1890 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTUKE. 



453 



For although this is called the land of perpetual 

 summer, one can not plant just at any time. 



We have our winter gardens and fall gardens; 

 but the unsophisticated Yankee who plants the 

 common g-arden vegetables between March and 

 September will have have an opportunity to paral- 

 lel the bee-men's biggest story of " spring dwin- 

 dling." There are showers and sunshine in abun- 

 dance, conditions uniler which one would think the 

 gardens ought to boom; but they don't. 



In our market, the quart measure is the stand- 

 ard, and the nickel the smallest coin that will buy 

 any thing. As to prices, would not some of your 

 Ohio gardeners delight in selling their tomatoes at 

 30 cts. a quart? That has been the price here for 

 the last two months, and they are small tomatoes, 

 and few in a quart too. Very poor celery is 2.5 cts. 

 a stalk; lettuce, 5 cts. a head; potatoes, .50 cts. a 

 peck; onions, 10 cts. a quart; string beans, 5 cts. a 

 quart; strawberries are cheap now, at 25 cts. a box. 

 Sweet potatoes are one of the very few vegetables 

 that flourish in summer, and are always cheap— 

 from 40 to 75 cts. per bushel. We do not plant slips, 

 as you do, but lay a foot or eighteen inches of the 

 vine across the ridge, and push it into the earth 

 with a forked stick, and in a few days it sends out 

 new roots and leaves. 



The swarm of bees, my first and dearest, in more 

 than one sense, about which I wrote you last fall, 

 picked up a little after the robbers ceased paying 

 their unwelcome attentions, but it was not more 

 than a good-sized nucleus when orange-blossoms 

 came in April. But thsy proved themselves " hust- 

 lers" then, and speedily filled their hive with brood 

 and honey. As I wanted experience in manipulat- 

 ing them, more than honey, I divided them a short 

 time ago, and now have a virgin queen five days 

 old, on the three combs I took from the old hive. 



Now I must tell you how I got a swarm out of a 

 barrel, and stop. They were runaways, which a 

 negro had caught a mile or so from town, and shak- 

 en into a barrel which had no head in either end. 

 For a cover he set a heavy box over them. I 

 bought them, and early one foggy morning my ten- 

 year-old boy Don and I went to bring them home. 

 I had a light box, fixed so as to hold four or five 

 frames, and proposed to transfer their combs if 

 they were large enough; if not, to transfer the bees 

 alone. My first move was to lift that box off the 

 barrel; and if ever I had a "bse in my bonnet" it 

 was a second or two after. They said, " What are 

 you at here? Get out of this!" in good English. 

 So I set the box back and took a little time to con- 

 sider their proposition. I had found a case to 

 which "Directions for Transferring," as per ABC 

 book, comprehensive as they are, would not apply, 

 and I had to make some of my own. First, we fired 

 up the cold-blast smoker, and smoked them till 

 they couldn't wink. Then I turned the box upside 

 down again, and set it to one side. A few combs 

 were fastened to it, and seemed very soft— so much 

 80 that they all fell over to one side as I turned the 

 box. Then I put my little hive where the barrel 

 stood, and jarred the bees into and around it, most- 

 ly around it, as it was small and the barrel big. 

 The combs were all too short to reach across the 

 frames; but I put three of them in, upside down, 

 so that the heaviest part would rest on the bottom- 

 bar, and hung them in my box. On a comb not 

 larger than my hand I found the queen, and put 

 her safely into the hive. Now, how to get the bees 



in was the question. I could not wait for them to 

 go in of their own accord, as I wanted to take them 

 away at once. There was a narrow alighting-board 

 on my bo.x, so I nailed down the lid, and, making a 

 little paddle, I began shoving them toward the en- 

 trance. When I got a bunch of them on the alight- 

 ing-beard I would gently crowd them up to the 

 entrance, and, by making haste slowly, I soon had 

 all but a few stragglers safely housed. Then I 

 nailed the entrance shut, put the box under my 

 arm, and walked home with my prize. How much 

 we enjoyed the early morning walk, the dewy pine 

 woods, and our success, you "bee brethren" will 

 realize if you recall your early experiences when 

 the glamour of novelty was with you. 



Just one question: Do any bee-keepers use the 

 crosswise Simplicity frame? I have made my own 

 hives and frames, and, either by mistake or for 

 some now forgotten reason, made the first frames 

 crosswise, and all since. I handled some long Sim- 

 plicity frames for a neighbor, and do not like them 

 at all, compared with my own. E. J. Batrd. 



Orlando, Fla., May 20, 1890. 



Friend B., the crosswise Simplicity 

 frames have been in use for many years, 

 and there has been once or twice a boom on 

 them ; bnt I suppose that most bee-keepers, 

 like ourselves, became disgusted with hav- 

 ing two kinds of frames in tlie apiary ; and 

 as the greater part of the frames in use are 

 the regular Langstroth, the crosswise were 

 sooner or later ruled out. I do not know of 

 anybody now that uses them to any extent. 

 The only objection is, they are out of the 

 beaten track. 



THE GREAT FLOOD OF THE 

 MISSISSIPPI. 



THE OVERFLOW AMONG THE HOMES OF BEE-KEEP- 

 ERS ; THE PROSPECTS FOR A CROP OF HONEV. 



Bro. Rout:— The greatest overfiow of the Mississ- 

 ippi Valley has passed, and all the planters are busy 

 with their preparations for the coming season. 

 Planting cotton is almost completed, and much of 

 it is up, and ready for the hoe and plow. The pros- 

 pect for the future is very encouraging, and I have 

 no doubt that a large cotton crop will be made. 

 When the year closes, one would scarcely realize 

 that such a flood could have passed over this rich 

 alluvial country, and its ravages so soon obliterat- 

 ed. The corn crop will be small, as it requires to be 

 planted early, so as to avoid the summer drought. 

 A large quantity of millet and peas will be planted 

 for fodder. 



The overflow was 2'/4 feet higher over the country 

 than I have ever known it, having resided here 

 from my birth. The loss of stock was immense, es- 

 pecially cattle. Most of the work stock was saved. 

 Thousands of cattle were driven on to the few high 

 ridges of land above the flood, and a large portion 

 perished of starvation. The destruction of human 

 life was more than one would suppose. More than 

 twenty persons were drowned within a radius of 

 twenty miles of this city. My friend, W. G. McLen- 

 don, whom you may know as a large bee-keeper of 

 Chicot County, Ark., lost his son, three years old, 

 who fell from the piazza into the water, four feet 

 deep, while his mother and father were away some 

 distance from the house feeding the cattle that 

 were located on a scaffold. No one saw him at the 



