February, lycxj. 



1 ^'^ft^^^C 



American Bee Journal j^^'^ %^^^S. 



\i 



63 



single-ticr, but when 24-seclion cases arc 

 under consideration there is a choice be- 

 tween single-tier and double-tier. Ac- 

 cording to the catalogs double-tier cases 

 are little used, but it seems that at least 

 Colorado bee-keepefs do not hold sin- 

 gle-tiers in highest favor. The case is 

 thus strongly put by Wesley Foster, in 

 Gleanings ; 



Comb honey is not wanted by the dealers in 

 single-tier shipping-cases. Several cars of comb 

 honey could be sold in the next week if the 

 honey were nut up in double-tier glass-front 

 cases, and tliere are several cars of comb 

 honey in Colorado packed in single-tier cases, 

 some without glass, and also lacking drip- 

 sticks, and it would have paid the producers 

 to study the market requirements more, and 

 paid less attention to the few cents saved 

 on a case. Two objections are as follows: 



First, in handling a carload of honey in 

 single-tier cases one will feel twice as tired 

 as after handling the same amount in the 

 double-tier. One can not get the hand-hold 

 as close to the edge as with the double tier, 

 and there is less room for the fingers. 



Second, if a case is picked up by the corn- 

 ers it will often twist enough in carrying to 

 break or crack some of the honey. This is 

 almost sure to occur if one carries in two 

 cases at a time and does not grip them just 

 right. 



Third, the top of the sections is flush with 

 the top of the sides of most of the single- 

 tier cases, making breakage almost sure. In 

 shipping, expressmen and freight-handlers drop 

 the end of one case in the middle of another 

 case on the pile; and if they do this at all 

 roughly the breaking of comb is certain. Cases 

 are stepped on often, and a single-tier case 

 simply will not stand this usage, while a 

 double-tier case with half the surface is safe, 

 provided there is an eighth-inch space between 

 the cover and the top of the section. 



Fourth, from the grocer's standpoint, the 

 glass in a case is for showing the goods; and 

 the more goods that are shown, the better 

 the impression, and the more honey sold. 

 Furthermore, it is a guarantee that at least 

 a fourth of the honey is all right if a double- 

 tier case is used. 



Fifth, a single-tier case takes up twice as 

 much room on the counter, showcase, shelf, 

 or floor; and since one can not put any- 

 thing on top of it and still get honey out of 

 it, the saving of half the floor space by the 

 use of the double-tier places it far in the lead. 



The objection brought against the double- 

 tier is that broken honey will leak on to the 

 section below. Leaky and broken honey should 

 not be cased for shipment any way, and ex- 

 perience shows that this objection is not worth 

 considering. 



A uniform case, the double-tire glass front, 

 has been adopted by Colorado bee-keepers. 

 Let all use it, and grade strictly according 

 to the rules. 



Airship Built on Bee-Model. 



Mr. F. W. Schroeder's new airship is 

 designed as nearly as possible on the 

 model of the bee. He can rise almost 

 perpendicularly into the air and travel 

 at great speed. When the Schroeder 

 airship comes to be given away with a 

 pound of foundation, the occupation of 

 vagrant swarms will be gone, for we 

 shall be able to overtake them and hive 

 them on the wing. We recommend the 

 idea to our most progressive suppliers 

 of bee-keeping appliances, and to all 

 whose sensitive emotions are antago- 

 nistic to the operation of clipping queens' 

 wings. — The Irish Bee Journal. 



A half-inch copper tube reaches from the 

 bottom of the inner pan through both pans, 

 and projects eight inches. In use, this double 

 pan, with inner space filled with soft water, is 

 set directly on an ordinarj^ cheap gasoline- 

 burner. A comb-rest is provided by means of 

 a piece of pine board run through the handles 

 of the pans. A small nail driven through 

 from below makes a point to hold the frame 

 while uncapping. The stove is kept burning 

 continuously while extracting; and if it does 

 not quite keep up with the work it can be 

 left burning during the noon hour or after 

 the day's work is finished. I can sec no 

 danger from leaving it, but be sure that the 

 pail under the spout is large enough to hold 

 the contents of the pan. It works finely, and 

 I see no need of any thing better. The wax 

 and honey run- out into a pail, but there is a 

 certain amount of slumgum that will accumu- 

 late in the pan. This is kept from running 

 out by means of a piece of tin notched on 

 the under side, set about j4 in. back of the 

 spout. After the pan has cooled, this slum- 

 gum can be peeled out in the form of a cake, 

 to be run through the Hatch-Geramill press 

 if the bee-keeper is so fortunate as to possess 

 one of those desirable machines. 



