The Cadiz sentinel. [volume] (Cadiz, Ohio) 1864-1911, 1867-12-25
For the CaiiE Sentinel.
BEES.
ny R. wILKIN, APIARINr.
HONEY Is NOT MADE BY BEES.

HONEY Is NOT MADE BY BEES.
Bees do not make honey-they only eel
lect it. Their honeysaek is not chemical
laboratory for manufacturing sweets II
bees are fed on Cuba honey, Cuba honey
will be found but slightly altered in the
combs. If you feed dissolved sugar, dis
solved sugar will be found in the cells. IF
bees collect honey from dogwood or tobacco
bloom, we get an unpleasant or bitter hon
ey. Buckwheat yields dark colored hon
ey. White clover yields beautiful trans
parent honey. which when first gathered. is
almost as limpid as water. But being left
uncapped until the water evoporates, and
then sealed air>tight, is neither sour nor
candid.
Bees do not collect honey from filthy
slops as many suppose. They frequent
such places most, in the spring of the year,
for water when they need it for their young.
Their instincts lead them to obtain their
drink from ooze or moist earth, instead of
streams or bodies of water, whereby their
excessive eagerness they would be drowned.
Bees like or suck the honey from the
flowers, with their proboscis until their hon
ey sack, which is in the abdomen, is filed.
They then disgorge this into cell and re-
turn for another load.
When honey is scarce in the vicinity of
the apiary and abundant elsewhere, they
sometimes fly three or four miles in search
Of it, yet they collect larger quantities if it
can be found within half mile. Perhaps
four ffths of the honey collected is from
white clover, and most of this is collected in
four or five weeks, about the swarming tlme
The presence of abundance of flowers, is no
sure evidence that honey is being collected.
As soon as honey gathering begins to dimin-
ish, after swarming, much more surplus
need not be expected that season, although
they may, whilst the flowers last, continue
to collect enough for present use, to save
what is stored away for winter.
Buckwheat used to be considered great
source of honey, but it is very uncertain,
and for seven or eight years past has yield
ed almost nothing.
Willow and Maple are the first to yield
food for bees, and are excellent to feed their
young and give them an early start. Frnit
bloom comes next, and often assists largely
in filling the lower chamber of the hive. -
Next comes locust and white clover. The
locust yields freely but lass only few days
Poplar and linden or Eastwood are excellent
but they are becoming scarce in most local
tiles. In the Western States prarie bloom
is ii great source of honey.
Is there such a thing as Honey Dew?'
In reality think there is no such thing a.
honey falling from the atmosphere in the
form of dew, as have never known any
one TO find it on the ground, fence, rocks OF
any place except on the leaves of trees anC
plants, or on something Immediately unde
them. Several persons have told me tina
during last summer, they saw it on curren
leaves. 1t is often seen on the leaves of tn
hickory tree. From all | can learn. con
clude it is a sweet substance that oozns from
the leaves of trees and plants where the,
have been punctured by such insects as tn
aphis or plant louise; or from an over uxu
RANT growth have have burst the stems O
leaves. When this has dried on the leave
the dew moistens it and enables the bees t.
collect it. If any one;can give me authen
ticatcd facts Through the newspaper or 9th
erwise) confir,natory OF a different theory
from the above, would be glad to hav
them.
The longer honey is left in the hive til
darker it becomes. Old honey is NOR
wholesome than new; but it is not nrcessar
r for the combs to be black in order to b
! old. Honey and honey comb are ditferen
things. New honey is often stored in old
3 dark combs. Honey in white combs ma
s be kept white. When liquid honey is ex
I posed to the air. it soon becomes ca1died i
e cold weather; aud if liquid honey is allowe
to stand in a vessel with combs the who'll
s mas. will become candicd. To prevert thu
fit some cross strips of wood two or thre
S inches from the bottom of the jar or vesst
that is to contain the honey them set tn
combs on their edges on these sticks and a
the liquid honey will settle below. A be,
ter way is to keep the money in the box i
which it was made until ready to use.
! r,nJ