November, 1908. 



American ^eeJonrnalj^ 



345 



of information on bees among the farmers and 

 all who are so situated that they can keep 

 bees will result in overstocking any locality. 

 But those who do this should tell the truth, 

 and not write big, glowing, sensational articles 

 that are miles from the truth. 



If all the farmers who keep bees in an old- 

 fashioned, slipshod way were to start m and 

 buy modern hives, and give the bees the care 

 they should have, there would be no need 

 of foul brood laws or anti-spraying laws; but 

 because the farmers are ignorant of the real 

 profit they are letting go to waste, such laws 

 must be made in order to protect the man 

 who keeps bees for his bread and butter, and 

 for all who keep them in a modern way. 



If all would help in the spread of informa- 

 tion, as Dr. C. C Miller, E. W. Alexander, 

 an^ some others, have done, ignorance and 

 the box-hive bee-keeprs would soon be a thing 

 of the past. 



Last, but not least, in helping others we 

 will help ourselves, for it will cause honey 

 to be used by families where it was not used 

 before. The idea that some honey is adul- 

 terated still clings to some people, and the 

 more they know about the truth, the better it 

 will be for the bee-keepers' patience. 



Chas. M. Hix. 



Hampshire, 111. 



Very Light Yield of Honey. 



My honey crop this year has been very 

 light. I have only 2 colonies, but I did 

 not get a pound of honey in the supers, but 

 I am pretty sure they have plenty to winter 

 on. I can examine only one. The other 

 has built the comb in such a way that the 

 frames can not be moved. I intended to put 

 it into another hive when it swarmed, but it 

 did not swarm. T. T. Armstrong. 



Hiawatha. Kans., Oct. 15. 



Good Yield of Extracted Honey. 



On September 2 1 we finished our fourth 

 extracting from 50 8-frame Hoffman supers, 

 summing up a total of 754- pounds of fine 

 honey, from white and sweet clover, for which 

 we found ready sale at 7 cents a pound. 



We live in the Snake River Valley,^ near 

 the famous Thousand .Springs. This is the 

 best honey country we have ever lived in, 

 foul brood being unknown here. 



PuRDv Bros. 



Hagerman, Idaho, Oct. 12. 



Still Dry — No Fair Bee-Exhibition. 



It is still very dry here. Bees are still at 

 work on a white weed. The balance have 

 all dried up. Our County Fair is going on 

 now, but they make no provisions for a bee- 

 exhibition. I live with my mother who is 89, 

 on a place of our own. R. B. Perry. 



Greenfield, Tenn., Oct. 15. 



Bad Luck in Spring. 



I had very bad luck 

 spring. I lost 

 them. It was 

 dwindled badly, 

 pounds of extracted 



than 

 ry cold spri 



ny bees last 

 one-third of 

 ng and they 

 ot about 60 

 colony, 



creased from 25 to 48, and had to feed only 

 5 colonies. 



I can not do without the American Bee 

 Journal. It has so much useful information 

 about bee-keeping, and so much interesting 

 reading. Edward Knoll. 



Clarksburg, Ont., Oct. 17. 



Honey Crop Same as Last Year. 



The fall ciop of honey here is about the 

 same as last year. I have 75 colonies in 5 

 yards. I work for honey only — both comb 

 and extracted. I have a good home demand 

 built up. John W. Cash. 



Bogart, Ga., Oct. 12. 



Shipping Bees by Express. 



You say you don't know what can be done 

 to put a stop to such an outrage, as that 

 mentioned on page 903.- May I ask who is to 

 blame? You, Mr. White, and I, and every 

 man who earns his living by his hands and 

 brains and goes to the polls to vote every elec- 

 tion day. So long as we vote for capitalism 

 and trusts, just so long wc will have to get 

 down on our knees to them. To stop it, vote 

 in favor of government ownership of ex- 

 press, banks, and railroads. That is what Vm 

 going to do on Nov. 3. 



I had some of the same experience as Mr. 

