1012 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Dec. 1 



be to use inch bottom-boards with saw-cuts 

 in, and let them project at the back of the 

 hive. The first one I made, eij^ht years 

 agO", is in use to-day. L. T. Leach. 



Orillia, Ont., Can., Nov. 2. 



[The device can be cheapened in the way 

 stated; bvit I still think it would be too 

 much of a good thing — too expensive. — Ed.] 



DO BEES KEEP QUEENS FROM LAVING? 



I was asked by an old bee-keeper how 

 bees manage to keep the queen from laying. 

 He said he noticed (in observatory hives) 

 that the worker bees gather around her in 

 a circle with heads toward the center, thus 

 keeping her inclosed in the middle. This 

 was something new to me. How is it? 



When a queen is superseded do the bees 

 rear the new queen from a natural cell 

 (same as in swarming), or from a forced 

 one? H from the latter, are not all queens 

 from superseded colonies forced queens? 



Goshen, Ind. H. J. Schrock. 



[There are seasons when the queen stops 

 laying under the impulse of instinct, as for 

 instance in winter or during a severe 

 drouth. In some instances the workers 

 regulate the amount of brood to suit the pe- 

 culiar conditions by destroying the eggs 

 already deposited; but we have never no- 

 ticed them actually preventing the queen 

 from performing her functions. 



As a general rule, supersedure queens 

 are reared from embryo queen-cells about 

 the same as in a case of swarming. This, 

 however, is not invariably the case, as we 

 have known of instances in which the su- 

 persedure cells were removed so often that 

 the bees started building them over the lar- 

 va2 in the worker cells. The general rule 

 is that they proceed as in swarming. — Ed.] 



MORE DRONE COMB FROM WORKER FOUNDA- 

 TION. 



Talk about bees making drone comb out 

 worker foundation, p. 841, I can go you one 

 better. This last spring I had one colony 

 that made drone comb out of a full-frame 

 worker comb. Said comb was at least three 

 3'ears old, with only a few patches of drone 

 comb on the edges. When 1 discovered it, 

 it was so full of sealed drone-cells on bolh 

 sides that I estimated the worker-cells left 

 on both sides together did not amount to 

 over four square inches. 



Fredericktown, Mo. Jas. Bachler. 



[This is quite a remarkable incident. I 

 do not remember to have seen a case like it 

 before. — Ed.] 



WHEELBARROW- SPRINGS — A SUGGESTION. 



Mr. Root: — I saw on page 391 Mr. John 

 W. Murray's article on the wheelbarrow, 

 and I am tempted to say to you that I too 

 would like to see the Daisy wheelbarrow 

 improved in this way. Have the wheel 

 made two inches smaller; the springs light- 

 er, so as to act as springs; have the spriny$ 



turned up instead of down. This will 

 throw the weight of the load on the wheel 

 instead of on the man who is wheeling. 

 The wheel being smaller, with the same 

 length of spring as at present, one can 

 clean the dirt off the wheel much easier. 

 Lighter or less highly tempered springs 



can be used by letting the springs press up 

 against the wood work of the shafts. I want 

 to get a wheelbarrow next spring, and I 

 wish to speak in time. Of course I do not 

 expect you to take to my way of thinking 

 unless you see it is for the best; but I will 

 gladly pay the difference in cost. 



You say in your catalog that the Daisy 

 wheelbarrow will carry 500 lbs. Don't you 

 see that a set of springs that will carry 

 such a load are no springs at all under a 

 lighter load? but with the springs as they 

 are, they ought to be bent the other way. 

 My wheelbarrow springs snapped badly in 

 frosty weather; in fact, they broke like 

 pipestems; but in warm weather they stood 

 the test of weight very well. There is too 

 much weight on the man who is wheeling, 

 and not enough on the wheel. 



Wm. H. Eagerty. 



Cuba, Kan., July 30, 1903. 



[Your bent-up spring would have less 

 elasticity and less strength than one bent 

 the other waj'. The small wheels would 

 not be as good on a rough path or road as 

 the larger ones; that is to sa3', on ordinary 

 uneven ground, a large wheel is much more 

 easy on combs than a smaller one; and, 

 after all, the small wheel and bent-up spring 

 only enables you to handle a little heavier 

 load providing the roadway or path or 

 ground is fairly even. Why not use the 

 larger wheels and take less load and make 

 more trips? Try the experiment some time 

 with a small paddy wheelbarrow, with a 

 small wheel, and then with a modern 

 wheelbarrow with a large wheel. I think 

 you will find the push or pull, or, technical- 

 ly speaking, the "draw-bar pull," would 

 be much greater in the first case mentioned 

 than in the last; so that what you actually 

 save in weight would be more than counter- 

 balanced in the extra strength exerted to 

 push the small wheel over obstructions. 

 The same problem is encountered in the 

 wheels used in automobiles. But the ob- 

 jection to small wheels is overcome by the 

 use of pneumatic tires, into which an ob- 

 struction may crowd without materially im- 

 peding the progress of the vehicle. — Ed.] 



NOT A POISON. 



Referring to that brood Mr. Keating sent 

 3'ou (p. 842), you may recollect that, prior 

 to receiving it, you received a similar sam- 

 ple from me. You communicated with me 

 by letter, for which I am much obliged. 

 You have expressed 30ur opinion as to the 

 likelihood of death by poison in both cases. 



