538 



AMERICAN BEE JCUFrNAL. 



Aug-. 24, 1899. 



The Dzierzon Theory, savs Deutsche Illustrierte Bien- 

 ■enzeitung-.so far stands as solid a.s a rock, and it will re- 

 quire more proofs than have yet been broug-ht ag-ainst it to 

 Ijudge it in the least. 



Bees and Colors — R. Hamlyn-Harris says in the Brit- 

 ish Bee Journal that scarlet blossoms seem to be entirely 

 ignored by bees. Blue, violet, and white are their pet col- 

 ors. Yellow is less frequently visited, and green is treated 

 ^vith extreme indifference. 



Celluloid Quilts seem to be in use in England, accord- 

 ing to accounts in the British Bee Journal, giving an im- 

 pervious covering thru which one can see. Glass\as been 

 used to a limited extent in England and in this country. 

 Celluloid is also used for queen-excluders. 



" Draper's Barn " is what the new hive on trial by the 

 A, I, Root Co. and .some others is plavfullv called. It is the 

 same as a 10-franie Langstroth hive, only it is 2', s inches 

 deeper. Its 10 frames are equivalent in "comb surface to 

 125+ ordinary frames, and two of the "barns" hold more 

 than three 8-frame hives.— Gleanings in Bee-Culture. 



Putting Bees Out of the Cellar, Mr. Young says, in the 

 ■Canadian Bee Journal, he does without paying any atten- 

 tion to where they are placed, and without' putting' out at 

 different times. He sa.vs : "I start about 10:30 or 11:00, 

 and when I get thru you would think they were swarming! 

 I used to try a few to-day and a few to-mo'rrow. Those you 

 let fly to-day. to-morrow are readv to iump on the other 

 ones." 



Rietsche s Uncapping=Fork is highly spoken of in tlie 

 <ierman bee-journals as a better tool than a knife for un- 

 capping. A writer in Elsass-Lothringischer Bienen-Zuecli- 

 ter says tlie needles of the fork slip more easily under the 

 cappings than the knife-blade : there is no teari'ng ; uneven 

 and tender combs are easily and quickly operated on ; the 

 fork works more. easily and rapidly than the knife, alid it 

 costs less. ;^ ■ 



"Plumping" is a term used in the British papers, an 

 ■explanation of which is kindly sent by Mr, H. Edwards. As 

 iised by Mr. S. Simmins, colonies in order are plumpt by 

 having given to them from other colonies all the brood they 

 can care for, these other colonies being stimulated to fill u'p 

 the places made vacant by the removed brood. The queens 

 from -vvhich the brood is taken are thus forced to lav a larger 

 quantity of eggs, and the colonies upon which " plumping " 

 is practiced are earlier made ready for the harvest. The 

 plumping begins with the strongest colonies. 



How Long do Worker-Bees Live? About 45 day.s'in 

 the working season, says Doolittle, in Gleanings in "Bee- 

 Culture. About June 10, put an Italian queen in a colony 

 of blacks, and in 40 days from the time the last black be'e 

 came out of its cell there will still be many black bees, a On 

 the 44th day very few indeed will be left, and in 45 days not 

 ^"'^ « ^'^ found in the colony. But a bee leaving i"ts cell 

 the first of October may live eight months, and in rare 

 cases nine. The difference in the amount of work done 

 makes the difference in the length of life. 



Age of Combs. -Leading bee-keepers of England seem 

 to have a very different opinion from that entertained in 

 this country as to the time when brood-combs become too 

 old to be desirable. Says the British Bee Journal : 



" We strongly advise the removal, every spring, of a 

 couple of outside combs— choosing the oldest or most faulty 

 ones, of course^and substituting frames fitted with full 

 sheets of foundation. Then, after the bees have fairly 

 started to build out the foundation, the frame may be placed 

 right in the center of brood-nest without the slightest fear 

 of chilled brood. By this means we get two new combs 

 built every season, and by gradually renewingj.the whole 



not only keep the brood-combs in good condition, but avoid 

 faulty ones, and thus conduce to the comfort of handling 

 workable frames when manipulating our hives." 



