1882 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



123 



HONEY FROM CORN. 



A "CLINCHER" FROM GALLUP. 



f N reply to Jesse Oren, on pap:e 29, Jan. No., I will 

 say that, one season in Iowa, my bees gathered 

 honey very freely from corn, and I mentioned 

 the fact at the time In the A. B. J. They gathered 

 large quantities of pollen from the tassels, but the 

 honey was gathered from the silk. The silk fairly 

 glistened with sweet — so much so that you could 

 taste it with your tongue, and also see it with the 

 naked eye. I succeeded in getting four kegs of l.'iO 

 lbs. each, almost clear corn honey; and when it 

 granulated it was the coarsest-grained honey that I 

 ever saw. It was quite yellow, and had a peculiar 

 taste. I could detect somewhat the flavor of corn 

 Bilk. Never, in all my experience before or since, 

 have I seen bees work so freely on corn as they did 

 that season. The atmosphere was quite humid and 

 hot, night and day, during said How of honey. 



I introduced the first Italian bees into Mitchell Co., 

 Iowa, and in the fall an old bee-hunter found them 

 at work on a field of buckwheat, just 6 miles west of 

 my place, and lined them to my apiary. He had 

 never seen any Italians before, and did not know 

 that there were any in the country. He had to line 

 them 3 miles through heavy timber, and ho was 

 about two days and a half about it; but he stuck to 

 it like a good one, for he thought he was going to 

 make a fortune by finding a new race of bees. You 

 ought to have seen the change in his coutenance 

 when he found them in my hives, and I told him 

 that I had kept them all summer, and got the queens 

 from Wisconsin, and put them into black swarms. 

 He wanted to know how I managed to kill off all the 

 blacks, and raise Italians in their place. He said 

 that he never had followed black bees over 3'/^ 

 miles. E. Gallup. 



Santa Ana, Cal., Jan. 10, 18S2. 



Now we have got it, sure enough, and 

 right from our old friend Gallup too. Bees 

 do get honey from corn, and it comes from 

 the silk. I confess this is a new idea to me, 

 for I never saw a bee notice the silk, that 1 

 know of. Who can report, during the com- 

 ing season, bees working on the silk of cornV 



MRS. 1.UCINDA HARRISON AND HER 

 ASSISTAINT IN THE APIARY. 



SOME KIND WORDS AND SUGGESTIONS ON 

 ETY OF TOPICS. 



fflpJiHE December number of Gleanings failed to 

 PI appear, and it upset us " intirely." We kept 

 musmg over our loss, and forgot to sew but- 

 tons on our partner's shirts, bunted our spectacles 

 when we had them on, etc. After we had notified 

 you, and it was mailed the second time, it came, aft- 

 er we had received the January number. 



CONVENTIONS. 



What attraction had Battle Creek over Lexington? 

 Had you cut down all that "power of bushes" 

 around your ranch that need shaking so often? Wc 

 intend to have revenge, and with that end in view 

 shall 'lectioneer to have the "reunion" meet at 

 Medina, O., in 18?3; and if youthen find " handker- 

 chiefs" wrapped around "stove-lifters," and "Our 

 Homes " on "sad-irons," and "plaid shawls" pinned 



around "bell jack-screws," you may know "who's 

 been there." 



Can't you let us have your prayer-meeting room to 

 convene in? When the time came for your ap- 

 pointment we could adjourn, or turn it into a prayer- 

 meeting, with Brother Johnson, of Kentucky, as a 

 leader. We could all feed together at the lunch 

 counter, and wouldn't it be cozy and sociable? And 

 you could — turn an honest penny. 



HONEY FROM CORN. 



About the middle of last August I was visiting a 

 venerable and intelligent bee-keeper of Passumpsic, 

 Vermont. He remarked, that his bees were then 

 gathering honey from sweet corn. I remained dur- 

 ing the month of August in St. Johnsbury, Vt., and 

 noticed particularly the blossoming of the corn. 

 My attention was directed to it by its blooming so 

 late, and the tassel appeared thicker, being covered 

 with more bloom, and continued out longer than at 

 my home in Central Illinois. When we have hot 

 nights, we say, " It is good corn weather;" the bloom 

 comes to perfection quickly, and dries up much 

 sooner than in a damp, cool climate. We should 

 not be too positive, with reference to the value of 

 honey-producing plants, for they most assuredly 

 vary, according to soil and climate. We wrote at 

 one time a description of the R')cky-Mountain bee- 

 plant {Clcomc integtifoUa), as we know it here. A 

 bee-keeper of Denver, Col., reprimanded us for not 

 giving it justice; judging from his description, and 

 other accounts of it, we infer that, in its h bitat, it 

 blooms much larger, and produces more honey than 

 in this locality, owing, no doubt, to difference 'n soil 

 and climate. 



MRS. HAKRISON'S BEE-DRESS. 



Here we are, dressed cap-a-pia for work in the 

 apiary. There is one thing lacking in the picture, 

 which we wear when bees arc very cross, and we 

 did not put it on; for if we had, you could not have 