 White not long ago. I wanted to send a 

 5-gallon can of honey to an uncle in Nevada. 

 The honey was worth only $3-90. and ^^^ 

 railroad company wanted to charge me $7.40 

 per 100 lbs. out there, or $4.50 for one can. I 

 fooled them. That is since "Teddy" has regu- 

 lated the railroad rate. 



My crop this year is 43.000 pounds of 

 comb honey from 600 colonies, and the work 

 was done alone, except one month of grading 

 and packing. A Subscriber. 



Montrose, Colo. 



Fair Crop of Honey. 



I had 43 colonies of bees, spring count, 

 and now have 90. I have taken off over 

 2000 pounds of honey. The dry weather 

 stopped their gathering about the middle of 

 July. I sold some of the honey for 15 

 cents, but the most of it for iz'/i cents a 

 pound. John Sebring. 



Oilman, Iowa, Oct. 22.. 



Half a Crop of Honey. 



The weather was not favorable the past 

 season for a honey-yield. I had half a crop. 

 The weather was too wet and cold in the 

 spring, and too dry since. W. H. Stout. 



Pine Grove, Pa., Oct. 21. 



Good Year for Bees. 



We have had an extra-good year for the 

 bees — a good flow from horsemint in May and 

 June. Then in July the sumach gave us a 

 good crop, and at this writing the bees are 

 just rolling it in from broom-weed. If frost 

 stays off 2 weeks longer I will get from one 

 to 2 supers per colony from broom-weed. 



All together I will get about 100 pounds per 

 colony, counting out 3 that didn't do anything. 

 I have 24 colonies, mostly hybrids, and run 

 for both comb and extracted. I have a good 

 home market for all I have to offer, at 15 

 cents for comb and 10 cents for extracted. 



Blanket, Tex., Oct. 12. A. A. Ashley. 



All Bee-Keepers Should Read Bee- 

 Papers. 



I have 3 neighbors who keep bees, yet none 

 of them care to take a paper. None of them 

 attend to their bees except to hive a swarm if 

 they chance to see it issue. One man has not 

 caught a swarm for 2 years, nor do any of 

 them seem to care how many swarms get 

 away. 



Yet often they ask me about such and such 

 a matter concerning my management of bees. 

 I have grown into the habit of making a re- 

 ply like this, "Really, I know very little 

 about such things. The best way is to take 

 a good bee-paper. Almost every number of the 

 American Bee Journal answers some such 

 question." 



I hope I am not selfish, but if I pay for what 

 information I get from a paper, why should 

 I pass it on to those fully as able — even more 

 so — to take such papers? 



Mrs. Gcrtruds L. Goodwin. 



Roy, Wash., bept. 24. 



An Iowa Apiary. 



Editor York; — The enclosed clipping is 

 from the Decatur County Journal. It is writ- 

 ten by the postmaster of Leon, who was once 

 editor of the paper. He questioned me some 

 days ago about my bee-business, as I receive 

 a good many queens by mail. The closing 

 sentence is misleading. He asked me where 

 I got my best queens and I replied that I 

 get my best purchased ones from West Vir- 

 ginia, Kentucky, Texas, and New York; and 

 that I get some good ones from other States. 



Leon, Iowa, Sept. 7, Edwin Bevins. 



[The item Mr. Bevins referred to '^" his 

 letter above reads thus: — Editor.] 



THE BEVINS brothers' APIARY. 



The Bevins Brothers conduct one of the 

 most extensive apiaries in this section of Iowa 

 on their well equipped and cultivated farm of 

 several hundred acres in Eden township, 5 

 miles south of Leon on the Pleasanton road. 



Edwin Bevins has made a study of the busi- 

 ness for years and he is probably one of the 

 most practical authorities on bee-culture in the 

 State. To a representative of the Journal, Mr. 

 Bevins stated that the present season is the 

 poorest for the honey-business that he has 



known for many years. He attributes this 

 fact to the severe freeze that occurred last 

 spring, Injuring the white clover plant from 

 which the bees obtained the food used in the 

 manufacture of honey. In 1904 the growth of 

 white clover was very prolific, and consequently 

 that year surpassed all others in the produc- 

 tion of honey. 



