668 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



June 15 



of the hive-body to enlarge the entrance. 

 The empty super or hive-body must be re- 

 moved in 24 or 48 hours, or the bees will 

 build comb on the bottom of the frames, ex- 

 tending down into the empty body below. 

 Another thing that I think is very necessary 

 to have the bees stay hived is to have the 

 stock of empty hives piled in a cool place so 

 that they will be as cool as possible when 

 the bees are put in them. I think the bees 

 swarm out as Mr. Barfield mentions, not so 

 much from a desire to abscond, nor because 

 there is anything objectionable in the hive, 

 but because it is too hot for bees warmed up 

 by the exercise of swarming. 

 Bowhng Green, 0. A. J. Kilgore. 



A BLOCK FOR HOLDING FRAMES WHILE 

 NAILING THEM TOGETHER. 



Here is a block which I have used for 

 some time, and think it the best I ever saw 

 for holding the frames while nailing them. 

 The construction of the device will be suffi- 

 ciently clear from the illustration. 



To use this, lay it down on the bench. 

 Place two end-bars in position, and pull down 

 hinge No. 7 until it is straight, and it will, 

 if properly adjusted, hold them so firmly by 

 the rubber buffers on the ends of piece No. 

 5 that no amount of hammering will jar 

 them loose. H. R. Buffham. 



Newman, Cal. 



[This device would probably work satis- 

 factorily for frames whose top-bars are 

 nailed from the top. For frames whose top- 

 bars are secured by nails driven through 

 the end-bars from the side, some other plan 

 would doubtless work better. 



We would suggest that the thick block. 

 No. 1, be made a little narrower so that the 

 top-bar may rest on the bench if the block 

 is turned on edge for the purpose of nailing 

 the bottom-bars. — Ed.] 



SOFT MAPLE AS A MATERIAL FOR SECTIONS; 

 CHECK THE DESTRUCTION OF BASS- 

 WOOD FOR TIMBER. 



Mr. Root:— I notice that, in your com- 

 ment on pasteboard sections. May 15, you 

 state that no wood has been found to take 

 the place of basswood, and bend without 

 breaking. As a prospective bee-keeper I 

 am greatly interested in the preservation 

 and, if possible, the increase of basswood- 

 trees; hence it occurs to me to ask if soft 

 maple, sometimes called red maple, has ever 

 been tried for sections. The wood is a beau- 

 tiful creamy white, cuts cleanly and easily, 

 holds a smooth surface, and is quite tough 



when properly seasoned. My knowledge of 

 it comes from its use for turning and carv- 

 ing when I was a boy. The tree grows rap- 

 idly, is fairly abundant, easily raised from 

 seed, and stands transplanting and civiliza- 

 tion well. There are, or were, hundreds of 

 acres of it in Iowa. My memory is that a 

 State law, in force in the 70's, perhaps still 

 effective, rebated a certain amount of the 

 taxes of each man for every acre of trees 

 he planted, and soft maple was largely used 

 for this. I think the loss of the maple as a 

 pollen plant would be much more than bal- 

 anced by the saving of the basswood as a 

 honey-plant. 



Another thought has occurred to me, and 

 that is, that organized effort— Tpossihly by 

 the National Association, could do much 

 good for the bee-keepers of the country by 

 checking the destruction of basswoods for 

 timber, and especially by encouraging and 

 assisting in the planting of basswoods. 

 Through the schools on arbor day, and 

 through the State and National experiment 

 stations and colleges, young trees could be 

 grown and distributed. It may sound like 

 a dream, but I believe there is good hard 

 sense and good hard dollars back of it if the 

 right people will take it up. 



Willmette, 111. D. Farnsworth. 



[The objection to soft maple is that it 

 would be altogether too hard to work to ad- 

 vantage. Basswood is almost as soft as 

 pine; and on wood- working machinery it 

 would work about as easily. The soft maple 

 would make the labor on sections cost a good 

 deal more per thousand; moreover, it would 

 not grow nearly as rapidly as basswood. We 

 have had repeated examples in our locality, 

 where the latter would make about twice 

 the trunk diameter of the former in five or 

 ten years. At our old homestead one of the 

 soft maples blew down, and was, at the 

 time, about four inches in diameter. We 

 set out a basswood with a trunk only as big 

 as our thumb in its place. Over twenty 

 years have now elapsed, and the trunk of 

 the basswood is considerably larger than the 

 soft maples alongside of it that had a start 

 of some seven or eight years' growth. 



But there is another point to be consid- 

 ered. Prof. Cook has pointed out that soft 

 maples have many insect enemies in the 

 way of borers. It is not an uncommon 

 thing to see a tree of this kind ' ' dying at 

 the top." In some of our parks it is getting 

 to be a real problem to save the soft maples. 

 The same authority. Prof. Cook, says the 

 basswood is almost entirely free from insect 

 enemies. 



The owner of one of our large pleasure- 

 resorts is about to set out a large number 

 of basswoods, for he says he can already 

 see the beginning of the end of his soft 

 maples. Without shade of some sort, his 

 resort will be ruined. 



Check the consumption of basswood tim- 

 ber? I do not know how we are gi'ing to do 

 it. The furniture and box makers use a 

 hundred times as much of this valuable 



