412 



December, 1909. 



American ^ec Joarnalj 



and the securing of worker-cells in the upper 

 part of the frame instead of sagged cells 

 that are not fit for worker brood-cells. It 

 will pay to use splints for the one advantage 

 of stiffening the comb for extracting, be- 

 cause they save the combs from breakage. 



In our experience last year there was no 

 trouble caused by bees gnawing at the lower 

 end of the splints; but I see no use for the 

 full-length splint, and the short ones are 

 easier and more quickly applied. 



Light brood foundation with splints gives 

 a much stronger comb for extracting the 

 first time than wired medium brood foun 

 dation. ____^^_^^^ 



European and American Basswoods 



The -Vinerican basswoud blotuiis eailier 

 than the European by at least ten days. 

 About the time t\^e American basswood be- 

 gins to go out of bloom, or a little later, the 

 European commences, thus extending the 

 season. It seems to me that the European 

 is more prolific in bloom than the American, 

 and I think that the tree begins to bloom at 

 an earlier age. The European basswood be- 

 gins to bloom at from five to eight years of 

 age. and being of quite rapid growth, it soon 

 makes a tree of considerable size. 



It would be quite possible to select a ver\- 

 early-blooming American basswood and a 

 very late European, thus extending the sea- 

 son still more. If bee-keepers would give a 

 little attention to this matter they might be 

 able to lengthen out the season several days, 

 but it would be necessary, when trees of an 

 earlier-blooming and later-blooming habit 

 were found, to propagate by budding or 

 grafting, which is not a difficult process in 

 the case of the linden. — Prof. W. J. Green. 

 in Gleanings in Bee-Culture. 



Shallow Extracting Frames 



Louis Scholl makes a strong point 

 in favor of these when tlie crop is 

 short, or when one wants to catch the 

 iiigli price of an early market, in Glean- 

 ings : 



While the deep Langstroth supers contain 

 quite a quantity of honey, very little of it is 

 ready to take off. as it is scattered through- 

 out the combs, with some green honev inter- 

 mixed, which the bees are still bringing in 

 sparingly. It is not profitable to go through 

 these supers and remove only the completed 

 combs, of which there are few. as it con- 

 sumes entirely too much time. 



With the shallow supers we find all the 

 upper ones completed, sealed over, and 

 ready to be taken right off. The honey is 

 riper since the bees began earlier, and has 

 been stored more nearly at the same time, 

 and always in the uppermost part of the 

 hive. Is there any doubt about this being a 

 superior grade of surplus honey over that 

 \vhich is stored in decii combs, besides en- 

 abling us to produce more of it. and that 

 earlier, in the shallow supers than in deep 

 ones? 



Preventing Honey Running Over 



If honey is allowed to run constantly 

 from the extractor, only stopping it 

 when a pail is filled, there is danger of 

 a mess if one forgets and allows the 

 honey to run all oyer the floor. E. D. 

 Townsend, in Gleanings, gives a way 

 to prevent all chance of such trouble, 

 which Editor Root says is all right if 

 there be a little extra capacity below 

 the extractor reel. Mr. Townsend 

 says: 



Allow the extractor tofill with honey until 

 the revolving baskets begin 10 swim in the 

 honey. Then set the pail under the gate, 

 lift the handle of the gate and hold it up un- 

 til the pail is full. With the large gates now 

 put on extractors, and with warm honey a 

 pail will fill in about one-fourth of a minute. 

 Now empty tne pail into the tank, leaving it 

 turned upside down to drain until the ex- 

 tractor needs emptying again. We have 

 been all tnrough the troubles which follow 

 when the extractor is run with the gate open 

 all the time. It is a poor and expensive way 

 simply to close the gate when a full pail is 

 exchanged for an empty one. The other 

 way is much better. 



