November, 191 1. 



American ISee Journal 



him that I could fill the orders, and 

 made him a price on the queens. He 

 replied that it was far more than he 

 had been paying for queens, but he 

 enclosed a check for the amount and 

 wrote me to mail them, which I did, 

 and they arrived in good condition, 

 and he was successful in introducing 

 them. I knew well that he could not 

 judge good queens, although he had 

 handled lots of them, but he wrote me 

 that they were the finest queens he 

 ever saw, and every now and then he 

 would write and compliment me on 

 those queens. 



Some 4 or 5 years afterwards he 

 wrote that the average was twice as 

 much in that yard as in others, that he 

 had made a great amount of increase 

 from it, etc., and that he had had nearly 

 failures at all the other yards, but he 



had every season secured a good crop 

 of lioney there, and wanted to buy 

 enough of such queens to head all his 

 colonies. I wrote him that I was un- 

 der no obligation to sell queens now, 

 and I had none to offer. 



I don't know whether the Caucasian 

 bees will winter well in the cellar or 

 not. as I liaven't had any reports. 



No, I am not a commercial queen- 

 breeder, and will never enter the field 

 at the prevailing prices of queens. I 

 can far better sustain life at honey- 

 production. But it takes good stock 

 and a lot of queen-rearing to make 

 honey-production pay, and if every 

 honey-producer will go at the "queen 

 job," and buy only a few good queens 

 as he goes along, and quit buying 

 "cheap" ones, he will prosper more in 

 tlie bee and honey business. 



Contributed 



Articles^ 



Successful Wintering of Bees 



BY IS.VAC F. TILLINGHAST. 



To carry the bees over winter suc- 

 cessfully in our climate is one of the 

 most serious problems which the bee- 

 keeper has to solve, yet there are rarely 

 more than two general causes for their 

 loss. These are, first, lack of food, 

 and, second, a surplus of moisture, both 

 of wliich the alert bee-keeper will 

 readily overcome. 



It is really quite surprising how 

 much cold weather a colony of bees 

 will stand if kept dry, and, on the other 

 hand, it requires not very severe freez- 

 ing to prove fatal to them if water is 

 allowed to work in, or if not packed 

 so that the natural accumulation of 

 moisture can escape by a kind of ven- 

 tilation which at the same time will re- 

 tain their bodily heat. 



There is no doubt but those who 

 have a properly constructed cellar, well 

 drained and ventilated, and with a dry 

 concrete floor, can winter their bees 

 with greater safety and less expense, 

 or less consumption of food, than can 

 be done out-of-doors, but as most cel- 

 lars are arranged they are far too 

 moist, and the bees are usually better 

 off in the open air. 



In our climate we usually have days 

 every month in winter when it is warm 

 and pleasant enough for the bees to 

 ta-ke a good flight, and my experience 

 has shown that they keep in better 

 health ami suffer less from " spring 

 dwindling" than where confined for 4 

 or .") months as they frequently are in 

 cellar wintering. So for a number of 

 years past I have practised packing 

 them for winter on the summer stands, 

 an operation which I accomplish about 

 as follows: 



The oil-cloth which is kept on top 

 of the frames when the surplus supers 

 and sections are not on, is doubled 

 over to the front, leaving the back half 

 of the frames exposed. Then in the 

 center of this uncovered space I invert 

 a wooden butter-dish (such as your 



grocer gives you as a part of a pound 

 of butter), extending it crosswise of 

 the hive, to cover as many frames as 

 possible; and then fit an empty super 

 on the hive as tightly as possible so 

 that no water can be driven in. 



This makes a clustering-place for 

 nearly a quart of bees, where they can 

 retain their bodily heat, and keep warm 

 and snug in the coldest weather, and 

 also be enabled to reach their stores of 

 honey below by passing over the tops 

 of the frames. It also prevents the few 

 bees from becoming detached from the 

 main cluster and getting caught be- 

 tween two combs and perishing, as 

 they otherwise sometimes do in sud- 

 den snaps of very severe weather. 