Any machine devised to use any more heat 

 than I have indicated, or any plan to run the 

 honey over a larger heated space, will injure 

 it. The honey must run out freely as soon 

 as melted, and one should use the minimum 

 of heat. We now have no cappings on hand 

 to bother at the close of each day's extracting. 



Fall Preparation of Bees. 



In order to have an extra force of 

 young bees for winter, and at the same 

 time an extra supply of stores, Alex. 

 Dickson, in the Canadian Bee Journal, 

 thus advises to proceed in the fall: 



Remove the outside combs, which are full 

 of honey, and replace with empties put in the 

 center. Your young queen is thus given a 

 chance to do her best before the closing of 

 the laying season, and you will find when the 

 time for fall feeding comes that your colonies 

 are flowing over with young bees. A colony 

 should have at least 25 pounds of honey to 

 winter on, so be sure to feed up all colonies 

 having less. 



The combs you have taken out to give the 

 queen a chance to lay you will put away till 

 feeding time, and then you can give them 

 back as winter stores. 



Extracting Outfit for Out-Apiaries. 



The question whether it is better to 

 have a separate outfit for extracting at 

 each apiary, or to have a single outfit 

 to be hauled from one apiary to another, 

 depends upon circumstances, according 

 to R. T. Rhees. He says in the Bee- 

 Keepers' Review: 



"It is cheaper to fit up a small house with 

 a stationary extracting outfit, than fit up one 

 equally good in the shape of an extracting 

 wagon, hence, if a bee-keeper has only two or 

 three yards, or where more than that number 

 are so isolated that they can not be reached 

 in a continuous route, I would advise a small 

 house at each yard, hauling about only such 

 light apparatus as can not well be kept at 

 each yard. ^ 



"It is cheaper to fit up one good extract- 

 ing outfit on a low- wheeled farm truck, than 

 it is to fit up one equally good, or even a 

 part of one, at each of many yards. Besides, 

 it is quite a saving of time to have everything 

 in place ready to commence work when you 

 driv.e into the yard, which is not the case 

 where the local honey-house is used for ex- 

 tracting. Therefore, I would use an extract- 

 ing wagon where a number of yards are so 

 located that they can be reached in a rota- 

 tion by making short drives from one to the 

 other." 



Capping-Melter. 



A home-made machine by which the 

 cappings may be melted as fast as cut 

 is thus given by Harry Lathrop, in 

 Gleanings in Bee Culture: 



I had the tinner fix a melting-pan by tak- 

 ing a large stamped tin dishpan, placing one 

 a size smaller in it and connecting them to- 

 gether with braces, leaving an inch space be- 

 tween them on botom and sides for water. 



Hot Bee-Prank in New York State. 



The following interesting "bee-story" 

 was sent to us by S. Davenport, of In- 

 dian fields, N. Y., it having appeared in 

 a local newspaper : 



From time immemorial mysterious happen- 

 ings occur on Hallowe'en night and are as- 

 cribed to various agencies, from the fairy 

 elf of imaginative origin to the mischievous 



imps led on by his Satanic majesty. Some of 

 the doings may be safely attributed to the 

 harmless fairies and others indeed to the evil 

 one himself. Of the latter category of deeds 

 provocative of human wrath, many arc con- 

 ceived in the brains of wild and reckless 

 youth, whose minds arc bent on having a 

 little fun and a good time. And they gen- 

 erally get it during the nocturnal darkness 

 of Oct. 31st. 