Bees Help the Vineyard 



A young man in the shoe-business 

 was burned out in the fire at San Fran- 

 cisco. He owned a few acres of table 

 grapes near Sanger, in the San Joaquin 

 Valley. He decided to turn farmer, 

 and went down and cultivated his 

 grapes. The soil was good, the season 

 a fair average, his vines were healthy, 

 his neighbor had big crops. He had 

 nothiftg. What did he do? He took 

 the next train to Berkeley, and went to 

 the "Cow College," as they call the 

 agricultural department of the State 

 University. He laid the case before 

 the viti-cultural expert and got it 

 diagnosed and prescribed for. The 

 diagnosis was that the blossoms prob- 

 ably needed to be fertilized from the 

 pollen of other vines by artificial 

 means. The prescription was a dozen 

 colonies of ' bees to be distributed 

 through the vineyard. The next season 

 he had a bumper crop. 



This small incident is significant be- 

 cause it is typical. The Californian 

 takes his problem to experts and fol- 

 lows advice when he gets it. He has 

 no bucolic contempt for theorists. — 

 fVorM's irork. 



Extractiugr Without Shaliiugr or 

 Brushing- 



S. E. Miller, of Missouri, thus gives 

 the plan, which seems to be from actual 

 experience, in the Bee-Keepers' Review : 



First, I will say that the plan is not practi- 

 cal unless queen-excluding honey-boards are 

 used, so it will not apply to the fellow who 

 insists upon having brood all through his 

 hives that are run for extracted honey. 



Clear a space of all fixtures that may be in 

 the way near the doors of the honev-house. 

 Open the wood doors and leave the screen- 

 doors closed. Leave the door free of all ob- 

 struction through which to pass with the 

 wheelbarrow. 



All doors and windows should be provided 

 with escapes, and the windows may be used 

 as well as the doors by lowering the upper 

 sash, provided there is room enough to place 

 the supers, and the windows are screened 

 and provided with escapes. Now with your 

 wheelbarrow, your smoker in good order, 

 and your hive-tool, you are ready to begin 

 operations. Two or three robber-cloths will 

 be needed if bees are inclined to rob; and at 

 such time is when this method is of the 

 greatest advantage. 



Proceed to the hive you may choose to 

 commence upon; raise the cover and give a 

 few vigorous puffs of smoke. Insert the 

 hive-tool between the super and brood- 

 chamber, or next super below, as the case 

 m,i\ be. As you pry it up give more smoke. 

 Standing beside the hive, grasp the super by 

 the end hand-holes; lift it clear of the lower 

 part, and with a sort of swing bring it over 

 and place it on the wheelbarrow, which 

 should be as close at hand as possible. There 

 is a knack about this movement that, if prop- 

 erly acquired, will enable the man of average 

 strength to handle the heaviest loframe su- 

 per of extracting combs with but little diffi- 

 culty. 



If there is more than one super to the hive, 

 proceed in the same manner. When all are 

 off. put on the cover. I would not at this 

 time remove the excluders, as they are 

 sometimes rather hard to remove, and it 

 takes time ^liat we cannot spare just now. 

 Cover the supers with a robber-cloth if rob- 

 bers are about. Proceed to the next hive 

 and repeat the operation. Continue until 

 the wheelbarrow contains as many supers 

 as you feel like pushing. Then wheel it into 

 the honey-house and pile the supers cross- 

 wise of one another near the door or win- 

 dow. In doing this von have not used a 

 brush or removed a single comb from the 

 supers. The supers may be piled as high as 

 you feel like lifting them, and as close to- 

 gether as you can place them. Proceed in 

 this manner until you have occupied all 

 the space you can spare in the honey-house 

 near the door and windows. 



By this time the supers that you first 

 brought in are practically clear of bees. 



The latter having clustered on the screen 

 door, or if sufficient escapes have been pro- 

 vided they will have passed out almost as fast 

 as they leave the supers. It would, there- 

 fore, be well to have several escapes in the 

 top of the door, or else to have one large es- 

 cape the entire width of the door by having 

 the screen run up nearly to the top of the 

 door and having a bee-space between the 

 screen and door frame top. 



