.432 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



June 1. 



shouldn't be a chaflf cushion over the cover. 

 Now, doctor, I don't believe in sealed covers at 

 all; but just to be in fashion I fixed up one and 

 put it on the hive in August so as to be sure it 

 would be sealed, and it was as tight as bee-glue 

 could make it; and then when cold weather ap- 

 proached I put one of the same cushions I use 

 on all my hives right over it, one thickness of 

 cotton cloth and six inches of chaff. Now, 

 may be you would like to know how it worked. 

 The cover was partly glassed, so that I could 

 see the bees at any time by raising the chaff- 

 box without disturbing the sealing or the bees 

 either. The first month, all was well: then it 

 began to get damp around the sides of the hive, 

 and soon the bees began to look fat. At the 

 end of another week it was wet. Drops of wa- 

 ter were on the glass; bees were getting fatter 

 every week, and soon they began to die; and 

 the drops of water got to be so large that they 

 couldn't hang any longer, and dropped down, 

 forming puddles on top of the frames, and the 

 bees died faster, and the whole colony came up 

 on top of the frames, and were the most misera- 

 ble-looking set imaginable, while the bees in 

 the hives without sealed covers were dry and 

 comfortable. I saw that they were all going to 

 die right away if they did not get a change, so 

 I pulled off the sealed cover and put on the 

 chaff-box, and in a week the water had gone 

 oiTt of the hive; the bees stopped dying and be- 

 gan to grow smaller, and in two weeks they 

 were all right, and are breeding up again; and 

 although it may be only one straw to show 

 which way the wind blows, it is all I want to do 

 with it until I wish to get out of bee-keeping. 



ICE CLOGGING THE ENTRANCE IN WINTER. 



As Mrs. Axtell and some others seem to fear 

 there may be danger from ice in winter, I will 

 tell them how my bees were wintered in ice the 

 past winter. To start with, on the 17th of No- 

 vember, without any warning, it began to snow 

 from the northeast, and snowed six inches of 

 the wettest snow I ever saw, with one excep- 

 tion, and it stuck all over every thing it touch- 

 ed, so that the hives were completely covered 

 with wet packed snow; then it turned cold, and 

 froze on. so that it could not be gotten off; then 

 in about a week it rained, and froze as it fell, 

 until there was an inch of good clear hard ice 

 all over the snow, which was frozen to every 

 thing, and the hive resembled a snow mound 

 coated with ice; then it snowed again at differ- 

 ent times until the snow was higher than the 

 hives, and, in part of the yard, twice as high, 

 and packed so hard that"! could walk right 

 over the hives and not show a track. Now, I 

 thought, is the time for bees to smother if they 

 are ever going to, as they were completely cased 

 in ice, and all that snow on top; but I let them 

 alone until they had been there about six 

 weeks, then I went and dug out a few hives. I 

 found the bees dry and all right. I let them 

 alone another month, then dug out some more, 

 finding this time that they had 'melted away 

 the ice and snow all around the hive, and were 

 standing each in a little room roofed over with 

 ice and covered with snow; and they stayed so 

 until March came with sunshine enough to 

 melt off the crust and slowly settle down the 

 deep snow; but the bees did not get out more 

 than a few at a time until Mar. 38, having been 

 without a flight since some time in October — I 

 have forgotten just when, but near the close of 

 the month. Upon counting up I found three 

 had starved; one had died of what I call cold- 

 weather dysentery; three of genuine dysente- 

 ry, and four more were in bad order because 

 they were not in good condition to start with, 

 and had got worse instead of better. They 

 have since died, except one, which still shows a 



couple of spaces occupied for three or four 

 inches around, with a little brood hatching. Gl 

 don't believe that bees often smother with ice 

 or snow in the entrance or anywhere else around 

 the hive; and. also, whenever itis warm enough 

 for them to fly. the snow will pack enough on 

 top to hold a bee so that they will fly up again 

 if they get down. 



. THE WHISKY BUSINESS. 



If lots more of us would join you in your pro- 

 test against having any money we pay for tax- 

 es going to build distilleries, and should also go 

 further and protest against helping to build 

 jails and poorhouses, and pay the expenses of 

 courts, and all the various expenses connected 

 with the drink-evil. I think it would be a good 

 thing; for it is an indisputable fact that the 

 government is in partnership with the whisky- 

 business, and objects to a third partner, too. as 

 witness the continual hunt for what they call 

 "moonshiners." or illicit distillers. Now. as 

 this is a government of the people, it either fol- 

 lows that a majority of the people want it so, 

 or are too careless to say what they do want, or 

 it would be stopped ; but the fact is, Satan 

 wants the business carried on; and the misera- 

 ble subterfuge of making a political issue of 

 what is the greatest moral question of the world 

 to-day is keeping the business alive; and we 

 have the spectacle of two great parties, both 

 afraid to do any thing to cripple or seriously in- 

 terfere with the traffic which is causing more 

 disease and death, and untold misery, than any 

 other one thing on the facf of the wide world 

 to-day; and then if you add to it the vast pile 

 of money required to pay the cost of the result- 

 ing crimes and poverty entailed, it seems as if 

 DO thoughtful person could keep still and let 

 the thing go on; but there are still too many 

 people in the world who think they are not 

 their brother's keeper, and that if a man will 

 drink himself to death it is none of their con- 

 cern. 



FRAMES A LITTLE SHORTER AT THE BOTTOM. 



Dr. M., if you want to know just why it would 

 not be a good plan, just go out to your shop and 

 make a few some morning before breakfast, and 

 see how you like them, and may be you can tell 

 us then. 



HONEY FROM CHESTNUT-TREES. 



On page 2.54 Mr. Benton makes reference to 

 honey from the above source. Now, I should 

 like to know what kind of chestnut-tree besides 

 the horse-chestnut ever yields any honey. I 

 lived 31 years in a chestnut region, and have 

 watched lots of bees working on the bloom, but 

 I never saw them getting or even attempting to 

 get any honey, but {ilways scrambling about 

 over the long bloom'{or tails as the small boy 

 calls them), and getting only a small pellet of 

 white pollen, scantily furnished at that, A 

 great many people claim that they get lots of 

 honey when chestnut is in bloom, but it is al- 

 ways in a place where basswood and chestnut 

 grow in the same part, and the honey comes 

 from the basswood; and the chestnut, making 

 the most showy appearance, gets the credit, both 

 trees being in bloom at the same time. But I 

 hardly take Mr. Benton to be the man to be so 

 mistaken; so if he knows of some kind of chest- 

 nut that yields honey, let him tell us about it. 

 Then, too, he says it is gathered before July, 

 and our chestnut very rarely blooms before the 

 4th of July, and sometimes not till the middle — 

 I mean in the Northern States. I do not know 

 when it blooms in the South. 



TWO QUEENS IN A HIVE. 



A good many report two queens in a hive; 

 but it is always one old and one young one; but 

 that Strawy Miller keeps two in a hive, right 