This year's anniversary has presented no 

 exception to the general rule and many in- 

 stances of Hallowe'en pranks have been no- 

 ticeable, from the lifting of the front gate 

 and the displacement of signs and other mov- 

 able objects from their wonted locations, to 

 the elevation of grindstone and wheelbarrow 

 to the roof of the blacksmith's shop, the 

 overturning of old vehicles adorning his prem- 

 ises, the removal of wheels to distant parts 

 and casting them down the Hannacroix bank, 

 and later still, on election night, to the re- 

 moval of hives of bees from the apiary on 

 Snider Hill and carrying the same, five in 

 number, some 200 yards up the road and de- 

 positing them over a stone wall in a bed of 

 dead leaves, where they would not be readily 

 seen. This work was attempted on Hallowe'en 

 night, but the owner being disturbed in hi# 

 slumbers, the perpetrators fled in fright lest 

 they be detected, but on election night they 

 accomplished their purpose and made off with 

 their booty. What strenuous effort and sacri- 

 fice of sleep and comfort it required to secure 

 a little mischievous fun, to say nothing of 

 the many lance thrusts they received from 

 the innocent honey-bee. There was evidence 

 that they had a hot time of it as they went 

 on with their nefarious work, ruthlessly dis- 

 turbing the homes of the innocent honey-bee 

 and causing thousands of them to die. They 

 went to bed that morning nursing swollen 

 heads and smarting fingers, the just reward 

 of their deviltry. 



To accomplish their job they improvised a 

 hive-carrier out of some rails, but as they 

 got along under the Greening apple-tree their 

 carrier broke and let their bees fall to the 

 ground. Thousands of them swarmed the 

 air, and ugh! ugh! hi! hi! ugh! ugh! resound- 

 ed on every side, driving them from their 

 task. Here the director of the party met with 

 a sad mishap. Whirling about in a rage as 

 the little stingers beset him on all sides, he 

 accidentally tore off one of his "cloven hoofs'* 

 and in the agony of his torture he was glad 

 to escape and leave his "hoof" behind. Now 

 the trail of his meddlesome presence can eas- 

 ily be traced by reason of his stump foot- 

 prints. 



With the bees subsiding under the chilling 

 effect of the night air, the boys returned to 

 work and succeeded in reaching their desti- 

 nation and then depositing the hives over the 

 stone wall. Here another mishap occurred. 

 One hive was divisible, consisting of two 

 stories. In placing it over the wall the hive 

 came apart and the brood-chamber landed 

 down among the leaves bottom side up and 

 with all the brood-frames displaced. This 

 great disturbance of the bees again aroused 

 their anger and they swarmed up about the 

 heads of the miscreants peppering them with 

 hot shot in righteous vengeance for the out- 

 rage on the sanctity of their home. Thus a 

 lot of fun was enjoyed, but they paid dear 

 for their whistle. 



The sequence of this exploit was not as en- 

 joyable to the victim as to the perpetrators, not- 

 withstanding their merited punishment. After 

 discovering by the merest accident where the 

 hives had been deposited, he had a job of it to 

 return them to their old locations and to get 

 them rearranged in their normal situations. 

 It was like the tug of war to lug the hives 

 back single-handed and unaided, and then to 

 clean the brood-nest of each of the dead leaves 

 imbedded therein and to readjust them. There 

 was no fun in it. but with proper care there 

 were no stings. Perseverance and perspiration 

 did the work, and finally it was accomplished. 

 It took just 4 hours to restore and readjust 

 the hives of bees to their old location. 



These hives of bees <tere some of the best 

 of the apiary of 32 colonies. Each possessed 

 a young queen and from 10,000 to 20,000 bees. 

 They had been fed up for winter and were in 

 prime condition for passing the critical period 

 of their existence. When they were restored 

 to their summer stands they were very muck 

 weakened, showing that many thousands of 

 bees had perished by this wanton marauding. 

 It may have been jolly fun for the boys, but 

 it can be easily seen that it was no joking 

 matter for the bee-keeper. 



It was a satisfaction to the victim to know 

 that the perpetrators did not have the pleasure 

 of seeing him tugging along with the heavy 

 hives with the drops of perspiration flow- 