You are now ready to commence uncap- 

 ping and extracting, and the bees will keep 

 out of your way about as fast as you can 

 work, provided you can work the supers 

 in the same order that they were brought 

 in. It may be necessary to use the brush 

 occasionally for a few stray bees, but thjs 

 is a small matter. My doors are not pr o 

 vided with sufficient escapes, and some- 

 times what would make a fair-sized swarm 

 of bees accumulate in the upper corner of 

 the door frame and on the screen. I simply 

 push the screen door partly ajar, and strike 

 t a blow with my hand, then quickly brush 

 the bees from the door frame and close the 

 screen. 



At times there may be quite a few bees 

 flying about in the honey-house, but they are 

 not a serious interference, and one can well 

 put up with it when he considers the amount 

 of hard and disagreeable work he has avoid- 

 ed, for brushing bees from combs out-of- 

 doors, when robbers are on the war-path, is 

 anything but a pleasant task. 



Bee.s iu Uganda and Chile 



Mr. E. H. Bruner, a Chicago sub- 

 scriber to the AiTierican Bee Journal, 

 kindly sends us the following about 

 bees and beeswax in Uganda, taken 

 from the " Daily Consular and Trade 

 Reports," of Sept. 3, 1909: 



Consul Arthur Garrels. of Zanzibar, re- 

 ports that, according to an East African 

 newspaper, the chiefs and people of Uganda 

 are becoming enthusiastic in the domesti- 

 cation of bees for the production of wax, 

 one of the few products that can be profit- 

 ably exported from the Nile country. Asa 

 result of the work of instructors sent to 

 teach bee-keeping, bees are being largely 

 domesticated by the natives, as mantya's 

 8000 hives having been erected in the easern 

 province alone, 2000 hives being already oc- 

 cupied, and there is reason to believe that 

 within another year beeswax will be among 

 the staple exports of Uganda. At Entebbe 

 it is worth about 22J4 cents per pound. 



Also the following referring to bee- 

 culture in Chile : 



Consul .'Xlfred A. Winslow. of Valparaiso, 

 calls attention in the following manner to 

 one of the more important of the minor in- 

 dustries of Chile, and the opportunity for 

 the more extensive introduction of modern 

 American methods and appliances: 



Chile exports large quantities of honey 

 and beeswax, notwithstanding the fact that 

 comparatively little effort is made to ad- 

 vance the industry, as indicated by the fol- 

 lowing extract from the Boletin de la Socie- 

 dad Nacional de Agricultura. the leading 

 agricultural publication in Chile; 



"We are safe in saying that there are few 

 countries that have conditions more favor- 

 able to the production of honey than Chile. 

 The benignity of the climate in the greater 

 part of her territory, with the exception of 

 the extreme north and south, and the abun- 

 dant flora, wild as well as cultivated flowers, 

 favor the extension of the bee-industry. Not- 

 withstanding all these favorable circum- 

 stances, the bee-industry has not been de- 

 veloped in proportion to the advantages that 

 obtain, owing to the fact that there are so 

 few operators who understand the manage- 

 ment of bees, and particularly according to 

 the latest methods. Ne\'ertheless. the pro- 

 duction goes on increasing from year to 

 year. The apiaries that are well attended 

 give splendid results, and especially those 

 of the south, where it is not uncommon to 

 find hives that produce as high as 40 kilos (88 

 pounds) of honey during the year." 



During ifjoS there were 5.510,120 pounds of 

 honey and <)oq,125 pounds of beeswax exported 

 against 3,if)H,j4o pounds of honey and 573,760 

 pounds of beeswax for IQ07. of which Ger- 

 many took about 60 percent. France is per- 

 cent. England 15 percent, and Belgium 8 per- 

 cent. 



Here seems to be a good opening for the 

 further introduction of up-to-date appliances 

 and methods, as the field is ideal for the in- 

 dustry. 



