1882 



GLEAi^INGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



385 



pay thrice the profits of wise sales. It is only a ques- 

 tion of purchasing the right thin?, at a i-easonable 

 price, at the right time. Di)n't try to stay in the 

 Square Li t t)!>cause I am pleasei on the wIidIc, be- 

 cause, were I a little leds reasonable, I would take 

 nil the good things of the shipmenta as a matter <if 

 ourse, and "howl" for the lack of perfection. 

 Dowagiac, Mich., July 5, 188.-'. Jamks Heduon. 



FriPiid Ileddon, our experience a few years 

 a?o ill sending queens by mail was some- 

 tliing like yours; but, as" in almost every- 

 thing else, hands who make it their every- 

 day business, and do almost nothing else, 

 acquire a faculty of succeeding, and yet one 

 can hardly see why they succeed eitlier. We 

 now ship ([ueens by the thousands, and send 

 them safely almo.st everywhere. With the 

 very sams cages and candy we sent you, we 

 have hardly a failure. It is true, our cages 

 are tilled with candy almost the dav they are 

 sent out, for we have one h;ind tilling cages 

 a great i)art of ttie time. Are you sure the 

 little bottles were filled with water V We 

 now, instead of using the oil- can, have a res- 

 ervoir, holding a gallon or two, placed on a 

 shelf, with a tin tube leading down to it. 

 This tube ends in a nozzle taken from an oil- 

 can, and the pressure gives a jet of water 

 that tills the bottles very quickly. For all 

 moderate distances, especially during damp 

 weather, we omit tlie water-bottles, and yet 

 we have very few losses. There is some- 

 thing in having just the right number of 

 bees. J think we put in from a dozen to 

 twenty. We can not agree, tliat queens go 

 safer by express. E\'i)ress companies are 

 not nearly as prompt as mails in delivering, 

 and I can not tind that they handle goods 

 with very much greater care than the mails 

 do. Perhaps I'd better apologize for so 

 much that seems like contradicting ; but our 

 Express Company, a few years ago, declined 

 being responsible for damages to bees, and 

 do decline now. We have for years stood all 

 losses from bad handling, and do so yet. 1 

 am not really sure they are far wrong. It is 

 our business to put up such goods so they 

 can not easily come to harm ; and since we 

 have used wired frames for our combs, a 

 breakdown has not been heard of. The ex- 

 press company, at the time I mention, paid 

 us $15.00 for breaking down the combs of a 

 lot of hives. Well, when we found they de- 

 clined being responsible for honey-combs 

 any more, we were driven to the necessity of 

 making some combs that could not break 

 down, and we liave done it. We have also 

 had quite a little experience in collecting of 

 the railroad companies, when they damaged 

 goods sent by freight, but we don't tind it 

 the easiest thing in the world. 



1 know that good fertile queens sometimes 

 refuse to lay, after being shipped, but L do 

 not think it makes much difference whether 

 she goes by mail ov express. jSTeiglibor II. 

 carried one of his best queens down to his 

 River Apiary, and although she was out of 

 the hive not more than an hour, perhaps, 

 she never laid any more. It might be, that 

 riding live miles after his fast •* boss " did 

 it ; but as the cage was in his pocket, it don't 

 seem as if it should have been worse than 

 the mails. It seems to me that it requires a 

 little stretch of the imagination to see how 



the yellow bands could be " jarred off " from 

 future generations, but it may be so. (^uile 

 a number of facts seem to declare that a 

 queen maij go out and get fertilized again, 

 after being some time deprived of laying by 

 being shut uj) in a cage ; but it may be a 

 mistake. (_)ur packing has been praised so 

 much, it seems a iittle singular that our 

 hands should have got careless with yours, 

 and I can not blame you a bit for beiiig dis- 

 gusted with sawdust in queen-cages. It 

 don't seem as if anybody could be so thought- 

 less. Your orders came in May andJiuie, 

 friend II.; and I tell you, if our friends all 

 get orders sent in these busy months inside 

 of two weeks, I think they do pretty well, 

 especially where the order is a large and 

 varied one like yours — not complaining, of 

 course, because an order is a laige one. It 

 is quite a different thing from having clerks 

 waiting, as they now are, for something to 

 do. and taking every order almost the min- 

 ute the letter is op?ued. i'our order for 

 cages reads thus : " Twenty mailing-cages, 

 just right to send 20 ((ueens to California." 

 For this jjurpos:; we sent 40 cages, inteudftng 

 you to fasten two together. We did not put 

 them together ourselves, because the water- 

 bottles are not easily tilled after being nailed 

 together, and very likely we failed to ex- 

 plain the matter. Queens sent to California 

 in single cages, would be apt to bring disap- 

 pointment. I would suggest, friend II., that 

 the goods you do not think worth the money 

 might have exactly suited some other per- 

 son ; for I do not intend to offer a single ar- 

 ticle that is not useful in the place it is de- 

 signed for. L thank you for the philosophy 

 you embody in your concluding compliment, 

 and ai)ologize for the space I have occupied, 

 on the ground that one of the main things to 

 make life pleasant is to meet fairly, and 

 grapple with philosphically, the cause of 

 these little disappointments and vexations. 

 I tell you, our business was not builded up 

 without my knowing something of vexations. 



(LOVER IIONKY, OR STORKS OF GRAIV- 

 ILiATED SUGAR. 



WHICH IS 8A.FKST FOR WINTER? 



W ^^'^H to ask you a question or two, which please 

 i(|| answer. I have 28 colonies of bees; am run- 

 — ' ning most of them for extracted honej'. I had 

 come to the conclusion that I would lay a waj', dur- 

 ing the white-clover season, a certain number of old 

 combs, full of white-clover honey, to give to colonies 

 short of stores in the fall, at time of preparing 

 them for winter, and also a reserve for spring feed- 

 ing, should any colonies need the same. Now, what 

 I wi.-h to know is ihis: Suppose in the ftill I take 

 old empty tough combs (they being better fo.- win- 

 tering bees on than new combs), make good thick 

 sugar syrup, fill these combs by laying them on their 

 sides, and running the syiup into them through a 

 sprinkler, give these combs thus prepared, suflicicnt 

 for each colony, in time for them to cap the same, 

 or finish filling, and then cap, will not this iiian be as 

 good for the bees as the combs of white-clover 

 honey? If so, it would pay for all trouble, and the 

 difference in price between the honey and sugar. I 



