748 



GLEANINGS IN B E E C U I. T U K E 



DECEMBER, 195 8 



BOUT 



c 



ur 



/\t li r 



years ago 

 I sent for a sam- 

 ple })aekage of 

 the yellow ami 

 white sweet 

 clover seed, and 

 the first year of 

 i t s maturity I 



gathered 18 pounds of seed. I seedeil some 

 alongside the garden and the creek and in 

 the alfalfa field on a separate piece of 

 ground, and I have 50 pounds of seed gath- 

 ered this season. Our stock, horses, and cows 

 eat it with delight, and my bees gathered 

 lots of honey in spite of the drouth we had 

 again this season, which lasted from the last 

 day of March until Aug. 5. ' ' — Mrs. Mar- 

 garet Green, Washington County, Ida. 



"An old beekeeper tells me that I can 

 feed my bees ground oats this winter as 

 sugar can not be had, and I could not afford 

 it anywav. How about the oats?" — Wiley 

 W. Smith, Wythe County, Va. 



' ' I should have requeened this fall but 

 there M'as no use of buying new queens, for 

 I couldn 't find the old ones, as they are too 

 black and too shy for me, and no one near- 

 er than 40 miles that I know of that could 

 find such black queens. ' ' — A. I. Marston, Ida 

 County, la. 



' ' Middle south Florida is one of the best 

 honey fields in the State, both as for quali- 

 ty and quantity. I have 140 stands of bees; 

 no disease; never feed; gather some honey 

 every month; swarm in September; took 20 

 gallons from one stand and made three divi- 

 sions." — N. J. Thompson, Polk County, Fla. 



' ' The Klabuhn Brothers in Gleanings ad- 

 vise to buy the bees, hives, tools, and all 

 beekeeping equipment of neighbor beekeep- 

 ers who keep only a few hives or gums and 

 so neglect them that they have disease. 

 Can some one tell me what to do with the 

 small beekeepers here that will not sell and 

 will not improve their beekeeping?" — Ralph 

 Hall, Stone County, Ark. 



' ' Colonies in this region located exclu- 

 sively in orchards did poorly. Nearly all 

 our orchards are cherries and prunes, which 

 are never sprayed with arsenate as apple 

 trees are. The wasp is one of the bee pests 

 with which we have to contend. We bait 

 him, using a wire flytrap in which is placed 

 a small piece of salmon. In this locality we 

 do not seem to need the winter protection 

 discussed in Gleanings. For instance, I 

 have found that colonies wintered under a 

 low shed closed on three sides but entirely 

 open to the east came out in fine condition 

 in the spring. The east is the direction from 

 which we seldom have any wind. My bees 

 remain in this shed the year around. ' ' — J. 

 W. Beckley, Marion County, Ore. 



' ' This season in Australia is an excep- 

 tionallv good one for lionev. Thousands of 



BEES, MEN AND THINGS 



(You may find it here) 



1 



1=1 



t o n s are being 

 jiroduced. My- 

 self and broth- 

 er have 40 colo- 

 nies, and up to 

 the present have 

 harvested about 

 .5,500 pounds and 

 expect 3,000 

 more. Our sea- 

 sons here aie very irregular. One in four 

 will be a grand honey season. Of the other 

 three, two will be good and one almost a 

 failure. Our beekeepers are becoming more 

 modern in their method and are working 

 their ajjiaries on the good American system, 

 and it is becoming a big industry, especially 

 as people are beginning to find out the value 

 of honev as a food. ' ' — Percy Sweetman, N. 

 S. W. 



"With the temperature at 88 in the shade 

 and bees working furiously in goldenrod, it 

 hardly seems like the last day of October, 

 does it? If the weather remains good, I 

 shall probably get a super of honey from 

 each of my colonies yet this fall from the 

 goldenrod, which is abundant. " — F. G. 

 Berner, Orange County, Fla., Oct. 31. 



' ' The retail price of the aluminum combs 

 is 55 cents each, f. o. b. California, which in- 

 cludes the frame itself nailed and wired 

 with four vertical wires. I have used only 

 two of the frames this season as an experi- 

 ment and have found the bees take to them 

 readily both for honey and brood. I now 

 have a cluster of bees on these frames for 

 wintering and will watch results. ' ' — M. R. 

 Delahay, Howard County, Md. 



" If I were back to young days (I am now 

 73 years old), I would immediately figure on 

 making beekeeping my principal and sole oc- 

 cupation. In the 10 years just past, while 

 studying the bees ' habits and management, 

 I have learned to love them dearly despite 

 the few stings given me mostly in the early 

 years of my acquaintance before I had learn- 

 ed that by proper care and judicious han- 

 dling stinging would be almost entirely 

 eliminated. ' ' — E. E. Cohen, Waupaco Coun- 

 ty, Wis. 



' ' About July 1 the bees began to let up 

 on bringing in honey and scarcely got 

 enough to feed themselves. At that time 

 the small miller swarmed by the millions 

 (A'er all the alfalfa and clover. I could see 

 no reason why the bloom did not still pro- 

 duce nectar, and my only solution of the 

 situation was that the millers beat the bees 

 to it, they being scattered over the fields 

 night and day. About July 24 we had a ter- 

 rific storm which nearly destroyed all the 

 millers; and the bees got very busy again 

 and kept it up until about Aug. 15 when 

 they began to slow up on account of cold 

 days. Our crop ran from 40 to 75 pounds 

 per colony. ' ' — C. E. Crowfoot, Logan Coun- 

 ty, Colo. 



"Items noticed in 1918: That in some 

 seasons 8-frame hives are better than 10- 



