(Entered as second-class matter July 3D. 1»U7. at the Post-Offlee at Chicago, 111., under Act of March 3, 1879.) 



Published Monthly at 75 cents a Year, by George W. York & Company, 146 West Superior Street, 



GEORGK W. YORK. Editor 



DR. C. C MILLER. .\ssociatL- Editor 



CHICAGO, ILL., SEPTEMBER, 1909 



VoL XLIX-No. 9 



ditorial ^ofes 

 aitd Commenfs 



Haisiiig: the Price of Honey 



If you are dissatisfied with the price 

 you are getting for your honey and 

 Would like to know what you can do to 

 get more, please put it down as a gen- 

 eral rule that the first move toward 

 raising the price is to raise the quality. 

 If some careless bee-keeper sells to 

 your grocer or your private customer, 

 honey that is only half ripened, at a 

 price 2 cents below what you are ask- 

 ing, don't drop your price to meet him, 

 but redouble your effort to produce an 

 article so superior that your customers 

 cannot fail to note the difference — even 

 call their attention to its superiority. 

 Persistency in that line will surely 

 bring its reward, and in time you will 

 find that people will be clamoring for 

 yoiir honey in preference to that of any 



one else. 



^ 



CiettiiifT the Sections an<l t'oiiib.s 

 Cleaned Out 



When the season closes, whether it 

 be in July or September, sections should 

 at rmce be taken oflf. If left on longer, 

 the liees may do no little damage by 

 daubing glue over the combs, and some- 

 times gnawing the foundation. Then 

 comes what is for many the trouble- 

 some part, getting the bees to clean out 

 the sections that contain only a little 

 lioney. 



There are two ways to accomplish 

 this, that seem diametrically opposite — 

 each good in its place. The Miller plan 

 is to pile the supers out-of-doors, where 

 the bees can have access to them, but 

 to have them covered up, and allow an 

 entrance for only one or two bees at a 

 time. The B. Taylor plan is to let every 

 super be exposed to the fullest extent. 

 Which of the plans is to be used de- 



pends upon the number of supers as 

 compared with the number of colonies. 

 If there are as many supers as colonies 

 — possibly it half as many supers as 

 colonies-^then the Taylor plan is all 

 right. If the number of supers is less 

 than stated, then the Taylor plan would 

 result in having the combs torn, an<l 

 the smaller the number of sections the 

 worse they will be torn. The Miller 

 plan is the tiling for a small number. 



E.xtracting-combs may be cleaned up 

 on the hives — not an easy thing to do 

 with sections — but it is much easier to 

 set them out fully exposed to the bees. 

 Unless the combs are new, they will be 

 little torn, even if the number be small. 



get queens from him very early ne.\t 

 year; and queens reared during the 

 iioney-flow come in the natural time 

 for queen-rearing.aud so average better. 

 Queens are introduced more safely 

 now, while honey is coming in, than in 

 tlie spring before there is any flow. .'Vn 

 important item is that a queen intro- 

 duceil now will be in full working or- 

 der from the very start next spring, 

 ready to breeil from as soon as the sea- 

 son is sufficiently advanced. 



So you see there is very good ground 

 for taking time by the forelock and or- 

 dering queens now instead of waiting 

 till next spring. -A good way is to buy 

 several untested queens. You then 

 stand a chance to get in the lot what 

 will prove a choice tested queen. 



(iet New Queens Now 



Next sprint; a number of bee-keepers 

 will be asking about getting new 

 (|ueens for the sake of improving their 

 stock. If they are wise, they will not 

 wait till spring, but act iiozr. Not that 

 their getting new stock w-ill make any 

 very great difference this year, but the 

 new queen or queens will be in place 

 ready to do business on good time 

 next year. There is more than one 

 good' reason for this. In the spring a 

 (|ueen can lie had only by paying an 

 extra price, for if it be got early it will 

 be one that has been wintered over. If 

 not kept over winter, it is not likely to 

 be of the best quality, for experienced 

 bee-keepers say that queens reared 

 very early are likely to turn out very 

 poor. 



It sounds a little paradoxical, but it 

 is true all the same, that the best 

 queens arc the cheapest. That is, from 

 the same breeder you will get queens 

 reared at this time of year, or a little 

 earlier, for less money than you can 



Multiplication of the Foul Brood 

 Hacilli 



We are told that one reason why foul 

 brood is such a dreadful scourge is 

 that the little plants that are calleil 

 bacilli increase so very rapidly. E.acli 

 bacillus, in half an hour, will divide 

 into two. Well, a potato can be divided 

 into a good deal more than two. But 

 not everv half hour. In half an hour 

 a bacillus will become 2, and in an hour 

 it will be 4. .\ half hour later there \yill 

 be 8, and in 2 hours from the beginning 

 there will be Ki. Surely not a formid- 

 able number, but just keep that up, 

 dotibling every half hour, and in (5 hours 

 vou will have 4uno. That begins to 

 'look like something. In 12 hours, I(i,- 

 000,000, anil ill 21 hours, 250,000,000,000,- 



000. 



Perhaps it is not best to pursue the 

 painful subject any farther. 



Use of Younfi ltroo<l 



It is, a common practice with many 

 to give a frame of brood to a newly- 

 hived swarm. Such a swarm, if put 

 into an unshaded hive in the broiling 

 sun, with little chance for ventilation, 

 is very likely to desert the hive, while 

 a fully established colony under pre- 

 cisely the same conditions will have no 

 thought of absconding. The estab- 

 lished C(dony cannot afford to leave its 

 valuable possessions, while the swarm, 

 having as yet only an empty hive, 

 wisely concludes it will do well to 



