, 

 thinking that I would make some experi- 

 ments to see how nearly theory and practice 

 would agree, but the matter escaped my 

 mind until now. 



The section that I use is always light- 

 weight, averaging only a little over three- 



quarters of a pound. I should like to have 

 them heavier. I am sure that I can not do 

 this by making them thicker, except at 

 great loss. I would make them higher, 4i 

 X5Xl|, if it were not for the expense, an- 

 noyance, and complication that such a change 

 would make in a large apiary already well 

 supplied with fixtures adapted to standard 

 sizes. 



WIDTH OF SECTION. 



I presume, Mr. Editor, in correcting Dr. 

 Miller for assuming that the 4i plain section 

 is 1| thick, and in yourself assuming that 

 "as a matter of fact" the 4 J square plain 

 is I5 thick, you simply mean that the ma- 

 jority of the square plain sections used are 

 of that thickness, although you state that, 

 so far as you know, there are no 4| plain, 1§ 

 thick. Let me quote from the catalog of 

 the A. L Root Co. : 



' ' The regular size of section hitherto has 

 been 4i square by li, with the usual bee- 

 way. The same section without beeways 

 will be IJ, and will hold about the same 

 amount of honey. The old seven-to-foot 

 with beeways will be 1§ without beeways." 



Further on, on the same page of the catalog, 

 we read, " Widths of . . . sections gen- 

 erally kept in stock . . . plain sections 

 IJ, 1§, 1|, and IJ." Again, in quoting 

 prices, "Plain, no-beeway sections, 4jX4iX 

 li. 1§, or If . . . in lots of 1000 or more, 

 will be 25 cents per 1000 less than prices 

 named above. ' ' Now, would not any one be 

 justified in assuming that the 1§ square sec- 

 tion was one of the regular sizes? "As a 

 matter of fact," I have used them for five 

 or six years, have a considerable stock of 

 them on hand now; and if I continue to use 

 plain sections I will continue to use that 

 width unless I succeed with some experi- 

 ments now under way, in which I hope to 

 use I5 plain sections with the same thickness 

 of comb I now get with the 1| plain or sev- 

 en to-foot regular, in this way getting rid 

 of some of the worst defects of the plain 

 section. 



I am afraid that I am unalterably in favor 

 of the thin section. Although there are 

 some inconveniences to be met in the pro- 

 duction of light-weight sections, I would 

 rather put up with them than to go back to 

 the old-style thick-comb section. 



Did it ever occur to you that a great deal 

 of the sentiment that has grown up in favor 

 of 4X5 sections and plain sections is not due 

 to either the size or shape of the section, or 

 to the fact that the combs are built between 

 fences, but simply to the fact that the combs 

 are thinner? Do not understand me as say- 

 ing that this accounts for all of it, because 

 some who like these things have not used 

 the thinner sections. But a very large pro- 

 portion of the testimonials in favor of fences 

 and 4X5 sections come from those who have 

 changed from the li section, equivalent to 

 the IJ plain, to the If plain. They have 

 found that they got more honey, plumper 

 sections, and better finish, and they have 

 laid it to the shape of the sections, the kind 



