302 



THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW 



The Question Box is approved by 

 Stenog., in Gleanings, even if the answers 

 are contradictory. He says that "even 

 the divergence in answers is often a source 

 of new knowledge." Upon those ques- 

 tions about which there is a "divergence" 

 of opinion, "yes" and "no" answers con- 

 vey very little information. It is among 

 the reasons given for the various beliefs 

 that we must look for information. 



written in opposition to tall sections, for 

 I think their proportions are more artis- 

 tic than those of a square section. I 

 wouldn't change my fixtures, however, 

 simply that I might adopt them. 



rfB^H^«.M^ ( "jl^ 



The RauchfuSS solar wax extractor is 

 illustrated and described in Gleanings. 

 Its most striking peculiarity is that the 

 wax does not drip down from the middle 

 of the wax-chute, but is diverted to one 

 side where it drips into one of three pans. 

 When the first pan is full it overflows 

 into the adjoining pan. When the 

 second pan is full it overflows from 

 that into the third pan. It will be 

 seen that the first pan catches all of the 

 dirt and sediment. What overflows in- 

 to the last two pans is free from dirt, and 

 is ready for the market. 



«Hif«.»^»"ll'»' 



»»*»u»»''fc»u» 



PUSHING NEW THINGS. 



In a late issue of Gleanings, my old 

 friend, E. D. Ochsner, of Wisconsin, op- 

 poses the adoption of the tall sections. 

 He also intimates that manufacturers are 

 too much given to the pushing of new 

 things for the sake of making money; 

 that is, regardless of whether the new 

 things are better. Among- other things, 

 Mr. Root says, in reply, that manufactur- 

 ers -would make more money if bee-keep- 

 ers would stick to one style of section or 

 hive. In one sense this is true, but there 

 is another point: If some manufacturer 

 can bring out something that is superior, 

 he gets the lion's share of the trade; and 

 this is one factor that makes each manu- 

 facturer always on the alert for some- 

 thing newer and better; and having adopt- 

 ed something that he believes to be su- 

 perior, it is the most natural thing in the 

 world that the manufacturer should "push 

 it." Don't construe this item to be one 



SEI.ECTION IN BREEDING. 



Dr. Miller, in Gleanings, suggests that 

 when taking off honey we mark the 

 number of the hive on each super taken 

 off. Then when we find a greasy-look- 

 ing lot of sections we will know where to 

 replace a queen next spring. The editor 

 says it is a good scheme, and an argument 

 in favor of numbering hives. There are 

 other points besides this that might be 

 looked after with advantage. The late 

 Dr. Whiting once told me that he 

 found that one of his colonies built 

 scarcely any brace-combs. He requeen- 

 ed his apiary with queens bred from 

 the mother of this colony, and continued 

 for two or three years to destroy and re- 

 place the queens that showed a disposi- 

 tion to build brace-combs. In this way 

 he p<-actically rid his apiary of the brace- 

 comb nuisance. This is the kind of work 

 that may be done by the amateur, the 

 queen breeder, or the man with at least a 

 medium sized apiary. The Coggshalls, 

 the Hetheringtons and the Elwoods 

 scarcely have time for such work. It 

 might pay them, but there are probably 

 other things that pay them better. 



CAGED QUEENS AND HOW BEES CARE FOR 



THEM. 



Commenting upon the report in the 

 Review that bees will care for a caged 

 queen laid at the entrance of a hive, Dr. 

 Miller reports that he once threw an old 

 caged queen at the foot of an apple-tree 

 in the middle of the apiary. A few bees 

 came and clustered on the cage, as they 

 often will. Then he threw another old 

 queen there, and kept up the practice 

 until there were a dozen or so of queens 

 in the pile. They stayed there for weeks, 