Next, over this half of the hive, and 

 over the inverted dish, I place a piece 

 of old coarse carpet, or gunny-sack 

 will answer, tucking it down carefully 

 around the edges, and then fill the su- 

 per with dry wheat or oats chaff. 



Now carefully fit on the cover, and if 

 there is any possibility of its leaking 

 rain or snow water cover it with a 

 piece of roofing, being sure that there 

 is no place for water to work in, either. 

 Then raise the rear end of the whole 

 hive at least 2 inches, letting it rest 

 upon a couple of bricks or stones so 

 that rain or melting snow will speedily 

 run away from the entrance, and not 

 work in so as to clog it or keep the 

 bottom-board wet. 



When thus fixed there is but one 

 more source of loss to contend with. 

 We are liable to have many warm, 

 simny days towards spring which will 

 induce the bees to come out in large 

 numbers while snow is still on the 

 ground, on which many will alight, be- 

 come chilled, and never return to the 

 hive. 



If the bee-keeper has empty supers to 

 spare, it is a good plan to place one 

 under each hive, which puts the bees 

 so far from the entrance that they are 

 not so quickly incited to emerge on 

 account of a little sunshine, and gives 

 air enough to prevent suffocation in 



case the entrance becomes stopped by 

 ice or litter. 



Otherwise it is well to keep the en- 

 trances well shaded, so that the bright 

 sunshine will not induce them to sally 

 forth too early for their safety. 



If during a very bright and warm 

 day they still will come out in large 

 numbers, while snow is still on the 

 ground, a sprinkling of straw or waste 

 hay in front of the hives will save 

 many, as they will prefer to alight on 

 it rather than the snow, and then 

 nearly all get back safely without be- 

 coming chilled. 



If the hives are not in a naturally 

 slieltered location, it is well to protect 

 them from the winds by standing some 

 corn-fodder or straw against the north 

 and west sides to act as a wind-break. 



But, however you may manage, if 

 you use all your ingenuity to keep the 

 bees dry, as well as warm, they will 

 seldom suffer from cold. 



Factoryville, Pa. 



Foul Brood and the Inspectors 



BY E. M. GIBSON. 



It has come to the breaking point 

 with nie, and I am going to write some 

 truths about foul brood, and if some 

 one's feelings are hurt, I hope others 

 may be benefited. 



There is not the slimsiest thread of 

 consistency in keeping foul brood year 

 after year to menace those who keep 

 their apiaries clean. One would not 

 be allowed to keep any other infectious 

 disease in a neighborhood— why foul 

 brood r We hear of bee-keepers whose 

 bees get the disease, but that is the last 

 we hear about it— they get rid of it 

 without an inspector having to come 

 and make them do so. Nearly every 

 issue of our bee-papers has one or 

 more articles about foul brood and its 

 cure, and I believe a great majority of 

 them ought never to have been pub- 

 lished. If I were inspector I would be 

 lenient with the beginner, but the old 

 transgressor would lutvc to " get busy ' 

 and clean up. 



In the first place, I would see to it 

 that everv owner of bees received a 

 circular explaining the McEvoy treat- 

 ment, and giving explicit instructions 

 about being careful in the manipula- 

 tion of the same. The McEvoy treat- 

 ment will cure foul brood, either 

 American or European. When I re- 

 fer to the McEvoy treatment it is to be 

 understood that I mean with starters 

 or with whole sheets of foundation. I 

 used full sheets, and if I had used only 

 that treatment instead of trying every- 

 thing else I had read about, I would 

 have gotten rid of it one year sooner 

 than I did. If there is a sure cure for 

 foul brood, why not confine one's self 

 to that process ? 



There need be no trouble about diag- 

 nosing the disease; the rawest begin- 

 ner would not be misled, for if his eye- 

 sight failed, and his olfactory nerve 

 was in tune, he could make no mistake. 

 Some districts of the inspectors are 

 so large that it is impossible for them 

 to do all the work, and the law in this 

 State does not require them to do so. 

 The owners of bees should be in- 

 structed as to the method of cure, and 



