THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW 



55 



The Information that soaks into a man's 

 brain through the ends of his fingers is of 

 a far different character from that 

 founded upon theory. A new subscriber 

 who had secured the back numbers for 

 1 906, recently wrote: "That article of 

 yours in one of last year's numbers, de- 

 scribing 'Conveniences in the Production 

 of Extracted Honey," is one of the best 

 things 1 ever read. Only the man who 

 had actually done the work could ever 

 have written it." 



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Some Combs, a few of them, perhaps 

 three, or four hives of them, were de- 

 stroyed in a manner that is a little 

 peculiar. Late in the fall 1 stored away 

 in the woodshed, perhaps 100 supers full 

 of extracting combs. A few days ago 1 

 wished to know how much a hive of ten 

 combs would weigh, and went to take one 

 down, but it would not come loose. I got 

 an axe and pounded it, but still it stuck. 

 Finally, I pried it off, and found the hive 

 one complete mass of bee-moth's webs 

 and cocoons. Several of the hives 

 in the outside tiers, near the top, were 

 more or less in the same condition. The 

 rest of the combs in the other hives were 

 in perfect condition. The trouble was 

 caused by running a washing machine in 

 the wood shed. The hot steam coming 

 up from'the open machine had so warmed 

 up the combs standing near that the 

 larvae had hatched out. 



g-n^«*^rf^rf^«m 



Feeders are something that we expect 

 to use another spring. 1 have about 50 

 of the Alexander feeders now on hand, and 

 perhaps as many more of the MilJer and 

 Heddon style, and I am having 350 more 

 of Alexander style made this winter, and 

 I am having them six inches wide instead 

 of four, so that they will hold more, and 

 can be used to better advantage in fall 

 feeding. As soon as all danger of cold 

 snaps are past (after fruit bloom) I shall 

 begin feeding, and every colony shall have 

 plenty of stores from then until the open- 

 ing of the clover or raspberry harvest^ 



When the harvest comes it shall find the 

 hives full of bees, brood and stores, and 

 the first honey gathered will go into the 

 supers. This step alone may make all of 

 the difference betwesn success and failure. 

 One pound of feed given at the proper 

 time may bring in, or cause to be brought 

 in, five pounds of surplus. 



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Wintering of Bees is of no interest to 

 California bee-keepers. One man, in re- 

 newing his subscription, said he had only 

 one fault to find with the Review, it 

 would talk about wintering! "Don't you 

 know," he continued, "we don't winter our 

 bees out here in California? We just let 

 them alone and they winter themselves." 

 I am well aware that articles on the 

 wintering of bees have little interest to a 

 California bee-keeper, but. to us here in 

 the East, successful wintering is half the 

 battle. We don't have those terrible, dry. 

 "off" years to contend with. Our bees 

 always get enough for winter, and almost 

 always some surplus, which is better than 

 one year of enormous yields sandwiched 

 in between several years of starvation. 



Superseding Queens. 



At the two last conventions that I have 

 attended, the Chicago and the Michigan 

 State, this question of superseding queens 

 has come up for discussion. The point 

 was urged that queens ought not to be 

 kept beyond their second year. The 

 reasons given are that they do not lay so 

 early in the season, nor so late, nor so 

 abundantly at any time. 



Personally I have not had much experi- 

 ence with old queens. Almost all of my 

 life I have been more or less in the queen 

 business, and the call for tested queens 

 takes them away before they become 

 more than a year or two old. 1 think 

 that Mr. E. D. Townsend came near the 

 truth of the matter when he said it was 

 likely there was occasionally a colony that 

 did not come up to the average on ac- 

 count of the age of the queen, but he en- 

 deavored to keep enough bees in each 



