1875. 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



ji;;!it when put in, and we i)rotMise(1 to watch 

 them — have watched them, and we oven went 

 in witli a couple of lieavy seak'd combs about 

 the middle ofhist month, to make tliem sure, 

 but on turninir up tlie (juilt tiiey lool^ed so 

 (juiet, with pleniy of scaled lioiiey near them, 

 that we hesitated to disturl) thi'ui, and set 

 down our combs and went out, tliiniviujj: tley 

 would "iro' until time to take them out. T> - 

 day we find all the honey u:one and the be(s 

 dead. The lamp nursery revived some of 

 them partially, but it was too late. Now here 

 is a ([ueer feature ; this was a fair colony and 

 the bees were in splendid condition, but the 

 dust that tjuinby mentions on the bottom 

 board was almost entirely missini^. Althouifh 

 they had been housed nearly 4 months, the 

 bottom board contained scarcely a tea-spoonful 

 of accumulations of matter of any kind. We 

 confess now, that we are inclined to think that 

 bees in the most perfect IwdWi. void nothini; in 

 the winter at all. We might feel inclined to 

 blame friend Bolin, for the above loss, because 

 he advises not to disturb them, but we i^ness 

 we won't, for it would be better to ler, the one 

 (lie, than to injure all the rest by disturbin.ii' 

 them while we were giving this one a comb of 

 honey that might (lultc as well have been put 

 in last fall. 



Mdvch \Wi — The weather ])eing very warm, 

 we liave to-daj' set our bees on their summer 

 stands. With the exception of one more that 

 had starred they are all in excellent condition. 

 lu fact we ai'e sure we never before owned 

 so many bees in the middle of March as we do 

 now, and thanks to the Imported Queen t7tei/ 

 are all ydlow ones. She has been worth alreadv 

 at least .flOO.OO. The bees were all put in the 

 house Nov. 3rd, (see page 13(5, Vol. 2.) "as dry 

 as a chip," and tliej' all came out to-day, as 

 dry as a chip. Guess we"ll hold on until May, 

 before we tell you just how to winter bees, but 

 we feel sure it won't be under glass. 



March 15th — We have had some severe cold 

 weather, but the bees that were in the bee 

 house, and those that were out all winter, are 

 all in excellent trim, while all but two, in the 

 forcing house are dead. Keeping a fire might 

 have enabled them to hold out a little longer, 

 but as they had buzzed against the glass, until 

 only mere handfuls were left, what is the use of 

 going further. Colonies no stronger, that 

 were wintered in the bee house are now in 

 beautiful order and none of them show any 

 disposition to leave their hives in unseasona- 

 !)le weather, while the poor inmates of the 

 r>rcing house latter!}', have hied out never 

 to return, at every glimps of sunshine. 'Tis 

 true only one of them was really fair, (the 

 Quinby liive) and to save them, we have left the 

 sauth side permanently open. Haven't v/e got 

 a nice place to feed meal — plenty of sunshine 

 and no wind. If we allow the bees to "get 

 out" it may do to /.eep them in after all. 



March 24<A— Very cold and wintry, (even 

 below zero) yet we have lost but one colony, 

 and they had the dysentery. Exannnation 

 showed that their stores were all unsealed. 

 This was evidently some bad management in 

 the fall, yet we hardly know how. Inmates of 

 the forcing house are now all gone except those 

 of the Quinby hive, and they are "beautifully j 

 small." ' I 



J^^?Y7i 2r)r/<— Standard hive has bees in all 

 stages and young Italians Just hatdied. One 

 special colony that was built up last fall en- 

 tirely on sugar syrup, with the Universal feed- 

 er, seems to-day precisely as good as they wire 

 in Oct., last; they were wintered in bcehousi. 



— ^». •«•.«»_ — 



\ AKIO«')S MATTERS. 



ijv (;. y\. i)0(ji,rrTMi. 



