•ijtis 



GLEANING8 IN BEK (11.1 lUK 



May 1 



Heads of Grain 



from Different Fie'ds 



NATIOKAL ASSOCIATION. 



Ihc membersip to-day, March 26, is 3700. The 

 I'lesidtnfs mark of 5000 is fast coming in sight. 

 Let tlie good work go on. 



Information Bulletin No. 15 has just been mailed 

 to members. This is of value only as each member 

 uses it. To many it is worth the dues of several 

 years. 



The second edition of " Bee-keepers' I>egal Rights" 

 has just been mailed to the members. It is a refer- 

 ence volume which every bee-keeper should have 

 in his library. Paid-up members get a free copy. 

 There are none for sale to outsiders. 



The winter losses of bees are quite heavy in .some 

 places. Some report a loss of three-fourths. 



The present honey prospects are good except in 

 .Southern < alifornia, where they have had no rains 

 for nine weeks. 



Kach new member gets a copy of the 1909 annual 

 report free, as long as the supply lasts. There are 

 not many left. 



R. L. Taylor. Chairman of the Board of Directors, 

 has been having the grip. 



If each National member would work to get new 

 members as our recent candidate for president (Mr. 

 Thomas Chantry) has done, we would number 5000 

 by the clpse of the honey harvest. Why not do so? 



It our members who produce extracted honey 

 will follow the advice given in Information Bulle- 

 tin No. 15 there will be a great demand for honey, 

 with hopes of better prices next fall. The bulletin 

 contains the following on this subject: 



GKEAT DEMAND FOR HONEY. 



"I have devoted much time toMlscover why so 

 many complain of no market for their honey. I 

 have asked fifteen wholesale dealers why honey 

 sales were slow when other foods found ready sale 

 at high prices. I also asked bee-keepers who buy 

 tons of honey besides their own for bottling, and 

 al.so asked many who used to be extensive honey- 

 eaters why they have dropped it from their daily 

 food. Almost every one replies with this answer: 



■' ' Good well-ripened honey, sealed by the bees 

 and matured in the hives, is always in demand at 

 fair prices: but this thin stuff, extracted before it is 

 ready, before it is well ripened— that will soin^- 

 that never has either flavor or body— that is what 

 sjiolls the market for honey." 



"Through the Information Bureau I have had 

 sent me many offers of honey to sell. For .several 

 such lots I found sales, and later received word 

 from the purchasers that the thin honey had no 

 body or flavor, except souring. If every member of 

 the National Association will promise me that all 

 of his honey iMi be ripe, capped-over honey before it 

 leaves the hives, he will have a market which he 

 can never supply. Our Association can never brand 

 the honey of its members until this is done." 



By the time the members of the National get their 

 honey ready for market this year I hope to be able 

 to have new patterns of honey-labels for their spe- 

 cial use. 



On the evening of March 31, as General Manager 

 N. E. France, with his wife, was mailing the last 

 buggy-load of Bee-keepers' Legal Rights, they met 

 with serious injuries by another team running into 

 their buggy, upsetting it and causing a runaway. 



i'latteville, Wis. N. K. France. 



A MODIFIED ALEXANDER PLAN FOR MAKING IN- 

 CRE.\SE. 



I'hf main honey-flow, which is from crim.son clo- 

 ver. Comes very early in this locality, beginning the 

 last of April and extending until late in May. Our 

 swarming is in March and Ai)ril. I prefer to have 

 my bees all in one apiary, but am compelled to di- 

 vide them into four yards in order to find a good 

 bee-range by actual test. 



To head off swarming and to secure increase at 

 the .same time, I wish to try a combination of the 

 Alexander and brush-.swarming plans. When a col- 

 ony makes preparations for swarming I intend to 

 preijare a hive-body on the old stand, as suggested 

 by Mr. Alexander, and put a queen-excluder over 



it. The old hive-body 1 will set at one side, then 

 brus'i all the bees before the new hive on the old 

 st".id; and when the,v have all gone in. place the old 

 iiive-body over the excluder long enough so that the 

 bees will care for the brood. I will then remove the 

 old body and set it at the side of the old stand, with 

 the entrance turned the other way. In 21 days I 

 can find the new queen in the old hive, cage her, 

 and Ijrush nearly all the bees in front of the new 

 hive on the old stand, then move the old hive con- 

 taining the new queen and her few bees to a new 

 place as a nucleus, and finally release the queen. 