That is equivalent to saying that in a 10-frame hive no 

 frame should be suffered to become older than five years. 

 On this side they would hardly be objected to on account of 

 age if the)- were five times as old. Why this great differ- 

 ence on the two sides of the water ? 



TraveNStain on Honey — A. J. Wright indignantly de- 

 nies in Gleaning^s in Bee-Culture that the dirty feet of bees 

 have anything- to do with travel-stain, or rather he denies 

 that bees ever have dirtj- feet. He offers this very interest- 

 ing method of determining whether their feet are dirtj' : 

 Take a board not less than 10 or 12 inches square, tack on it 

 a piece of clean white paper, and place it before a hive so 

 that the bees will be compelled to travel over it on entering 

 and leaving. If placed early enough in the morning and 

 taken away each night before dew falls, he thinks it will be 

 as white at the end of a long honey-flow as at the begin- 

 ning. He thinks travel-stain is due to the neglectful habits 

 of bee-keepers in not removing- the old bottom-board with 

 its dirt and litter, and replacing it with a clean one at the 

 time of putting on sections, as he thinks this dirt is carried 

 up by the bees and used in the cappings of the sections. 



Handling Bees Without Smoke.— Miss Gayton, promi- 

 nent among- the bee-keepers of Eng-land, never uses smoke 

 in handling bees. Whether one who lias a given amount of 

 work to do in a given time could always afford to wait for 

 bees to get in the proper frame of mind for easy manipula- 

 tion is a question. But in many cases it might be useful to 

 know how to get along without smoke. Miss Gayton says 

 in the British Bee Journal : 



" In 1870 I introduced my first Lig-urian queens, and 

 was delighted with the gentleness and activity of the Eigu- 

 rian bee. I have not introduced any Ligurian queens since. 

 The hybrids proved to be splendid workers, but require cau- 

 tious handling, as they have not good tempers. I may men- 

 tion that when manipulating I always don a bee-veil, but 

 never use smoke, and find that bees are more gentle with- 

 out it. Sometimes in autumn I use apifuge or a clean wet 

 cloth over the hive, but I usually trust to letting light in 

 graduall)' and only keeping a small part of the hive open at 

 a time, and then, after waiting a few minutes, I g-o gently 

 and quietly to work, the bees really retiring out of my way. 

 If, however, anything has made a colony very irritable, I 

 close it up at once and try another day, as I find if a colon}' 

 is thoroly ' roused ' it takes a long time for them to become 

 peaceabU' inclined again. If I can manage to d9 my work 

 without causing the smell of the sting-poison to be noticed, 

 I find no difficulty in handling the frames." 



Miss Grayton depends upon letting in the light " grad- 

 ually," and " waiting a few minutes." Adam Grimm prac- 

 ticed somewhat on the same line, but he took no account of 

 the matter of light, simply " waiting a few minutes " for 

 the bees to quiet down after being first disturbed, altho that 

 "few minutes" sometimes was only a few seconds. Possi- 

 bly the waiting allows the bees time enough to fill them- 

 selves with honey, or perhaps to /h\!;i>i filling with honey, 

 for when a bee once begins filling with honey it is no light 

 matter that will make it stop. 



Langstroth on the Honey. Bee, revised by the Dadants, 

 is a standard, reliable and thorc"ghl)- complete work on 

 bee-culture. It contains 520 pages, and is bound elegantlj'. 

 Every reader of the American Bee Journal should have a 

 copy of this book, as it answers hundreds of questions that 

 arise about bees. We mail it for $1.25,- or club it with the 

 Bee Journal for a year — both for onlj- $2.00. 



Queenie Jeanette is the title of a pretty .song in sheet 

 music size, written by J. C. Wallenmeyer, a musical bee- 

 keeper. The regular price is 40 cents, but to close out the 

 copies we have left, we will mail them at 20 cents each, as 

 long as they last. Better order at once, if you want a copy 

 of this song-. 



The Premiums offered on page 541 are well worth work- 

 ing for. Look at them. 



