February, 1913 



[American ^ec Journalj ^w^ 



a fine powder, is a caustic alkali, and is 

 very irritating when taken into the 

 nose, mouth or lungs of animals. It 

 should certainly prove very much more 

 irritating when taken into the numer- 

 ous spiracles or breathing tubes of 

 bees. One'might set a lot of this irri- 

 tating powder afloat in a bee-cellar if 

 he happened to be a little careless in 

 handling the lime in it." 



J. M. Francis. 



This leaves but little to say. Mr. 

 Francis explains fully that " taking up 

 moisture with a;'id//y does not mean 

 taking it up with rapidity. Were it so, 

 a cellar would become as hot as an 

 oven, as will be apparent when lime is 

 slaked hurriedly for mortar. 



When lime is put into a box, as in 

 the case of an X-ray machine, which 

 has a cubic capacity of not over .50 

 cubic feet, it soon renders the air free 

 of moisture, but when fresh air is corl- 

 stantly supplied, as it should be in a 

 cellar, it will require large quantities of 

 fresh lime to make a perceptible dif- 

 ference in the amount of moisture in 

 the air, and its greatest benefit is its 

 absorption of carbonic acid gas. 



Buck Grove, Iowa. 



Montana as a Bee-Country 



BY WM. SCHULZE. 



Reading in the Bee Journal about the 

 merits and superiorities which certain 

 sections and localities of some of the 

 States are said to possess, I have not 

 yet come across anything that could 

 beat the prospects which await the 

 apiarist in certain parts of Montana. 



I settled here at Chance two years 

 ago last fall, and bought from a num- 

 ber of farmers (ill hives of bees, which 

 had never had any care or attention. 

 As it was late in the season, and I was 

 overcrowded with other work, I could 

 not spend much time with them, and 

 consequently did not expect many of 

 them to pull through the winter nor do 

 much the following summer. However, 

 they surpassed my keenest expectations, 

 producing 40o0 pounds of honey be- 

 sides 50 percent increase. 



Owing to an unsual early approach 

 of winter, I was unable to build a shel- 

 ter, and had to let the hives stand out 

 in the open. My own experience, as 

 well as those of others back in Wis- 

 consin, made me fear that I would lose 

 almost the entire stock ; for the winter 

 was longer and more severe than any 

 winter in this part of the State for the 

 past 10 years. To my surprise I lost 

 only 15 percent ; of course, the colo- 

 nies had been weakened considerably. 

 Neverthless, this season they produced 

 $600 worth of honey. One little, puny 

 colony from which I did not expect 

 anything, produced $10 worth of honey, 

 besides enough to feed itself through 

 winter. 



The bees had to go a distance of 4 

 miles to gather the honey down in the 

 valley, where thousands of acres of 

 alfalfa are in bloom from June until 

 September, with an abundance of sweet 

 clover. Had I been closer to the 

 alfalfa, and better fixed to take care of 

 my colonies in an up-to-date scientific 

 way, I should have at least doubled the 

 amount. The nectar supply from the 



alfalfa and sweet clover is inexhausti- 

 ble, and in 10 years there has been 

 only one year when alfalfa was a fail- 

 ure from the standpoint of the bee- 

 keeper, and that was caused by a bug 

 destroying the blossoms. But even in 

 such a year there is enough sweet 

 clover and other nectar-bearing shrubs 

 and plants to ensure against complete 

 loss. 



There is no fear of a drouth, for the 

 country is well covered with irrigating 

 ditches from streams which have 

 always an abundance of water; neither 

 are there any of the disadvantages and 

 losses to encounter which sometimes 

 accrue through periods of too heavy 

 and continued rainfall. The country 

 is free from bee-disease, and one of its 

 greatest advantages is that there is no 

 need of out-apiaries, as the honey- 

 bearing crops are so plentiful that one 

 apiary can be made to consist of as 

 high as 500 colonies. 



So far, I have sold most of my honey 

 to the local dealers. I intend to pro- 



duce extracted honey more exten- 

 sively, as there is a growing demand 

 for it, and some of my experiments 

 have shown that I can harvest ^0 

 worth from one colony. As I am go- 

 ing to move down into the valley this 

 winter, and will be considerably better 

 prepared to take care of my bees, and 

 to conduct my business on more im- 

 proved lines, I expect to effect an in- 

 crease next year over tkis year's profit 

 of at least 100 percent. 



