l'J04. 



THE AMERICAN BEE-KEEPER. 



215 



•HARVESTING BEE STINGERS." 



Several readers have called our at- 

 L'litiou to an article in tlie Fhiladel- 

 hia North American for August 8, 

 la bora ting the details of a great in- 

 ustry carried on at Jenkintown, N. 

 ., by W. A. Selser, in extracting bee 

 lings to secure the poison for medical 

 urposes. While it is not improbable 

 tiat Mtt". Selser makes something of a 

 nsiness of supplying chemists, as in- 

 irated, the article is for the most part 

 Itsurd and ludicrous. The following 

 aragraph will suffice to illustrate the 

 eneral foolishness . of the thing as 

 ublished: 



Doesn't Hurt the Bee. 



'As the loss of the stinger does not 

 nterfei*e with the honey-producing 

 apacitj' of the bees, the apiarists are 

 nding fortune in the newly discover- 

 d cuH:e,and a gi'eat impetus has been 

 iven to bee cultivation. The stingers 

 ring $8 or $9 a thousand." 



THAT "PUZZLE." 

 In The Bee-Keeper for July, page 

 4S, was published a puzzling question, 

 nd we offered $1.00 for the best solu- 

 on of the matter sent in by a begin- 



'ffer before July 15th. Professional 

 piarists as well as amateurs have sent 

 1 replies, but to present writing we 

 re at a loss to tell who is entitled to 

 le dollar, for the reason that, to the 

 ditor's mind not one reply has really 



ri|ierited the reward. There seems to 

 are been no "best" or "most plausi- 

 le" solution received. 

 We have waited patiently for some- 

 ne else to solve the problem, but as no 

 plausible solution" has come to hand, 

 tie editor gives his oavu deferred re- 



^:. ponse, foe- which W. H. F. has asked. 



Is follows: 



Bereft of brood, queen and all else 

 ertaining to "home,'' and placed in a 

 lark room, it is the most natural thing 

 1 the world that a cluster of bees, in 

 esponse to the "call" from some lone 



_'j idividual, should congregate some- 

 '^here in the room; and the most likely 



^ lace would be in one of the supers. 



;!, Tnder similar, or the same conditions 

 uch a chister has been known to dc- 

 elop laying workers and attempt to 

 stablish themselves independently. 

 Then such a cluster was brushed he- 

 are a hive, lost and lonely, they would 

 sadlly enter any hive. Though war 



'jj '■Quid result to a greater or less extent 



''^*' any time, fighting would be the 



more intense and determined at night. 

 This is The American Bee-Keeper's 

 solution. If W. Z. Iltitchinson or E. K. 

 Root, Beedom's supremo .judge.s, will 

 supply (to their own minds) a moire 

 "plausible solution," they may either 

 one, or each, have a dollar. 



Elditof Adelsbach, of the Western 

 Bee Journal, summarizes the apicul- 

 tural situation in California about as 

 follows: 4,000 bee-keeperSi (luite a 

 number of which have from 1,000 to 1,- 

 500 colonies, while one man controls 

 8,000 colonies. It is estimated that 

 there is within the state about 3O0- 

 000 colonies, representing an invest- 

 ment of $1,500,000, and an annual ex- 

 penditure of $250,0<J0. The value of 

 the annual product is about $1,250,000. 



We shall be pleased to have brief 

 reports of the season from our readers. 

 Matter for publication should be writ- 

 ten upon only one side of the paper; 

 lines should not be too closely written, 

 and a margin should always be left 

 at side and top of sheet. The editor's 

 chief delight is in receiving letters 

 from his readers: but he begs to sug- 

 gest that before writing, each one will 

 kindly pick up all the lead pencils in 

 the house, walk away two or thtree 

 miles and lose every one of them. 



One of our northern correspondents 

 seems to take a special delight when 

 writing our southern office, in alluding 

 to the fact that Florida has but five 

 members of the National Association. 

 Does he not know that every state 

 maintains a similar or larger percen- 

 tage of bee-keepers who remain on 

 the outside in order to be qualified to 

 administer impartial and unbiased ad- 

 vice, as well as expert criticism? 



Mr. W. W. McNeal, our staff cor- 

 respondent, of Wheelersburg, Ohio, has 

 met a failure in the honey crop this 

 season, excepting a small quantity of 

 very dark stock. Mr. McNeal is. 

 however, vtery philosophical, besides 

 being a veritable mocking bird at 

 whistling, and he is already warbling 

 merrily as he contemplates the rich 

 possibilities of the future and makes 

 preparation for the season of 1905. 



An exchange says, in substance, that 

 the greatest enemy of the bee is the 

 ignorant bee-keeper. 



