1906 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CUl/lURE. 



1565 





Wise is the man who prepares ahead, 

 And makes ready for the unexpected; 



He is the man who makes his hread. 

 And, above all, should be respected. 



Circular No. 79 of the Bureau of Entomol- 

 ogy, Washington, D. C, "The Brood Dis- 

 eases of Bees." was kindly sent me by the 

 author. Dr. E. F. Phillips. Apicultural Expert 

 It treats the subject in a very condensed 

 form, and treats American and European foul 

 brood principally with methods for success- 

 fully treating the same. It will be found to 

 be of much interest to bee-keepers, and a 

 copy can be obtained free by writing Dr. 

 Phillips as aboye. 



That "shorter spelling" question is up 

 again. Several years ago this sort ot speil- 

 ine suited me so well that it was adopted and 

 used for a long time. While connected with 

 the Agricultural and Mechanical College of 

 Texas however, it had to be dropped tor the 

 reason that my manuscript matter had to be 

 eone over and "corrected" before it could 

 |o "Past" was changed to p-a-s-s-e-d; 

 " spilt " to s-p-i-1-l-e-d; "thru" to t-h-r-o-u-g-h, 

 etc The American Bee Journal kept it up 

 for a long time, although many of its readers 

 "fought" against that kind of short spelling. 

 but finally changed to the old way. 1 tor 

 one am in favor of the short spelling, it 

 was no trick for me to learn it, so why 

 should it be impossible for others? "A per- 

 son is never too old to learn. ' ' they say. 



That color plays a great part upon the 

 stinging propensities of bees was proven 

 again at the last extracting time when a 

 brother and [ worked in the yard together. 

 He wore a black felt hat and black pants, 

 while I had on a white straw hat and light- 

 colored duck trowsers. The weather was a 

 bit sultry, and the bees made a constant on- 

 slaught upon my brother's dark clothes ev- 

 ery time a colony was handled, driving him 

 out of the yard again and again, while i 

 worked on. receiving stings only on the bare 

 hands and unprotected wrists. They did not 

 make a charge for my hat, while my broth- 

 er's felt hat was covered with hundreds ot 

 stings and infuriated bees. The black cloth- 

 ing made the difference, for there was no 

 such trouble upon other occasions. 



The winter months are upon us, and the 

 time for preparing for next season i<honI(l be 

 now; however, it is "put off" until later. 

 when the bvisy season is at hand and every 

 thing has to be done on the jump. At this 



time, generally, orders are sent to the sup- 

 ply-dealer from all corners, and he runs be- 

 hind or short of stock, hence he can not fall 

 them. The bee-keeper loses time, and hon- 

 ey (money), and he raves and puts the blame 

 upon the supply-dealer when it is none but 

 his own fault. The better way is to get sup- 

 plies early, procure the discount given tor 

 early orders, and nail them up leisurely dur- 

 ing 'the winter months. Try it The result 

 will be that you will have every thing m 

 readiness far iihead of the time when need- 

 ed and the harvest will be obtained with 

 more leisure and more profit. 

 j^ 

 "Making" bees out of sugar syrup, says 

 ye editor, p. 1229. That is a very good way 

 to get bees. Most of our farmers have learned 

 our price of a colony of bees, and they have 

 consequently received the notion that theirs 

 are worth $3.00 a colony also. Others have 

 learned that xlhi are making bees pay big, 

 hence they hold on to theirs with the hope ot 

 reaping part of the other fellow's riches. By 

 practicing wholesale increase with proline 

 queens, and feeding enough to produce an 

 artificial "light flow," great results should 

 be obtained. How would you feed? and 

 what arrangements would you use? [Gener- 

 ally 1 would feed inside of the hives with a 

 small feeder of just enough capac-ity to give 

 a small feed dally. When small doses are 

 given, and often, practically all of it will go 

 into brood and bees. If large doses are giv- 

 en the syrup will go into the combs and not 

 much into brood. — Ed.] 



A JIAGNETIC HAMMER. 



\ small hammer, heavily charged, is one 

 of the most handv tools for a bee-keeper, i 

 have used them for years, always haying a 

 number of them at the several "stations. 

 Having a crippled forefinger on my left hand 

 makes it somewhat difiicult to pick up the 

 smaller nails used in frame-nailing, etc., so i 

 stumbled across the magnetic hammers, 

 which do the work for me. With it I can go 

 J A Green just one better in picking up 

 spilt nails. While he has an extra magnet to 

 carry around, which, in all likelihood may 

 not "be there" when the nails are spilt the 

 hammer, naturally going with the nails, is 

 put into play — a tool serving as two m one. 

 Such hammers are cheap, small tack-ham- 

 mers costing only from 5 to 10 cents and a 

 15-cent size, if it is well charged, is the most 

 satisfactory cheap hammer for frame-nailing, 

 etc . and will be "strong" enough for pick- 

 ing up any of the sizes of hive nails general- 

 ly used. 



DOES ALFALFA YIELD HONEY IN TEXAS? 



With the advent of irrigation in the arid 

 regions of Texas, and the planting of alfalfa, 

 will this State ever be classed with the West- 

 ern States that produce enormous amounts 

 of alfalfa honey annually? This has been an 

 interesting question over which many ot our 

 bee-keepers have pondered. It is the general 

 belief that alfalfa is a good honey-producmg 



