490 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Oct. 



tion seems necessary, here is aa opportunity to ex- 

 ercise three of the five senses in support of the 

 declaration, that "bees do at tiroes, and especially 

 when in repose, void comparatively dry excreta;" 

 and the words " so-called" are not needed to disqual- 

 ify any term affirmative of the fact. 



This was not written for publication, but simply 

 to re-assert previous belief founded on observation, 

 being prompted by reading the notice of the Nation- 

 al Convention on page 468, Sept. No. of Gleanings. 



J. F. Latham. 



Cumberland, Maine, Sept. 8, 1883. 



Although you say the above was not in- 

 tended for publication, I feel sure, friend L., 

 you will not object, when I tell you that I 

 very much desire it, not only because of the 

 conclusive evidence on the question you call 

 attention to, but as well in regard to bees 

 that will not work. You have given us a 

 case where an immense colony loafed all 

 through the season, when they might have 

 gathered hundreds of pounds of honey prob- 

 ably. Now, how do we know more or less 

 of this kind. of work is not going on in all of 

 our apiaries, season after season? I think 

 that colony could have been made to work, 

 but I am not sure I should have known just 

 what to do. I should have tried moving the 

 old stock away, and giving a young queen to 

 the bees clustering outside. Ilow much 

 honey did you get from your best workers, 

 of the same or nearly the same strength, 

 friend L.V 



QUEENS BY MAIIi. 



ALSO SOMETHING ABOUT GETTING GREAT YIELDS 

 FROM ONE COLONY. 



MANY thanks to friends Hutchinsr.n, Alley, 

 Good, and Brooks, and others who have come 



to my aid in my queen-shipping troubles. 



You know I am a beginner in queen-shipping, al- 

 though not so young in breeding. Before I got my 

 apiary to a pretty high standard of excellency, I 

 could not afford to ship away my choicest stock at 

 any price. My loss in honey would have more than 

 equaled my income for queens. 



When I was ready to send out queens in any con- 

 siderable numbers, I, not knowing which was the 

 best shipping -cage, sent to you, friend Root, foi? 100 

 of the Peet cages, and I used them as directed, and 

 nearly one-third of the queens died en route. We 

 failed to get a queen from here to Battle Creek (60 

 miles on this road) alive. Since using Mr. Alley's 

 cage, containing a sponge of diluted honey, I have 

 had but one loss, and that queen was delayed. It is 

 perhaps just that the shipper should warrant safe 

 arrival of queens; but of other goods, why the bee- 

 keeper shipper, any more than the grocer, hardware 

 dealer, or clothier? To be sure, the receiver can't 

 help it, if his box of oranges is torn open, and some 

 stolen or lost out; but neither can the shipper; and 

 the transportation companies are the only parties at 

 fault, and only the consignee has any claim on them. 

 One other point is, that " among many men there 

 are many minds," and this is as true morally as in- 

 tellectually, and so among many customers there are 

 some dishonest ones; and this warranting the safe 

 arrival of all sorts of goods opens up a broad field 

 for the exercise and growth of dishonesty. When 

 the fault is plainly with the shipper, if he is smart 

 he will know it, and he will see it is to his interest to 



stand under it: and if he docs not, law can force him 

 to, if he is good foi it; and if he is not, customers 

 must continue to take the consequences of dealing 

 with those who are not collectable. Regarding the 

 sugar and honey cage, we have just made 35, and are 

 putting them into use now. I hope they Avill work 

 well. Thanks to our friends. 



SHALL M'E INCREASE OR NOT INCREASE, TO GET GREAT 

 YIELDS FROM ONE COLONY? 



It is now plainly shown that Mr. Can-oil's report is 

 outdone in various places, both in the past and pres- 

 ent season, and no donations solicited. If Mr. Car- 

 roll falls behind Mr. Vandervort's success because 

 Vandervort produced the bees from more queens 

 than one, then let us for ever remember that it is 

 admitted, that the best way to get large yields of 

 honey is to increase 4 to 1 at the same time. If one 

 queen can produce more bees and honey by produc- 

 ing some queen bees to start on, we want to know it. 

 The next time Texas has a honey shower (Glean- 

 ings says the State is flooded with honey, and no 

 sale for it) Mr. Carroll can wisely commence divid- 

 ing, and raising comb honey. 1 would much rather 

 my bees would increase four fold, and give me 700 

 lbs. of comb honey per colony, spring count, than to 

 not increase at all, and give mo only the same of ex- 

 tracted honey. If Mr. Carroll sold TOO lbs. of extract- 

 ed honey for $105, he must have received 15 cts. per 

 lb. for it — a pretty good price for Southern extract- 

 ed honey, in a locality where the markets are " flood- 

 ed with honey." A man of Mr. Carroll's vending 

 ability could sell comb honey for 30 cents per lb., I 

 should think; and could he have gotten Mr. Vander- 

 vort's yield, he would have realized $310 for it, and 

 had a handsome increase besides, and then he could 

 have extracted out the "15 lbs. too much honey," 

 from four colonies, and sold 60 lbs. at 15 cts., and had 

 $9.00 more. 



I sold surplus cases and wired fdn. frames to a 

 farmer twelve miles from here, and he has increas- 

 ed one colony to 13, and already gotten over 300 lbs. 

 of white surplus comb honey, and has the fall har- 

 vest all before his apiary of now 13 colonies, strong, 

 heavy, and in good condition, and black bees too. 



" One swallow doesn't make a summer." Not- 

 withstanding I got the enormous yields reported in 

 the last Gleanings, and that I have carried as high 

 as 550 colonies in three apiaries since that time, I am 

 not rich yet, but far from it. I have not got a com- 

 pctencij yet; hope to get one, though, at this very 

 honey-producing business, and feel quite confident 

 that I shall; but if I do, it will not be by the enor- 

 mous yields from a few colonies, but the good round 

 50 or 100 lbs. per colony from the many, put up in 

 nice marketable shape. James Heddon. 



Dowagiac, Mich., Sept., 1883. 



Z/ater.— The Good sugar and honey cage is a per- 

 fect success for "alive arrival " of the queens, and it 

 is the most practical and easily manipulated of all. 



I earnestly commend the point friend H. 

 has made in his closing remarks. It is not 

 a great yield from a single colony we want, 

 so much as it is a fair yield from the whole 

 apiary ; and the nearer the owner can make 

 his colonies produce all alike, and of course 

 get a good fair yield from all, the better it 

 shows for his skill, l^ittle or nothing from 

 a great many, and large yields from a few, 

 would seem to indicate luck and chance, 

 rather than skilled management. The ques- 

 tion in regard to increase or no increase 

 would, it seems to me, depend largely on the 

 number of colonies. 