/jp|\UR. beos were coufincil the j)a:<t winter, Irom 

 yl Jl) November Kith to Ffbni.iry 2'5<1, (\vhi(;li was tli ; 

 ^'s^ lonarcsl we ever knew them to be since we win- 

 tered on the summer stiml.) y(!t they did not sutrjr, 

 ex(!ept four or live in which "tlie quilt got wet trom 

 8omo cause, so as to 1)(! frozen Boliil like i(;e. Tlies(! 

 spottfid their frames ami coml)S some. We fountl more 

 brood in tlie hives this season tlian we ever knew l)e- 

 t'ore .so early. Some liivcs had to tlie amount oT 'iOt 

 s(iuare inches in all st.ap:es. with jilenty ol young liees, 

 and there was not a hive (Feb. i.id) tiiat did not liave 

 some in. We tound two Queenless ami unite<t tlieni 

 with others, .so we have at present !)S. Wo must tell 

 the readers of Glkanin'GS how we liave introduced 

 our Queens for the past two years, without a siiif-'lo 

 loss. Make a cage as descrilie'd by Novice in tlie A. li. 

 J. for caging Queen cells, namely": take a ])iece of line 

 wire cloth about three inches s<iuare and cut out each 

 corner in a square form % of an inch, tlien bend up 

 the four sides and unravel the sicles down half way 

 and your cage is ready. Remove the original queen 

 from the stock you wish to give a new one, then place 

 the ()ueen to beintroduced on a comb in the center of 

 the cluster where there is honey seated or luisealed 

 and put tlie cage over her, pressing tlie points into the 

 coml) as far as they are unraveled, do not imt a 

 cage on the other side, as he recommended in A. B. J., 

 but take your knife and worm it tlirough the comb in- 

 to the ceiiter of the cage, and the work is done. la 

 removing your knife tje careful not to remove the wax 

 or honey. The bees by licking up the honey and re- 

 moving the wax tiecome accpiainted with the Queen 

 and there is no harm done if you do not remove the 

 caare in a month. 



Now Gle.\nings we want a little light about those 

 imiiorted Queens that Novice tells us about in the 

 March No. We sent Novice, as you will remember in 

 July for esrgs from his imported ijuecn from which wo 

 got two line cells. Well, one Queen got lost from 

 some hook or crook but the other we have at present. 

 Now were those eggs from the imported Queen ? The 

 (^ueen we raised from them has but very little yellow 

 on her and three-fourtlis of her workers are as black 

 as soot. The first Italian Queen we ever saw was in- 

 troduced some time in July and did not raise a drone 

 that season, neither was there an Italian drone within 

 li miles of her yet every one of her daughters were 

 duplicates of herself anil never jn-oduced a black bee. 

 Tliere were hundreds of Queens I'aised from her du- 

 ring 3 years yet none of them ever produced a black 

 l)ee. Also, see Gleanings for Nov., page 133. Work- 

 ers )iroduced by the Queens referred to above, are as 

 good honey gatherers as any we could wish. Why 

 lioes a certain Queen breeder tell us in the A. B. J. 

 that Queens from a pure mother mating with a black 

 drone will produce a part Italian and a part black 

 Avorkers!'' In conclusion .we would say as we did in 

 the A. B. J. in 1871, "Black bees are liot Italian and 

 coal is not chalk but huml)ugs are plentiful in some 

 loc-.alities and so with impure Italians." Please ask 

 Novice if he considers tlie (Jueens we h-ive been breed- 

 ing from as goo'i enough to raise St. 00 Queens from. 



15orodino, N. Y. March 8th, It-TS. 



[All the eggs sent out last season were assuredly 

 from our Imported Queen, and we cm give no ex- 

 planation of the matter unless your l)ei's cheated you 

 with a larva' i)rocurcd elsewliore. That they some- 

 times do this we have ample iiroo.f Dollar "Queens 

 are to be reared from tlie best stock wc can get, and 

 lie who gives l)ei-t Queens for the "dollar" will proba- 

 bly get most orders. UV iirefer an Imported Queen, 

 if they are all like the one we i)ur<-hascd last season, 

 llio one we have now. We shall have a IJueen from 

 Uadant soon, and stiall then l)c able to give further 

 testinionv. As friend L).. urgc^ntly invites bee-keepers 

 to iiay him a visit and select their own bees, it seems 

 tiiat be has lull conliilencc in imported stock. Probably 

 M (^)ueens were reared from our importeil, last season, 

 but wc have not as ye'^ seem a black worker among 

 their jirogeny, altliough some of the young (Queens 

 arc verv dark. V»'e fear that rrc shall never be satis- 

 Ijeil with any other, while such are to be had.— Kd.] 



