344 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Mar. 15 



INGS by such utterly erroneous teachings? 

 A careful study of history shows that the 

 groundhog and not the bear is the beast that, 

 on Feb. 2, makes observations on the weath- 

 er. O Gilbert! how could you? 



"Is IT NOT a fact that bees in that cellar 

 inside of their hives have a temperature of 

 nearly blood heat? "—footnote, p. 276. If I 

 remember rightly the temperature of the 

 cluster in the cellar when the bees are most 

 nearly dormant is 50''. Suppose, Mr. Edi- 

 tor, you take a thermometer and test the 

 matter as soon as you read this. [A tem- 

 perature of 52 degrees inside of the cellar- 

 wintered cluster — well, now, I will set our 

 boys to taking temperatures, and report 

 what they find. Later.— With a cellar tem- 

 perature of 55 and outside temperature of 

 37 the temperature inside of a cluster of one 

 colony was 84. We will test this out fur- 

 ther. Where did you see that the tempera- 

 ture was only 50 F.?-Ed.] 



It would be hard to find any point in bee- 

 keeping upon which greater variance of 

 opinion prevails than upon that of taking 

 bees out of cellar. Some say early, some 

 late. Some say take out by installments, 

 some say rush out in a bunch, each way be- 

 ing given as the one to prevent mixing. 

 My practice has been to take all out together 

 on a fine day. It has worked well, except, 

 especially the last two years, a few colonies 

 have become very strong at the expense of 

 others. Might be worth while to try E. W. 

 Alexander's plan of taking out in the even- 

 ing. He says, ' ' even if it takes not only all 

 night but into the next day." Now, does 

 he mean to keep on carrying in broad day- 

 light? If it works all right to carry out the 

 last in broad daylight, then it would be more 

 convenient to carry out all then, [We have 

 tried nearly all the methods for taking bees 

 out; and my own conclusion is that the plan 

 recommended by Mr. Alexander is the best 

 of all. When Mr. A. speaks about taking 

 the bees out at night, and keeping it up 

 all night, you will not forget that he 

 winters anywhere from 500 to 700 colo- 

 nies, and that his helpers may have to 

 make an all-night's job of it, even going in- 

 to the day. For a small lot of bees I should 

 suppose it would be just as well to take out 

 the bees the night before, providing we could 

 be assured of reasonable weather the next 

 day.— Ed.] 



It would be a good thing if the time and 

 place of the next National convention could 

 be soon announced. Unless lower rates can 

 be obtained from all parts to Texas, St. Paul 

 should be the place. There are objections 

 to following the G. A. R., but they're over- 

 ruled by the fact that the G. A. R. gets the 

 railroad rates, and the rates bring the crowd. 

 Even if rates are equal, one advantage in 

 following the G. A. R. is that a number of 

 good men are both bee-keepers and G. A. R. 

 men, and they'll attend both meetings when 

 they would not attend one alone. [San An- 

 tonio. Texas, the center of a great bee 

 coujitry, i=« making a stmng bid for the next 

 meeting of the National. Texas beekeep- 



ers feel that this is the third time that the 

 convention talked of going to their beautiful 

 city; and in view of the fact that it was 

 scheduled to meet there last winter, and had 

 to be held elsewhere owing to the yellow- 

 fever scare, they feel that this year they 

 have a right to expect it. They fully realize 

 that the G. A. R. excursion rates are very 

 low, and they are, therefore, making a stren- 

 uous effort to get the southern roads to 

 make some important concessions in the way 

 of rates. On the other hand, the Minnesota 

 bee-keepers, where the G. A. R. is to go, 

 meeting at St. Paul, are pulling very strong 

 to get the convention to go their way. There 

 is no doubt that, if the convention would go 

 into that great northwest region, it would 

 receive a most royal welcome. I understand 

 that the executive committees of the Nation- 

 al feel that the convention should not go to 

 Texas unless railroad rates can be guaran- 

 teed.— Ed.] 



Ye Editor, p. 277, thinks the smell rath- 

 er than the sound may call swarming bees. 

 Looks like a reasonable proposition. But 

 with that hypothesis, there are some things 

 hard to get over. "There is the stubborn 

 fact of the sound itself. Even the bee- keep- 

 er can hear it, recognize it, and differentiate 

 it from other sounds. Why not the bees? 

 If that sound does not call the bees, what is 

 that sound for? There seem good reasons 

 to believe that each colony has its individual 

 smell, recognized by its own bees. We know 

 positively that the call, whether by smell or 

 sound, is recognized by any bees in condition 

 to respond to the call. In many, many cases 

 I have seen ^ returning swarm go to a hive 

 other than its own, because the call was 

 there, a swarm having just previously re- 

 turned to that other hive. Has that colony 

 all at once changed from its individual smell 

 to a call smell, recognized by all bees alike? 

 [Do not get the impression that I think bees 

 do not hear. In my previous footnote I sim- 

 ply desired to bring out the point that the 

 scent factor may have had something to do 

 as well as the "call" in inducing those bees 

 to follow your swarm. I have noticed this : 

 In carrying clusters that have just been re- 

 moved from a limb of a tree across the yard, 

 if I did not walk too fast there would be 

 several hundred hangers-on that would fol- 

 low me like a flock of sheep. I attributed 

 this following to the odor of the swarm 

 rather than to the noise, because the cluster 

 was perfectly quiet. On the other hand, 

 when I have dumped a swarm in front of an 

 entrance, and got them started to rushing 

 in, it seemed to me that their roar or" call" 

 set all the bees wild in a scramble to get to- 

 ward that entrance. Apparently sound and 

 not scent was the drawing- card. — Ed.] 



You MISUNDERSTOOD, Mr. Editor, p. 276. 

 For years I bred from imported Italian 

 queens, not to get hybrids, but pure stock ; 

 the result, however, was hybrids. Quite 



gossibly, if I were to start afresh it would 

 e easier now to Italianize the neighborhood, 

 and I may try it. I confess, however, that 

 I don't feel any too sanguine about getting 