Mr. Bevins says that he commenced that 

 year with 90 colonies from which he ob- 

 tained 250 swarms of bees before the close 

 of the season. 



The Bevins apiary is stocked with Italian 

 bees obtained from New York, Pennsylvania, 

 Ohio and Texas. 



Danger from Foul Brood. 



The bees have made good in the mountains 

 this year — better than common. I got 291 

 cases of comb honey fit to ship, and 20 partly 

 sealed that I sold at home, from 125 colonies, 

 and the price held up better than I expected 

 it to. But I fear we are going to have lots 

 o"t trouble with fou! brood. A man died last 

 fall that owned the largest number of bees 

 of any one in the valley, and his bees were 

 sold at action and scattered broadcast. They 

 were badly diseased. We have an inspector, 

 but nearly every one has a few colonies for 

 home use. You know what that means. Be- 

 sides, every school house has a few in the 

 walls; so do most of the barns; and the bees 

 are under bridges and in the rocks where they 

 can't be got at, and if they get the disease 

 it will be impossible ever to get it out of the 

 country until they are all dead. Then maybe 

 we could start over again. E. C. Wright. 



Montrose Co., Colo., Sept. 28. 



Report for the Past Season. 



As I was sitting in my home this afternoon 

 I was reading the American Bee Journal and 

 just as the Editor says he wants it to contain 

 good moral literature, I will say that it cer- 

 tainly tries to, which I like to read very much. 



Reading Mr. Edwin Bevins' article on the 

 shredded wheat biscuit and honey, I will say 

 I had tried that before and please make nqte 

 of it next month. I cut it open as you would 

 a sandwich, and put the delicious honey in 

 it, and then of course I ate it as a hog does 

 good corn. 



My bees are fine, and have been the past 

 summer, and now my trouble, if any, wil! 

 commence. Last winter late, and early spring, 

 I lost 2 colonies from "moths," 1 suppose. 

 Between the frames there was mold, and then 

 in them were white worms about ^-inch long. 

 I don't know what to think of it, as I did 

 not lose any more that were on the same stand 

 or platform. 



My other colonies averaged 65 pounds per 

 colony. I secured my first super from the first 

 flow, but I didn't put any supers on this 

 fall, as I wasn't looking for a good flow, and 

 I know my bees did some storing also. 



Starting into winter I have 4 colonies. 

 Three are very strong, in old hives. I wish 

 to transfer them, but as they are in bad shape 

 I am puzzled as to what to do. Two of them 

 have crossed brood — that is, the brood is laid 

 crosswise of the hive. 



I have new hives of the lo-frame style 

 and the reversible. What about the reversi- 

 ble bottom, or whatever you call it? It comes 

 off clear of the hive. 



E. Boyd Williams. 



Wheatland, Ind., Oct. 18. 



Bees Do Well There. 



I have done well here with my bees. In 

 this State bees get along fine. I have win- 

 tered 6 or S colonies here in a shed for the 

 past 3 winters, and not one colony has died. 

 I put one sheet of oilcloth c, top of the 

 frames. On top of that I put a piece of flan- 

 nel, then the cover, then paper and old car- 

 pet or burlap. This shed has a ground floor 

 with about 2 inches of sawdust on top of 

 the ground. Geo. H. Allen. 



City Point, Mass., Oct. 3. 



Bees Did Fairly Well. 



Bees have done fairly well this season in 

 this locality. Mine averaged 40 pounds per 

 colony — all from white clover. There was no 

 fall flow at all. There was plenty of hearts- 

 ease, smartweed, and buckwheat, but there was 

 no nectar in it — something very unusual. I 

 always looked for the bulk of my crop out 

 of tile fall flow. I use me 10-frame hives, 

 double-walled, and use cork for packing these. 

 I think, all things considered, they make the 



