190'; 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



1081 



I will close by saying, before I run off on 

 the subject of wintering, that close attention 

 to all things connected with your bees is the 

 magic word that unlocks the door to success 

 in bee-keeping. 



Delanson, N. Y. 



BEE-KEEPING IN CALIFORNIA. 



A Visit to the Apiary of Moses M. Bray. 



BY W. A.. PRYAL. 



It was during a day late in October that I 

 visited Mr. Moses Bray, an old-time bee- 

 keeper in Santa Clara Co., this State. The 

 hillsides in the canyons were well wooded, 

 and, in a fair season, the honey-yield, I was 

 told, is very fair through these canyons and 

 ravines on the land side of the mountains. 

 Off toward the Pacific, or water side, the hon- 

 ey secretion is not so good, owing mostly to 

 the cooler condition of the atmosphere. 



Mr. Bray is a very fine old gentleman, and 

 has lived in these mountains for nearly forty 

 years — see Fig. 1. Twenty-six years ago he 

 was a cripple, rheumatism having got such a 

 hold of him that he could hardly walk. At 

 that time he had a colony of bees in a crack- 

 er-box. 



FEROCIOUS BEES. 



Crippled and all as he was, he went bee 

 hunting and soon had twenty-four colonies 

 captured from bee-ti'ees. He states that they 

 were the 

 worst - behav- 

 ed bees he ev- 

 er ' ' ran up 

 against," and 

 at one time 

 the number of 

 stings he i^e- 

 ceived seemed 

 to be nearly a 

 thousand. 



RHEUMATISM 



VS. 

 BEE-STINGS. 



Therein lay 

 the cure for 

 the malady 

 that had so 

 long crppled 

 him. The 

 rheumatism 

 was routed by 

 the poison 

 from the 

 stings, and 

 the ex-patient 

 vowed then 

 and there that 

 he would stay 

 with the bees. 



AN IDEAL API- 

 ARY SITE. 



At the time 

 of my visit Mr. 

 Bray's aver- 



age number of colonies has been about one 

 hundred, and the yield a little over one hun- 

 dred pounds per colony, with some extracted 

 honey also. His apiary is on the crest of a 

 hill, not far from the residence — Fig. 2. This 

 location is ideal in many ways, especially as 

 it takes the bees away fi'om the roadway be- 

 low; and it gives the hives an early exposure 

 to the first rays of the rising sun. Then an 

 extracting-house could be placed so that all 

 the hives could be run to it by gravity, there- 

 by saving heavy loads in handling and lift- 

 ing. Then the honey could be run to the 

 honey-house below by means of a pipe. The 

 hives, too, would get the last rays of the sun, 

 all of which would be better than if the col- 

 onies were in the valley. Against this scheme 

 is the one that, during windy periods ( which 

 are very seldom), the bees would find it hard 

 winging their way to their respective hives. 



bray's REVERSIBLE FRAME. 



Mr. Bray is something of a genius. He 

 shows a number of handy implements of his 

 designing. Some two years ago he conceiv- 

 ed a spring attachment for end-bars, which 

 also makes it easy to make a frame a rever- 

 sible one. Fig. 3 will probably make the de- 

 vice easily understood. A piece of sheet 

 iron is bent in the shape of an L. A hole is 

 bored near one end, and a slot parallel to 

 the edges of the strip is made near the other 

 end of the top-bar. Into the frame small 

 staples are driven equi-distant from the 

 screw, so that, no matter which way the iron 



-A PART OF MOSES BRAY'S APIARY, 100 FEET ABOVK THE CREEK 

 BELOW. 



