86 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Feb. 



had the worst " blizzard" I ever experienced, and I 

 took out about 12 pailf uls of suow the next morning. 



BURDETT HASSETT. 



Howard Center, la., Jan. 8, 1883. 



Many thanks, friend H., for the very val- 

 uable facts you have given us. Brick build- 

 ings are now made to overcome this objec- 

 tionable feature by making the wall hollow, 

 and this is the way our dwelling-house is 

 made. It is as dry as any frame building. 



FROM 30 TO 53, AND 4700 LBS. OF HONEY, BY A " SELF- 

 MADE " BEE-MAN. 



The Ist of June, 1883, found us with bees in 30 

 hives. Nearly half of them were one, two, three, 

 and four frame nuclei. We increased to 53 colonies, 

 with abundant stores for winter, and obtained 4T00 

 lbs. of honey; 109" lbs. of it was comb, the rest ex- 

 tracted. I make all my own hives, frames, and sec- 

 tions; and all the tools I have are two saws (one rip 

 and one cross-cut), two planes, hammers, square, 

 thumb-gauge, scratch-awl, and a work-bench. I 

 paint my own hives; in fact, I have done all the 

 work of my apiary, except the assistance of a young 

 man one day; and my wife nailed about 500 sections 

 for me. 



The honey of every hive was weighed separately, 

 and that, too, on a balance with only 16 lbs. of 

 weights, so that most of the time but two combs 

 could be weighed at a time. A record was kept of 

 every hive, and the amount of comb and extracted 

 honey credited. The extracting was done with an 

 extractor of my own construction, made of inch 

 pine lumber, for 2 frames (Langstroth). It holds 65 

 lbs. of honey below the rack, and is not so " awful 

 big " either, as one of my neighbors carried it on his 

 shoulder over half a mile, extracted the honey from 

 his hives, and carried it home again twice during 

 the season. S. A. Shuck. 



Bryant, 111., Jan. 13, 1883. 



Why, friend Shuck, you are a " trooper," 

 a regular self-made bee-keeper, and one who 

 makes his way independently of supply-deal- 

 ers, or any other kind of chaps who so har- 

 rass and distress those who depend on buy- 

 ing every thing. I don't believe you have a 

 farm on your hands, or much other business, 

 do you y Please tell us how much you got 

 from your best colony, if you kept it all 

 weighed so carefully. In short, we should 

 like to know all about how you do it, if you 

 will be so kind. Many thanks for items al- 

 ready given. 



WOOD SEPARATORS; A WORD IN FAVOR OF THEM. 



I would add my testimony in favor of wood sepa- 

 rators. I have used tin, and do not see that there is 

 a whit more liability to attach comb to the wood. 

 Now, the question is open again as to discarding 

 separators entirely. My advice is to go slow in that 

 direction. Who that has tried it has not had his pa- 

 tience tried also in casing it for market? If certain 

 conditions are carefully observed — to put in full 

 combs or sheets of fdn., and to keep them exactly 

 perpendicular In hive, most of the sections will crate 

 well enough ; but I have never known them to be 

 invariably so. 



HONEY-ROOM. 



I built last summer a storeroom for the purpose of 

 ripening as well as storing my honey, which pleases 

 me so well, and was so easily put up, that I will de- 

 scribe it. It is 8x12 feet, with single-pitch roof, but 



nearly flat; 754 feet high in lower side, and SM on up- 

 per, with close sheathing, and tin roof on that. It is 

 planked up and down and battened, and lined on the 

 inside with building-paper. Astripof tarred paperor 

 rooflng-felt at bottom, is held in place by a strip all 

 around next to floor as a protection against insects; 

 a tight floor, tongued and grooved. There are no 

 timbers about it, except stout sleepers fastened at 

 the ends into others like them, 2x8 in., with spikes, 

 all resting in solid foundation. I stored 4000 lbs. in 

 this, and believe I could have put in double, and I 

 have never had honey keep so well in comb, nor so 

 well ripened extracted. There is one window with 

 wire screen outside, running up 10 inches above 

 window, to let bees out. A screen door outside is 

 needed to enable one to work at all in warm days 

 inside. There are no insects to bother, and no shel- 

 ter for mice; warm and dry, and cheaply built. It 

 is too small for an extracting-room, which I had al- 

 ready, but it is preferable to have the honey stored 

 in a room used for nothing else. It would be well 

 to have it longer, say 8x20, with extracting-room at 

 one end, with 3 windows in that part. 



Charlottesville, Va., Dec. 25, 1883. 



The following is taken from the proceed- 

 ings of the Western Bee-Keepers' Associa- 

 tion, held at Independence, JNIo., Dec. 23, 



1882:— 



H.AXF-POUND SECTIONS. 



Mr. Salisbury stated that the tendency, especially 

 in the East, was for smaller packages of comb hon- 

 ey weighing not more than one-half pound, as hav- 

 ing a ready sale at a higher price, and more satisfac- 

 tory for general use. 



L. W. Baldwin thought that one-pound packages 

 were small enough for practical use, as the change 

 of apparatus, etc., of the apiary for procuring comb 

 honey in smaller sections would be accompanied 

 with great expense. He stated that he had sold his 

 crop of comb honey the present year, put up in 1?4- 

 pound sections, at 23 cents per pound in the Kansas 

 City market. 



REPORTS. 



There were represented at the association about 

 one thousand colonies of Italian bees and 26,000 lbs. 

 of honey, distributed among the different members 

 as follows: 



The association invites all bee-keepers within 

 reasonable distance to join or attend its meetings, 

 and help in bringing the bee-keeping interest more 

 generally before the public, advance the production, 

 and extend the markets of its products. It also ex- 

 tends an invitation to all ladies interested in any 

 way in bee culture to be present and take part in 

 the discussions of the association. 