By this plan, nearly all the strength of both hives 

 will be given to the colony on tlie old stand in time 

 for the clover flow. This will give the new queen 

 with her nucleus until July to build up in time for 

 the sourwood flow. 



Will this work all right, or should I follow the 

 ordinary plan of brush .swarming? My bees, being 

 nearly all hybrids, are very cross, and boil over 

 when I open the hives. I am a poor hand at finding 

 a queen. 



Biltmore, N. C. W. N. Randolph. 



[The plan as proposed above will be perfectly fea- 

 sible; indeed, if we are not very much mistaken. Mr. 

 Alexander himself suggested this modification in 

 one of his articles. The shaken-swarm plan can be 

 varied materially to suit local conditions and cer- 

 tain pl.ans that the apiarist may have in view. If 

 he does not desire increase, then he can put the sec- 

 ond drive of bees in with the first after the brood 

 has all hatched ovit. If he desires increase, then he 

 should, of course, move the parent hive to some 

 other location. By your plan you secure increase, 

 and at the same time give all the brood, after it 

 hatches out, to the first drive. — Ed.] 



< 



BLACKS AND HYBRIDS SWARM LESS THAN ITALIANS. 



I mu.st add my complaint to that of Mr. W. C. Mol- 

 let, page "9. as to the excessive swarming of the Ital- 

 ians. My bees are in ten-frame hives. I always u.se 

 baits in sections, and give the entrance an inch or 

 so by the width of the hive in hot weather. I have 

 had Italians of two different strains — southern-bred 

 and red clover, and fovnid the same thing in both 

 cases — a mania to swarm. They begin before there 

 is honey enough to go into the supers, and keep it 

 up. Last sea.son I undertook to prevent swarming 

 entirely by removing queen-cells, but more than 

 half swarmed in spite of me. A cell overlooked or 

 a day's delay, and out they would come. Most of 

 the bees in the neighborhood are dark hybrids, with 

 perhaps a few pure blacks. The record for most hon- 

 ey per hive, .so far as I know, is held by a colony of 

 dark hybrids which h.as swarmed not at all in seven 

 years, and has onl.v a J'sxS-inch entrance all the year 

 round. Others, with similar hives and bees, have 

 had very little swarming, while a neighbor who 

 never got supers put on any of his had only a mod- 

 erate amount of it. As a new swarm usually makes 

 little or no hone.v here, and a hive which has swarm- 

 ed once not much, this is quite an item. By putting 

 back swarms and by careful attention I have been 

 able to get a greater average per hive than others; 

 but individually they have been outdone by those 

 having little or no Italian blood. So far as I know, 

 the experience of others in the.se parts has been the 

 .same. I suggest that, in this coinitry as in Europe, 

 there are places where the blacks are better than 

 the Italians. 



Concerning whitewood (poplar) honey, it is the 

 best we know anything about here: but we get only 

 enough of it to make us hungry nowadays. 



McConnelsville, O., Feb. 10. H. D. Tennbnt. 



[See Mr. Macdonald's article, p. 2%.— Ed.} 



HONEY-DEW .\LL RIGHT FOR EATING. 



Is it not a fact that, when the honey-bee comes 

 along and gathers this excretion into its honey-sac 

 and then empties it into the cell in the comb, a 

 change takes place, and that this excretion becomes 

 hone.v-dew honey? and, through this change, is not 

 all waste m.atter eliminated? If this is established, 

 to what end is such discussion? In the hands of an 

 ignorant press and certain competitive corpora- 

 tions it can work a good deal of harm to those who 

 produce good honey as well as those who produce 

 bad. 



Calabasas. Cal., March 26. .S. K. IIed.strom. 



[.\n^ saccharine matter which the bees piay 

 gather is changed chemically, either just before or 

 just after It Is stored in the comb; but many of the 

 oriainal characteristics of the product will be the 



