1903 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



337 



to rank very high. Cleanliness is an all- 

 important point, and it is easier to prevent 

 impurities g^etting- into the wax than to take 

 them out afterward. 



[There is a great deal of practical value 

 in Mr. Morrison's article, and especially 

 to those in the southern part of the United 

 States, and in the tropics. I do sometimes 

 think we concentrate too much of our ener- 

 gy on /loney-production only, overlooking 

 the fact that wax is high in price. There 

 are times when a low-priced honey, due to 

 poor markets or excessive freight rates, 

 will make wax-production very profitable. 

 The scheme of using an ordinary wax- 

 press, perhaps such as may be had of any 

 dealer, and squeezing the honey out of the 

 combs and selling the wax in the good old- 

 fashioned wa3% deserves more than passing 

 attention. In European countries wax- 

 presses are common articles of sale among 

 the dealers. Wax is high in price, and 

 both the honey and the wax are produced 

 at one and the same time. With such con- 

 ditions the honej'-extractor is superfluous ; 

 and the wax-press, or, perhaps, more exact- 

 ly speaking, a honey-press, is a necessity. 



At the Buffalo convention of the National 

 Association, some four or five years ago, 

 Mr. R. C. Aikin produced a temporary 

 shock on orthodoxy by soberly announcing 

 that it was his private opinion that more 

 money could be made by crushing the 

 combs for the wa.v and honey than by ex- 

 tracting them for the honey alone. Perhaps 

 I have not stated this exactly as he put it ; 

 but I am not so sure but that certain con- 

 ditions of market and locality render this a 

 statement of fact. We should be glad to 

 hear from those in position to speak from 

 experience. — Ed.] 



BEE-KEEPERS ON THE KICKAPOO RIVER. 



Practical Plan for Insuring Bees against Fire Loss. 



BY HARRY LATHROP. 



For a few days I have been visiting some 

 of the bee-keepers on the Kickapoo. This 

 was for 3'ears a locality very much noted 

 for its great crops of basswood honey, Vio- 

 la on the Kickapoo, and Richland Center on 

 Pine River, being centers of honey-produc- 

 tion. But I am sorry to say that the field 

 is on the wane so far as honey-production 

 is concerned. The buzz-saw and the excel- 

 sior-mill are fast ruining the trees that 

 have made this localitj' famous. 



I have recently visited the bee-keepers 

 over on Pine River, including the Pickards 

 and C. A. Hatch. The Pickards use and 

 prefer the Gallup hive and frame for ex- 

 tracted honey, as does G. W. Wilson, with 

 whom I have just had a pleasant visit. Mr. 

 Wilson still gets fair crops of honey at his 

 home yard, as he has done for many years, 

 and I believe his methods are worthy of 

 •consideration. His hive is the same size in 

 length and width as the eight-frame "L." 



hive, but it contains 12 frames that are 17^' 

 inches deep. He has strong colonies, the 

 deep frame being favorable to safe winter- 

 ing and abundance of stores. For the i)ro- 

 duction of extracted honey I believe I should 

 prefer his hive to any thing else I ever saw. 

 But for comb honey, or for comb and ex- 

 tracted both, give me the standard L. frame 

 or the seven-inch case. One- great trouble 

 with the L. hive is that the bees are so 

 often short of stores, and require so much 

 feeding. It is the deep hive that always 

 has "too much honey" that will uniformly 

 show up a strong colony for the working 

 season. 



But in this short paper I wish to intro- 

 duce a subject about which Mr. Wilson and 

 myself had a very earnest conference. It 

 relates to insurance against fire on bees 

 while in the cellar or on their summer 

 stands. Mr. Wilson stated that he could 

 not get any insurance on his bees, and I 

 have heard others say the same thing. I 

 have carried some, but the rate was high. 

 Now, what we propose to have is a mu- 

 tual-insurance association to be operated 

 through or among the members of the Na- 

 tional, or among the members of each State 

 association. 



I think it should be so arranged that the 

 bees of each member should be insured 

 against loss by fire at any season of the 

 year, for two-thirds of their actual value, 

 to be determined by an appropriate board. 

 In case of a loss each member would be as- 

 sessed pro rata according to the number of 

 colonies he owned at the time of the loss. 

 For example, A is a member; his bees are 

 entirely destroyed by fire. It will require 

 an assessment of one cent per hive on all 

 the bees owned by the membership to repay 

 the loss of A as determined by the official 

 board through their local agent or other- 

 wise. If B owns 55 colonies his assessment 

 would be 55 cents. What do you think of 

 it? 



You remember that I was up here several 

 years ago, and met a bee-keeper (?) who 

 gave me some pointers regarding "foul 

 brood," stating that he had "seen it so bad 

 that there were at least a dozen eggs in 

 each cell." I met the same man the other 

 day, and did not know him till the subject 

 of foul brood was incidentally mentioned. 

 He then asked me if I could tell the queen 

 or worker bee that caused it. I caught 

 on to the fact that he was the same party, 

 and at once changed the subject. I will 

 close by informing you that the Wisconsin 

 bee-keepers are not all dead, nor have they 

 all decided to go to Colorado. 



Calamine, Wis. 



[It is true that ordinary fire-insurance 

 companies will not take any insurance on 

 bees. There is no reason why they should 

 be a greater hazard than ordinary farm 

 property. I am not sure but the National 

 Bee-keepers' Association might do well to 

 give this matter consideration. Suppose, 

 for example, we have, in addition to the 



