Fig. 43.—Comb-foundation machine. (From Langstroth.)
Such machines are now made in numerous patterns costing from $15 up. Foundation is made with flat-bottomed cells and also with the same form as that given by the bees to combs constructed wholly by themselves. Both sorts are readily accepted by the bees and built out. Both these kinds are also made in various qualities and weights. Only a good quality of perfectly pure beeswax should be accepted. Brood foundation is made in light, medium, and heavy weights. For use in section boxes thin surplus and extra thin surplus are made of light-colored wax. When full sheets are used in sections it is better to have it extra thin lest there should be a noticeable toughness of the midrib, technically known as "fishbone." For unwired frames the medium or heavy brood-comb foundation should be employed.
Until used it is best to keep comb foundation between sheets of paper and well wrapped, since if long exposed to the air the surface of the wax hardens somewhat, but if well packed it may be used years after it was made with almost the same advantage as when first rolled out.
It requires considerable skill to make foundation successfully, and those who use but a small amount will do better to purchase their supply. The high quality of nearly all of the foundation thus far supplied in this country has also justified this plan. Should the practice of adulterating wax become as common among comb-foundation manufacturers in this country as on the continent of Europe no doubt many more would procure machines and make their own foundation.
CHAPTER VI.
BEE PASTURAGE.
Bees obtain their food from such a variety of sources that there are few localities in our country where a small apiary could not be made to yield a surplus above its own needs. Even in the center of our larger cities bees placed on the roofs of stores and dwellings have often furnished quite a surplus gathered from the gardens of the city and its environs. Again, in regions where the soil is too light, rocky, or wet to admit of profitable cultivation, it is often the case that honey-producing plants abound; indeed, waste land is frequently far more profitable for the honey-producer than fields that have been brought under cultivation, especially when the latter are mainly devoted to grain or potato raising, for insignificant weeds in field or swamp often yield honey abundantly, and among the best yielders are certain forest trees, whose blossoms, by reason of their distance from the ground and in some instances their small size, escape notice. Showy flowers made double by the gardener's skill, such as roses, dahlias, chrysanthemums, etc., have rarely any attraction for our honey bees. Moreover, the small number of these ornamental plants usually found in any one locality renders the honey yield, even in case they are abundant secreters of nectar, so slight that they are of little value. The novice who is seeking to determine the honey resources of his locality should therefore not be led into error by these. He should compare the flora of his locality with reliable lists of honey-producing plants, and, if possible, consult some practical bee-master familiar with his surroundings. And all information on this score should be fully accepted only after careful verification, as it is very easy for anyone to be deceived regarding the sources of given honey yields—plants which produce abundantly one season not always yielding the next, or those that produce honey freely in one portion of the country not yielding anything in another. Soil and climate, the variations of successive seasons, and all other conditions affecting plant growth—conditions which even the most skillful scientific agriculturists admit are exceedingly difficult to understand, and in many respects, as yet unexplainable—influence the amount and quality of nectar secreted by a given plant.
The danger of overstocking is largely imaginary, yet in establishing a large apiary it is of course essential to look to the natural resources of the location, and especially to decide only upon a place where two or more of the leading honey-producing plants are present in great numbers. In the North, willows, alder, maples, dandelion, fruit blossoms, tulip tree (frequently called whitewood), locust, clovers (white, alsike, crimson, and mammoth red), with alfalfa and melilot, chestnut, linden or basswood, Indian corn, buckwheat, fireweed, willow-herb, knotweeds, mints, cleome, golden-rods, Spanish needle, and asters may be cited as the chief sources of pollen and honey; and of these the tulip tree, locust, white clover, alfalfa, melilot, linden, and buckwheat furnish most of the surplus honey. The fruit blossoms, with the exception of raspberry, come so early that a small proportion only of the colonies are sufficiently strong to store surplus, and of course this statement applies with still more force to plants which blossom before apple, pear, cherry, etc. Some of the clovers, mustard, rape, cultivated teasel, chestnut, barberry, sumac coral berry, pleurisy root, fireweed, borage, mints, willow-herb, Spanish needles, cleome, etc., though yielding well, are only found abundantly over certain areas, and do not therefore supply any considerable portion of the honey that appears on the market, though when any of them are plentiful in a certain locality the bee keeper located there will find in nearly all cases that the surplus honey is greatly increased thereby.
Fig. 44.—Willow herb (Epilobium angustifolium). A, young flower: s, stigma turned back: a, anthers; l, lobe or pod. B, older flower: s, stigma turned forward; a, anthers: l, lobe. C, spike of flowers. D, section of pollen grain: e, extine; i, intine; ti, thick intine; f, fovilla. E, growing point of pollen grain: e, e, extine; i, i, intine; f, fovilla; pt, pollen tube. (From Cheshire.)
In the middle section of our country, from Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina westward, most of the sources named above are present, although the maples (particularly hard maple) furnish less, and fruit bloom, the clovers, linden, and buckwheat are not as great yielders as in the North. Sourwood or sorrel tree, mountain laurels, sour gum or tupelo, huckleberry, cowpea, magnolia, and persimmon make up in part for these, the sourwood being especially important, while in some localities certain species of asters yield very abundantly. The tulip tree (known commonly as poplar) is a greater yielder than in the North, while in the western portion of the middle section the Rocky Mountain bee plant or cleome and more extensive areas of alfalfa and melilot are very important sources.