240 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTUKE. 



Sept. 



trance. To get them started, pour a little 

 of the feed into the hive ; tliey will very 

 soon " boil out," and discover the feed. 

 Even a weak nucleus, will empty the feeder 

 in a very short time— long before morning. 

 If you have but a little feeding to do, just 

 put some sugar in the trough, wet it with a 

 little water, and it is all done, without even 

 soiling your hands. 



With all the desirable qualities of these 

 feeders, they are cheaper than anything that 

 has heretofore come under our notice. The 

 size we have mentioned, holds about one 

 pint, and if you can not make them conve- 

 niently, we will furnish them for 5c each^ or 

 sent by mail post-paid, for 10c. ;;; 



FEEDING TO PRODUCE C03IB HONEY. 



You could feed white sugar, so as to pro- 

 duce very nice looking comb honey, but it 

 would be sugar syrup in honey comb, after 

 all, as you would find to your sorrow if you 

 should attempt to sell it as honey ; and 

 furthermore, it is doubtful if you could do 

 it without losing money, were such not the 

 case. Many, are the attempts that have been 

 made to produce honey by feeding sugar; 

 but all have resulted in failures. Where 

 you can purchase nice white extracted hon- 

 ey for 10c, you may be able t<) feed it so as 

 to make it pay, if you can get 20 or 25c for 

 the honey in the comb. Several of our 

 neighbors have fed out their extracted hon- 

 ey in this way, and tliey think it can be 

 done profitably, with the aid of the founda- 

 tion. This should all be done by a few col- 

 onies, because they must liave quite a quan- 

 tity, perhaps 25 lbs., before they are in shape 

 to build comb. The feed should then be 

 given as rapidly as possible, if we wish to 

 get nice white honey ; for the quicker we 

 can get our comb honey out of the hive, the 

 Avhiter and nicer will it be. Bees when fed, 

 are to some extent demoralized, and forget 

 to be as particular as they usually are, about 

 being neat and tidy. Sometimes they will 

 scamper over the white honey with dirty 

 feet, like a lot of children who have been 

 fed sweetmeats to an injudicious extent, 

 and this we wish to avoid. I am just 

 now making some experiments in this di- 

 rection, and have found that a common 

 milk pan placed in a third story, on a Sim- 

 plicity hive, answers the purpose excellent- 

 ly. The first story contains the brood 

 combs, the second, the section boxes sup- 

 plied with foundation as usual, while the 

 third contains nothing but tlie pan of syrup. 

 The i)lan of preventing the bees from drown- 

 ing, is very simple ; a sheet of cheese cloth, 



is spread over the pan, before pouring the 

 honey into it. I have had but very few bees, 

 drowned in this manner, but it is not as 

 clean and simple as the wood feeder, and as 

 the cloth may get displaced, is not as sue 

 of success ; the most awkward or inexperi- 

 enced person, can hardly make a mistake or 

 have a mishap, with the former, and it is 

 very desirable indeed to have implements 

 for bee culture which possesses such quali- 

 ties. 



CAUTION IN P.EGARD TO FEEDING. 



Before closing, I Avould most earnestly 

 caution the inexperienced to beware of get- 

 ting the bees robbing. I have advised feed- 

 ing only in the night time, to avoid danger, 

 for attempting to feed in the middle of thi 

 day will sometimes result in the robling 

 and destruction of strong colonies. Where 

 food comes in such quantities, and in such 

 an unnatural way, they seem to forget to 

 post sentinels as usual, and before they have 

 lime to recover, bees will pour in from all 

 the hives in the apiary. I do not know who 

 is to be pitied most at such a time, the bees, 

 their helpless owner, or the innocent neigh- 

 bors and passers by. Sometimes^ all that can 

 be done is to let your colony slide, and wish 

 for it to get dark that the greedy "elves" 

 may be obliged to go home. Now when you 

 commence feeding, remember that .my last 

 words on the matter were " look out." 



SlSSGKSSSiS. We can drive cattle and 

 horses, and can to some extent drive even 

 pigs, with a whip, but one who undertakes 

 to drive bees in any such way, will find to 

 his sorrow, that all the rest of the animal 

 kingdom are mild in comparison, especially 

 as far as stubborness and fearlessness of 

 consequences are concerned. You may kill 

 them by the thousand', you may even burn 

 them up with fire, but the death agonies of 

 their comrades seem only to provoke thehi 

 to new fury, and they push on to the com- 

 bat with a relentlessness which I can com- 

 pare to nothing better than a nest of yellow 

 jackets that have made up their minds to 

 die, and to make all the mischief they possi- 

 bly can before dying. It is here that the 

 power of smoke comes in ; and to one who 

 is not conversant with its use, it seems 

 simply astonishing, to see them turn about 

 and retreat in the most perfect dismay and 

 fright, from the effects of a puff or two of 

 smoke, from a mere fragment of rotten 

 wood. What would we bee-keepers do with 

 bees at times, were no such potent power as 

 smoke known ? 



A great nniny colonies of bees, common 



