1905. 



THE AMERICAN BEE-KEEPER. 



229 



FLAT FOOLISHNESS. 

 Mr. Forestier, who lives In the French- 

 peaking- part of Switzerland, made some 

 ixperiinents last summer to ascertain 

 whether the bees recognize each other or 

 ather those of the saine hive by their odor. 

 le first ascertained the effect on his own 

 lands. He washed them thoroughly, and 

 hen rubbed them with the "juice" obtained 

 )y crushing the drones from a certain hive. 

 Then he proceeded to open the hive, handle 

 he frames, bees, etc. Not a sting was 

 eceived, the bees even ran quietly over his 

 lands, like they did on their own combs. 

 But when he attempted to do the same 

 vith a different colony, the stings came fast 

 md furious. The experiment was repeated 

 several times with the same results except 

 ccasionally during higli w-inds or very hot 

 Breather, when the operator received a few 

 itlngs. This may be explained from the 

 act that a high wind would carry away 

 he "juice's" odor and leave only the na- 

 ural odor of the hands. In hot weather, 

 he abundant perspiration evidently spoiled 

 he program. 



The next was to try on bees. The re- 

 sults were the same. A bee washed in 

 greatly diluted alcohol and then daubed with 

 'juice" from the drones of another hive is 

 well received in the hive from which the 

 drones were taken, from; but invariably 

 killed or repulsed when presented to her 

 own home. The experiment was also made 

 with the two queens with the same result. 

 Mr. Forestier suggests that this might fur- 

 nish another "infallible" method of intro- 

 ducing queens. — Bulletin de la Suisse Ro- 

 mande. 



WHY NOT TRY THE PIGS? 

 Somebody has suggested that very dark, 

 unsalable honey would be a splendid horse 

 feed; that is, mixed with the usual grain 

 and hay ration. 



QUEEN CELLS. 

 An English queen breeder, Mr. H. W. 

 Brice, is quoted as saying that when a queen 

 is removed, two sets of queen cells are start- 

 ed, the nrst on larvae already hatched, the 

 second two days later, or about, on larvae 

 that were not hatched yet when the re- 

 moval took place. The first batch may num- 

 ber from three to fifteen, the second, only 

 two or three, perhaps only one. The queens 

 from the second batch are the best. 



PROBABLY CORRECT. 

 The remark has been made that some- 

 times the strongest colonies fail to give 

 the amount of surplus that their size would 

 lead to expect. Mr, Klein thinks in such 

 cases the proper proportion between old and 

 young bees does not exist. That they have 

 been strong only a short time, brood rearing 

 having only developed just before the flow. 

 He says that a colony not well supplied 

 with brood on May 1st is not likely to be 

 well supplied with bees on May 20th and 

 will scarcely be well supplied with honey 

 on June 15th. He insists on the necessity 

 of having the colonies strong when going 

 into winter quarters, so a large amount of 

 brood can be raised early enough to fur- 

 nish field bees when the flows come. 



TAKE IT WITH A GRAIN OF SALT. 



Mr. H. Fontaine proposes a new way of 

 managing bees for extracted honey. Some- 

 how or other, he placed once in a hive 

 some pieces of broken combs in a horizontal 

 position. To his surprise, he found that the 

 bees were using them as well as if they 

 had been in their usual position. This gave 

 him the idea of using in the surplus apart- 

 ments combs made with double artificial 

 base of wood or metal placed horizontally 

 and having cells only on the upper side. 

 The upper base, to which the cells would be 

 attached, should be perforated with small 

 holes. As fast as the bees would put the 

 honey in the cells it would run through these 

 holes and between the two pieces of the 

 double base and from there in any conven- 

 ient kind of receptacle. The best part of 

 the story is that a trial made with a small 

 piece of comb thus constructed has suc- 

 ceeded. — L'Apiculteur. 



WINTERING. 

 The editor of a German paper says that 

 when the bees have eaten all the honey 

 around them they can not always pass to 

 other comVs and sometimes not even move 

 toward the other end of the combs. There- 

 fore, the frames ought to be tall enough 

 and of such width and number, that the 

 honey is above the cluster. The bees can 

 always move up; that is, the cluster, no 

 matter how compact it Is, because the heat 

 produced rises also and they can follow 

 with it. He also prefers the frames across 

 the entrances so as to break the air cur- 

 rents. 



WATCH IT NEXT YEAR. 

 From a Hungarian paper, the statement 

 is quoted, that after a colony swarms, a 

 part of the cells are destroyed while there 

 are no queens in the hive. In that case 

 it is always the po.nt of the cell that is 

 gnawed. Often whea two or more cells 

 are close together, one will be left untouched. 

 Frequently good cells will be destroyed 

 while insignificant ones are unmolested. The 



