78 



NOVICES GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



NO. 06. —My bees arc gathering honey by 

 the barrel. Yours, truly, 



N. E. Phentick, Castaha, 0. 

 July 1st, 1873. 



Right glad to hear it, hope they'll keep 

 doing SO., 



No. 07.— Your extractor I believe to be a 

 good thing, but having never seen one of any 

 kind, I know nothing of the principles upon 

 which they work. I must confess that I am 

 more dumbfounded with its description than 

 I am with the hive- Couldn't you get up a 

 .-ample of it also, that you could send by 

 mail and charge enough to pay you? Very 

 respectfully, Wm. C. Griee. 



OS. Can your gearing be attached to the 

 Peabody extractor without much cost? I 

 have one of them. In feeding bees in your 

 "simplicity" hive, will it do to pour sugar 

 syrup on top of the frames? If not, what is 

 the best mode ? Chas. D.Ellis, 



Edcntown, N. C. 



We regret to say that we know of no 

 way in which t he Peabody extractor can 



he made better. If gearing could be at- 

 tached, the momentum of so much metal 

 besides the honey would make matters bur 

 little better. 



We have now on hand a half dozen 

 Peabody machines that have never been 

 used which we will sell for $8 each ; regu- 

 lar price, $15. They will do excellent 

 work, and very likely will never wear out, 

 hut the one who uses them we fear would . 



00.— Most porticular P. S.— Fearing that 

 my long sheet's contents would get some- 

 what crossways in your pile of unreadable 

 letters, I have concluded to give you the gist 

 —"nothing but the gist." 1. How to make 

 bees build worker comb only, and when to 

 feed bees syrup— here— for winter. 2. Price 

 of empty worker comb. 'i. Could your scales 

 be gotten up cheaper than $j, and is more 

 than one pair needed in an apiary ? How do 

 you rig a hive to at any time weigh with the 

 scales? 



T. J. Kennedy, Castalian Springs, Tenn. 



Bless your heart, friend K., we have 

 never yet had a letter on the subject of 

 bee culture that was unread, though some 

 of them required even P. G.'s utmost ef- 

 forts (she has been a "school marm" four- 

 teen terms), and we think they have all 

 repaid the time spent. 



1st. We don't know. This past sea- 

 son we were so well pleased to see them 

 build com!) at all, that we were not over- 

 particular. We keep drone comb out i f 

 the way of the queen, and find it just as 

 good for the extractor. A colony with a 

 young qur>en is not as apt to build drone 

 comb, and by reducing the worker force 

 we think it can almost always be managed. 

 few things are positively certain with 



heir, 



2d. Novice suggests that our best 

 worker combs are worth a dollar apiece to 

 us, hut P. (<. soys we don't want to sell 

 'em at any price. Won't some of our 

 subscribers offer them cheaper, /. e., in 

 raetal cornered Langstroth frames? 



i'.d. We should consider but one pair 

 of scales necessary in an apiary, and we 

 keep a one-story hive permanently hung 

 <m them. It is held by a wire running un- 

 der it, and is kept from swinging by the 

 wind too much, by two more wires attach- 

 ed to front and back carried horizontal^ 

 to stake ; leaving it to rise and fall by 



each ounce of increase or diminution. 



Again, $5 is too much for an imple- 

 ment like that for bee culture. But that 

 isn't the worst of it. Our stock is sold 

 out, and dealers and manufacturers now 

 say they cannot furnish any more at less 

 than $65 per dozen ; that ours was stock 

 remaining on hand, etc. Novice threat- 

 ens to study u)i something for about a dol- 

 lar that will tell when a hive is gaining or 

 losing at a glance, but even then it's very 

 convenient to have scales that will weigh 

 accurately when we are feeding for win- 

 ter, etc., and as they must be weather- 

 proof, perhaps they can't be made any 

 cheaper. It is just fan for its to know 

 every ounce of success or the contrary. 

 To illustrate : our bees have been going 

 northward of late as soon as daylight and 

 almost sooner, and on returning they were 

 covered with yellow dust. By the time 

 the scales had shown a few ounces in- 

 crease, Novice investigated, and found a 

 ten acre cornfield that it seems had been 

 planted with pumpkins, and corn put in 

 occasionally. The time was sunrise, or 

 shortly after, and he claims the hum of 

 industry that arose from a sea of yellow 

 blossoms (rivaling anything in Yiek's col- 

 lection in size if not in splendor) was 

 enough to — to — well enough to make any 

 spring balance feel the effects of it. In a 

 few days the grasshoppers, too, discovered 

 the nectar, and they seem now to be dis- 

 puting with the Italians as to who shall 

 get up earliest. 



No. 100.— I have kept bees in Iowa lor five 

 years, and 1 think it is one of the best States 

 in the Union for bees. But our best honey 

 harvest is from the middle of July till last of 

 September. I kept black bees for 2 years and 

 did not get a pound of surplus, and the sum- 

 mer I gave them Italian ciueens I got over 300 

 pounds from 5 stocks. 1 use the Langstroth 

 hive exclusively. 



Alfred McMains, Chariton, Iowa. 



No. 101;— My extractor (just finished) works 

 "like a charm ;" the only trouble is the 

 .-trips of tin came very near cutting the first 

 pair of combs into four inch strips; however, 

 I soon learned to turn slower and did i)«i 

 cut them so badly, but think the wire cloth 

 will be much better. My extractor is a home 

 made one, but I think it is on the right prin- 

 ciple : stationary can, revolving frame. 

 Any man that gets me to raise box honey for 

 him after this, will have to pay me at least 

 three times the price of extracted honey for 

 it. John Atkinson, Nelson, Pa. 



Nothing gives us more pleasure than to 

 hear from those who are "succeeding! with 

 home made implements. There is a 

 species of independence in being able, 

 when needful, to make materials at hand 

 answer our purposes that we always ad- 

 mire. 



No. 102.— I will enclose you a letter from 

 the young man wh» took my bees to Iowa. 

 If my bees do any thing like what they re- 

 port there, I will be happily disappointed. 

 1 had counted on exagerations; having ex- 

 tracted nejirly all the honey and reduced the 

 hives in bees as much as if they had swarmed, 

 it was as much as I expected that they would 

 build up to proper condition for winter, as I 

 know thev would have accumulated nothing 

 here. R. Wilkin, Cadiz. 0, 



We rejoice at the prospect of Mr. W's. 

 success in his project, and enclose ex- 

 tracts from the letter referred to: 



