40 



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the cells ; and had we the power, we 

 would doubtless have chauged these. 



As to the queen losing time in 

 "passing over bars and bee-spaces," 

 etc., I think amounts to nothing ; for 

 any one who knows anything about 

 the inside workings of the bee-hive, 

 knows that when the queen begins her 

 work of reproduction, her starting- 

 point is the centre of one of the central 

 combs — be they large or small ; here 

 she deposits in the neighborhood of a 

 dozen eggs, then passing to the other 

 side of the comb, she deposits a like 

 number ; then passing back she en- 

 larges upon the first, and so on until 

 she has a patch of eggs as large as a 

 man's hand, when she begins deposit- 

 ing in the adjoining frames succes- 

 sively, then back to the centre, and so 

 on, taking in more territory at the side 

 as she enlarges her circle in the cen- 

 tre, thus keeping her bunch of brood 

 nearly in the form of a globe — this, of 

 course, being done to accord with a 

 natural instinct or trait of the bees to 

 cluster in a ball, so that in the event of 

 cool weather the brood is all well pro- 

 tected and kept from chilling. 



Now it is but reasonable to suppose 

 that if we have large, deep frames, as 

 Mr. H. suggests, the queen will lose a 

 great deal more time in passing from 

 side to side, and from frame to frame, 

 than if the frames are shallow, or have 

 horizontal bee-spaces in the centre. 

 And by this line of reasoning I contend 

 that horizontal bars and bee-spaces, 

 instead of being detrimental and 

 forming an obstruction to the move- 

 ments of the queen, facilitate the same 

 and become a help. If I were to tol- 

 erate large, deep frames, such as the 

 Quinby, at all, it would be in the 

 brood-chamber only, with a shallow- 

 frame above for extracting, al a Dadant, 

 or a single-tier crate for comb honey. 

 But this I do not consider feasible in 

 the production of extracted honey, for 

 the combs are not interchangeable, 

 which I believe to be an important aid 

 in forcing the bees upward in the fore- 

 part of the season. 



Then again, in the production of 

 comb honey I believe the contraction 

 of the brood-nest to be essential to the 

 best success. I consider it a great ad- 

 vantage to have the brood distributed 

 over the whole under-surface of the 

 surplus cases — a condition which can 

 only be secured by dividing the brood- 

 chamber horizontally, by the use of the 

 shallow brood-frame. 



Mr. H. is running his apiaries nearly 

 altogether for extracted honej', and for 

 this purpose his large and deep brood- 

 chamber hives may answer very well ; 

 . but should he tiun liis attention to the 

 pi'oduction of comb honey, he would 

 soon adopt a frame much .shallower 



than the Quinby, if not a horizontally- 

 divisible brood-chamber. 



However, I should be pleased to 

 hear from such as have used the sec- 

 tional brood-chamber hive in the pro- 

 duction of either comb or extracted 

 honey, and with what success. Mr. 

 Heddon might favor us with an account 

 of his successes with the sectional 

 brood-chamber hive ; for if they do 

 possess advantages over other hives, I 

 am sure that all, like Mr. H., would 

 like to know it. 



Kansas City,*o Mo. 



among her people such a villain. I 

 think that the public would be more 

 benefited by feeding such an ignorant, 

 dastardly adviser on the same stuff that 

 he recommends for the destruction of 

 the honey-bee. That article contains 

 ignorance, falsehood and malice com- 

 bined. 



Worthington,o* Iowa, Dec. 24, 1887. 



BEES AND FRUIT. 



The Mistaken Idea that Bees 

 Injure Fruit. 



FUMIGATION. 



Report for 1§§7, Fumigating 

 Combs and Poisoning Bees. 



Written for the AmerUMn Bee Journal 

 BY P. LATTNER. 



Written for the American Bee Journal 

 BY ALLEN BARTOW. 



The last was the poorest honey sea- 

 son that I have experienced in 28 years. 

 I lo.st 50 per cent, of my bees last win- 

 ter, by their having honey-dew, or 

 bug-juice, for winter stores ; all that 

 had none, or did not live on that stuff, 

 wintered well. 



I commenced the season with 49 

 colonies, spring count. Four swarms 

 issued, but one of them left after being 

 hived. I increased my apiary to 80 

 colonies, by the nucleus method, and 

 took 1,200 pounds of extracted honey. 

 This was the result of having plenty 

 of combs. 



We had good fall pasturage, and all 

 the bees were put into winter quarters 

 in good condition. One-half of them 

 are on the summer stands in chaff 

 hives, and the other half are in a bee- 

 cellar under the bee-house. The cel- 

 lar is 16x22 feet, and 6J feet high, with 

 the ceiling lathed and plastered, the 

 floor cemented, ventilation from the 

 floor into the chimney, opposite the 

 entrance, and a stove to regulate the 

 temperature completes the cellar. 



Fumigating Empty Combs and Honey. 



I use the stove in summer to fumi- 

 gate empty and full surplus combs. It 

 is placed in the bee-house, in one cor- 

 ner, which is partitioned off and ar- 

 ranged right above the stove for that 

 purpose. One-half pound of pulverized 

 brimstone, saturated with alcohol, is 

 placed in an iron kettle inside of the 

 stove, with the stove-pipe directed 

 toward the combs ; then a lighted 

 match is dropped into the kettle, and 

 the work is done. 



About Poisoning tbe Bees. 



I was glad that the editor repri- 

 manded the correspondent of the Mes- 

 senger, at Atlantic, Iowa, in the Bee 

 Journal of Dec. 21, 1887 ; but I am 

 sorry that the good State of Iowa has 



I have just read, on page 803 of the 

 Bee Journal for 1887, an article in 

 regard to poisoning bees, being a few 

 quotations from a paper called the 

 Messenger, which asserts that there has 

 been gi-eat destruction of grapes here 

 by bees. Now that is not the fact. 

 That bees do not injure sound grapes, 

 or fruit of any kind, is admitted by all 

 intelligent fruit-giowers and bee-keep- 

 ers. But some years ago it was 

 thought that bees did injure fruit, but 

 thanks to Prof. Cook for dispelling 

 that mistaken idea from the minds of 

 both parties on that question. • It came 

 about in this wise : 



We had an agricultural meeting at 

 Sandusky, O., and Prof. Cook attended 

 and lectured on entomology, and the 

 anatomy of the bee was part of his 

 subject. At the close of his lecture the 

 Professor was subpoenaed, and gave 

 evidence in a case then being tried in 

 the County Court at Sandusky, and the 

 writer heard him being catechised for 

 about two hours by four lawyers. He 

 made it plain that bees could not 

 puncture sound fruit — so plain that the 

 suits were withdrawn. The facts were 

 as follows : 



The bees were poisoned by one 

 party, in the vineyard, and the party 

 owning the bees traced the poison, by 

 following the bees from the hives to 

 the vineyard, when he found great 

 numbers on the route, dead and falling 

 all the way from the hive entrances to 

 the poison in the vineyard. The owner 

 of the bees sued the grape-grower, and 

 the latter brought counter suit for 

 damages done to grapes. 



Now the point I wish to make is 

 this : It caused both bee-keepers and 

 fruit^men to investigate, and they 

 found that the facts exonerated the 

 bees fi-om blame. We found other 

 causes that opened the fruit. First, 

 grapes when over-ripe will crack open; 

 again, birds and other insects destroy 

 them. We have a small bird about 

 the size of a brown ground-bird, that 

 gets on a bunch of grapes, and pecks 

 them open as fast as one could count. 