What do Wisconsin bee-keepers 

 think of the prospect ? Wouldn't some 

 of my bee-keeping friends back there 

 who are discouraged by frequent fail- 

 ures, and have struggled for many 

 years with adversities of climate and 

 conditions, vainly striving to win fame 

 and fortune in the field of apiculture, 

 wouldn't they be pleased or willing to 

 change their unkind and unfavorable 

 surroundings by emigrating to the 

 beautiful and nectar-laden alfalfa val- 

 leys of Montana .' 



Chance, Mont. 



Send Questions either to the office of the .American Bee Journal or direct to 



Dr. C. C. Miller. Marengo. III. 



He does not answer bee-keeping questions by mail. 



Eight and Ten Frame Hives for Wintering 



I have 7 colonies of bees. 4 in 8-frame hives 

 and 1 in lo-frame. At i:3o today the bees of 

 all the smaller hives were flying while the 

 others were not. I examined them, and 

 found one of the colonies dead, though there 

 was about 30 pounds of nice honey left. In 

 the dead colonies there was a double hand- 

 ful of bees, and lots of drones. 



I cannot account for this. It looks as if 8- 

 frame hives were better for wintering in 

 northern Iowa than the lo-frame. All the 

 colonies had plenty of honey. Iowa. 



Answer.— The number of colonies is 

 rather small to deduce a general rule; but 

 even if you had a larger number it is not a 

 dead open-and-shut affair that the smaller 

 hives are better winterers. As to that dead 

 colony in the lo-frame hive, it's about cer- 

 tain that the size of the hive cuts no figure. 

 They had no normal laying queen, and had 

 not had one for weeks, for the dead bees 

 were few. and pan of them were drones. 

 You have left then the j S-frame hives and 2 

 lo-frame hives, and you are evidently of the 

 opinion that the bees in the latter two were 

 in too poor condition to fly while the bees in 

 the smaller hives flew well. Well, as there 

 were only 2 of them, it might iust happen 

 that those 2 were poorer than the others. 

 But did it never occur to you that it might 

 be that those 2 colonies did not fly hwiusc 

 they ivcrc in too good condition to ilv? That 

 would be my guess. December 23 the bees 

 had not been confined very long, and those 2 

 colonies were doing so well that they did 

 not yet feel the need of a flight. .\\. any rate, 

 wait until spring, and then you can tell with 

 more certainty which has done the better. 



Sugar Syrup With Tartaric Aeld 



Yesterday Dec. ^0' I was examining the 

 colonies I am wintering in the cellar, and I 

 found one that I concluded had starved. 

 Tliere was about 12 pounds of sugar in the 

 combs candied hard. My record shows that 

 on Sept. 20 this colony had about 15 pounds 



of honey. I fed them 20 pounds of sugar 

 syrup with one ounce of tartaric acid to 

 each 10 pounds of sugar. I am afraid some 

 of the rest of my bees will go the same route. 

 One dislikes to lose them after feeding and 

 giving them the best care one can. 



I have read of some who feed sugar syrup 

 without using acid, and do not have any 

 trouble, and it seems that there is little or 

 no trouble where acid is used. Last fall 

 some of my bees were carrying out candied 

 sugar in a week after I fed them. 



It is possible that I have not been making 

 my syrup right. The way I made it was to 

 place a boiler of water on the stove and let 

 it come to a boil, then add the acid and stir 

 it well. I then set the boiler off the stove 

 and stirred in the sugar. I used 2 pounds of 

 sugar to one of water. Ohio. 



Answer.— I must say there is something I 

 don't understand about this sugar-acid busi- 

 ness. There are those who. as you say. in- 

 sist that no acid is needed, and they are 

 very emphatic about it. Avery few say that 

 the sugar hardens in spite of the acid, and 

 you are one of the unfortunate few. The 

 time and manner of feeding may have some- 

 thing to do with it If you feed as early as 

 -■\ugust or the first of September, and use 

 more water than sugar, I don't believe acid 

 is needed. Even if you feed heavier syrup, 

 if you feed it slowly, there should be no 

 trouble. But with late feeding of thick 

 syrup, I should feel safer with the acid. I 

 hardly see why you should fail; you used 

 more acid than I ever used, and I never had 

 any trouble, although I have had much ex- 

 perience. Still it is possible that the mode 

 of proceeding may have something to do 

 with it. and I'll tell you how I proceeded, 

 when I fed late with heavy syrup: Water 

 was put into a vessel on the stove, and when 

 at or near the boiling point sugar was 

 slowly stirred in at the rate of 5 pounds of 

 sugar to a ouart of water. The stirring was 

 continued until the sugar was dissolved, so 

 that the su.gar might not settle to the bottom 

 and be burned. When the sugar was dis- 

 solved, an even teaspoonful of tartaric acid 



