34 



GLBANTNGS IN BEE CULTURE 



January, 1918 



GLEANINGS FROM THE NORTH, SOUTH, EAST, AND WEST 



THE DIXIE BEE 



NOT only is 

 the walnut 

 being cut 

 out from our Grace Allen, Nashville, Tenn 



Tennessee woods to make gunstocks, but the 

 locust also is being taken out rapidly. Walk- 

 ing across country one peaceful autumn 

 Sunday afternoon we saw several trucks 

 of locust logs being hauled, even on that 

 day, so urgent is the need. This locust, we 

 are told, is taken to our ship-building yards 

 to be used as ship ' ' pins. ' ' Many a bee- 

 keeper will notice the loss of this heavy 

 nectar -jdelder, while all lovers of beautiful 

 bloom and fragrant breezes will miss these 

 trees that have made countless generations 

 of human hearts glad in the lovely days of 

 late April. 



Dr. Miller, those men whom I referred to 

 as trying movable frames instead of box 

 hives, happen not to be in Tennessee. But 

 of course I must admit that Tennessee has 

 box hives, many of them; and among box 

 hive beekeepers (?) there is no swarm con- 

 trol. When I doubted about indiscriminate 

 SAvarming being the general practice in Ten- 

 nessee I was quoting from a bulletin, so 

 I suppose I was thinking chiefly of the bul- 

 letin-reading beekeepers. That problem 

 wasn't fair; but for a fact the bulletin-read- 

 ing, journ.al-taking, convention-attending, 

 careful, conscientious beekeepers of Tennes- 

 see have sometimes been nettled by being 

 scolded for things they didn't do. 



Take the matter of winter packing. It 

 might be put to them thus: " Here is a 

 good chance to make your present success 

 more successful. ' ' And they would quite 

 likely give it consideration. But they have 

 been told: " You lose half your bees every 

 winter, so you'd better get busy and pack." 

 Well, they know they don 't lose half their 

 bees every winter, so they don 't get busy 

 and pack. I am sorry more are not trying 

 it this fall, at least on a small scale. 



I protested just this way to our good 

 friend Mr. Bartholomew a couple of weeks 

 ago. He took issue with me on the ground 

 that beekeepers were beekeepers, whether 

 they were good or bad; and when people 

 said beekeepers of Tennessee they meant bee- 

 keepers of Tennessee, all of them; and so 

 they were justified in talking and writing 

 about our 50 per cent average winter loss, 

 and our indiscriminate swarming, which 

 sounds reasonable enough. 

 * * * 



C. E. Bartholomew, of the extension de- 

 partment, has been transferred from Ten- 

 nessee to Colorado. Owing to his recent 

 illness, a change of climate seemed advis- 

 able for the approaching winter — not that 

 lie is ill now, however. He took a splendid 

 long walk with us one beautiful October 

 Sunday, when the skies were bright blue 

 and the trees like a flame. His close ac- 



quaintance with 

 plants and in- 

 sects made him 

 a particularly in- 

 teresting companion, as we left mile after 

 mile of glowing countryside behind us. But 

 recently recovered health is truly something 

 to be guarded, so he plans to be particularly 

 careful for a while. Fortunately the depart- 

 ment was able to make the transfer, so 

 Tennessee 's loss becomes Colorado 's gain. 

 Our best wishes go with Mr. Bartholomew, 

 and we hope he may come back to Tennes- 

 see. 



* * » 



In the summer of 1916 we had a touch 

 of a trouble that answers most frequently 

 to the name of ' ' disappearing disease. ' ' 

 But it was in one colony only, so far as ob- 

 served — the one directly at the foot of the 

 peach-tree. Last year it was in many colo- 

 nies slightly, the worst one being another 

 one under the peach-tree. For a while I 

 felt, like Mr. Holtermann, p. 766, October, 

 that the shade must be a strong contributing 

 factor. An experience that Mr. Bartholo- 

 mew reported added weight to this conclu- 

 sion. Yet after all it became pretty badly 

 scattered thruout our little yard, most of 

 which is not particularly well shaded. Bare 

 places in the grass all around were strewn 

 with dead bees. 



Mr. Byer certainly uses the correct term 

 when he talks about " crawling " bees in 

 autumn, I love flying bees, and don't seri- 

 ously mind stinging bees, within reasonable 

 limits; but I do solemnly object to crawling 

 bees. They nearly always develop into , 

 stingers eventually, and somehow leave 

 me a lot more resentful than when they just 

 fly at me straight — biff! — that way. In fact, 

 it is only in the fall that I ever think about 

 the advantages of a really bee-proof working 



suit. 



* * * 



There were more moths darting and 

 hovering around the beeyard last fall than 

 I ever noticed before. Ordinarily we have 

 faith in the vigorous defense of our Italians 

 — justifiably so, as the only trouble we have 

 ever had with moths has been in combs 

 stacked in the supply room. I hope this 

 disappearing disease may not have weakened 

 their resistance. 



And now the editor says that we of the 

 South not only have a wintering problem, 

 even as they do in the North, but have also 

 a ' ' spiinging ' ' problem — ' ' and by no 

 means the least is the springing!" Well, 

 the solution for the wintering is the solution 

 for the springing, we understand — packed 

 hives. But please, Mr. Editor, don't spring 

 anything on us that packmg can't cure! 



- # -4 V" 



