Omaha daily bee., 1888-04-30
Bee Culture.

nightly training for the event,
Bee Culture.
The Oatman Brothers, OF Northern
Illinois have about seven hundred colo
nies of bees. In 1886 they had 10000
pounds of honey; this year they are
buying stores. Last year they made
one sale which brought in $1,000 cash at
their station. They never do any talk
ing about the profits OF their business
nor their big sales; they just keep shady
and let the bees do the work; thus none
of their neighbors get bees in their
bonnets" and they have little competi-
tion.
Light colored paint is the best for
hives as it reflects the rays of the sun
and the bees are not so apt TO set too
warm. A recent number of Gleanings
contains letters from a number of prom
inent apiarists on the subject of
painting hives and the editor sums
the matter up very nicely in this
way: Isn't 1t wonderful, to see how the
ideas OF great men run in parallel chan
nelsp Almost everyone agrees that it is
probably better economy to paint hives
than to let them go unpalnted, all
things considered. AT the same time,
our good friend Hasty let's out the fact
that he is still using hives made of un-
planed lath. noticed carefully to see
If there was not somebody who would
tell us that bees would winter better in
hives made of unplaned or unpainted
lumber; and when L read about IN v
friend Hasty's unpainted lath hive ex-
pected to hear him say, in closing, that
bees wintered all right every time in
these hives, when they suffered badly
in these hives planed and painted, and
made with tight joints. Isn't there
just one left among us to defend the old
straw hive on this score? or has the straw
hive been laid away, safety and Sc
curely, for all time to Gomez Most of
us have had experience in regard to the
advantages of hives painted white,
rather than other colors, especially
where they are to stand out all summer
in the open sun.
An important discovery to those max
ing comb foundation has recently been
given TO the public. Mr.. e. A. Morgan,
of Columbus, Wis, has the credit of the
discovery, and it is all the result of an
accident. In making foundation the
thin sheets of beeswax are very apt to
stick to the rollers that impress the bot
tom of the cells into the warm wax, and
various methods of treating the rollers
and sheets have been used to prevent
this, the majority, however, having set
Jleu GOWN 10 bne use Ol S6dFCn On Une
rolls, but this did not always prevent
the sticking, and much annoyance
was caused and time lost be-
cause of this trouble. Mr.. Nor
gan accidentally dropped some sheets
of wax into his pork barrel
and the brine adhering to the wax
caused them to be run right through
the rollers with no trouble whatever.
Mixing little salt with the starch used
causes it. to work like charm. While
on the subject, as there may be some of
our readers who do not understand how
foundation is made, we will add for
their benefit that these sheets of wax
are procured by dripping smooth
board into boiler of melted beeswax
and then removing the thin coating of
wax that adheres to the board. Well,
here was a great trouble too-the wax
would often stick to the dripping boards,
but now it is found that keeping these
boards we'll soaked in salt water will
prevent any sticking at this part of the
operation, SO very valuable fact has
thus been brought out by a little mis-
hap.