ILLINOIS STATE BEE-KEEPERS' ASSOCIATION 



185- 



good ibook we call the Bible, which 

 is the wbbd of God, mentions the bees 

 a great many times, wlhile it does 

 not mention any of the birds, as far 

 as I have seen. Samson killed the 

 lion by -the roadside, and the next 

 day, when ih© came along, what did 

 he find? A swarm of bees. And 

 when John the Baptist was in the 

 wilderness preaching repentance to 

 the Jews, his food was locusts and 

 wild ihoney; and the Bible says there 

 is nothing as sweet as honey. 



Question — -Would I have better suc- 

 cess if the hives stood in the sun 

 'jhe y«ar round? 



Mr. Dadant — ^No. 



Question — ^What is the best plan for 

 comb honey and not have many 

 swarms ? 



Mr. Morgan — To the first question, 

 which, as I understand it, is, which is 

 preferable, the shade or sun for bees, 

 I would say, as ifar as my experience 

 goes, that the sun is the better place, 

 with a board shade, sometlMng that 

 you can ihandle and; take off and put 

 on at your leisure, and not a large 

 tree shade, as some prefer. I would 

 prefer the open ground, and If we 

 had trees, to have them very small, 

 and not large enough to shade the 

 hives. 



Mr. Lawrence — If he lived in Florida, 

 he would want the shade. 



Dr. Jones— I think if you kept bees 

 in the sun the whole year round, you 

 would (have a bee funeral on your 

 hands, and you would be the chief 

 imiourner. I think it depends a great 

 deal on tfliie locality. 



Question — ^Is the Root capping melter 

 a success, and a good thing to use? 



Mr. Ranter — ^I used one of them this 

 siHnmer, and I came to the conclusion 

 that with all new combs I liked it 

 very much, but where you have old 

 combs it doesn't work so nicely. 

 Where you have but one yard of bees 

 I don't think I would use it. Where 

 you go to one yard and extract a 

 day here and, a day there, and you 

 have comparatively new combs, and 

 you have your honey and wax all 

 melted up and separated atl night you 

 are done. As far as new combs are 

 concerned I would consider it a suc- 

 cess, but if I had many old combs 



I wouldn't. 



Mr. Dadant — Isn't the heat of fhe 

 machine in the way? 



Mr. Ramer — It is somewhat unpleas- 

 ant, and I have been wondering what 

 an electric fan over me would cost^ 

 I noticed one of the Hutchinsons ob- 

 jected to the color, and we took that 

 honey and we placed it in two glas- 

 ses, and it was slightly colored, and. 

 I asked different ones if they could 

 see any difference in the color, and 

 we sampled' them, and some said the 

 honey had been through the capping- 

 melter which gave it a. little peculiar 

 taste, but they thought that was the 

 best honey. I took some of that 

 honey, and I mixed it with an amber 

 honey, and I thought it improved the 

 amber honey very much. 



Mr. Goddard — Mr. Chairman, I used 

 one of those this summer, and I found 

 just as Mr. Ramer states, that new- 

 combs melted up as fast as we put 

 the cappings in to the capping melter 

 and left nothing behind, but when we 

 had old combs they didn't melt up 

 entirely and it was inclined to clog 

 up. 



Mr. Brown — I couldn't find a plant 

 where a person was running a cap- 

 ping knife and was using even the 

 newest and best combs, or trying to 

 melt sections, that he could melt 

 them with rapidity enough to pay for 

 his time and trouble and the extra, 

 heat and not color it. Wben you 

 come to old combs the machine won't 

 work at all. 



Mr. Dadant — We have had consider- 

 able experience with extracting honey. 

 We have a number of apiaries. We 

 have been extracting since the 60's. 

 We had an extractor long before the 

 manufacturers made honey extractors, 

 and we have had quite a long experi- 

 ence in the matter. I suppose you 

 all know that the uncapping can la 

 called after me. We have had a 

 large number of colonies and honey 

 to extract, and we used pans and 

 sieves, and I don't know what not, 

 and we had nothing convenient. I con- 

 ceived the idea of having a large caji 

 and using a sieve. We have been 

 using a large capping can and we 

 are still using it; it was made strong, 

 of heavy tin; and had a strong pivot 

 in the centre, and we can go and ex- 

 tract all day; it holds about as much 

 as a barrel. The cappings fall into 

 the can the sieve, and the honey drains 

 to the bottom. When evening comes 

 w© prepare for the next day by dump- 

 ing those cappings in a barrel with 





