GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Sefe- 



SUNDRY "family" MATTEHS. 



Did any of you ever think what a task it is 

 ^;o get the address of each one of our many 

 readers all right, to get your papers all started 

 in the right channel, all the various initials 

 ;tll just as they should be, etc., etc. V It may 

 he that some editors have a faculty of getting 

 along without making mistakes, but we 

 Iiaven't, yet we doubt if any are much more 

 anxious to avoid mistakes than we are ; the 

 wor^t part of it is, that as we stop every sub- 

 scription as soon as the time paid for has ex- 

 ])ired, — we feel sure you all approve of this 

 plan, cush down — we are under the necessity of 

 making a new list each year, or rather we are 

 obliged to set the names oT those up anew, and 

 ran the risk of bhmders again, of all who do 

 not renew before their time has expired. 



The idea is simply that we are trying to 

 study up some plan to induce you all to renew 

 before your time expires, and thus save us 

 trouble as well as yourselves. It is a task to 

 move a multitude of people, do you not know 

 it? To be sure we may be a little presump- 

 tuious in taking it for granted that you are go- 

 ing to take Gleanings next year at all, but 

 we think we have good reasons for feeling 

 sure that a great part of you will, at any rate. 

 To be frank we liave decided to get up a pho- 

 tograph of the house Apiary and wanted to 

 irive this to every one who renewed before his 

 viine was out. We are sorry to say we cannot 

 attbrd to do this. At the low price of 75 cents 

 ihere is very little margin left for making extra 

 presents. Many kind friends have suggested 

 that we raise the price, saying they would wil- 

 lingly pay a dollar or more. Gleanings was 

 started with tlie purpose of making it a medi- 

 um of friendly interchange of ideas, and we 

 purposely put the price so low that no one 

 might call it a speculation. As we have said 

 elsewhere it is no fun for us to do business un- 

 less we can give our patrons pleasant little 

 surprises, now and then, to see how good an 

 article we can furnish, for a little money. 



Now the photo of the house Apiary will be 

 oi the size usually sold for 50 cents, yet we will 

 mail it to all who may choose to send us 10c. 

 extra, at the time of remitting. It will be sent 

 as an acknowledgement of the receipt of the 

 money, and will probably be ready to mail as 

 soon "as this reaches yon. The picture will 

 contain a view of our own juveniles, and will 

 interest the children if nothing more, and as 

 we shall try to have it embrace a glimiise of 

 all the recent improvements in bee-culture, 

 implements, etc., we think we can succeed in 

 making it worth 10c. to every one of you, aside 

 from the view of the house Apiary, which at 

 this date seems to promise to be the most suc- 

 cessful of our many experiments. 



Gleanings is getting to be of considerable 

 value as an advertising medium, and we have 

 thought perhaps it might be a good thing to 

 publish some of the flattering testimonials of 

 its value in this respect — how bees have been 

 sold almost as soon as the notice was out — 

 liow in(iuiries have continued to come in long 

 after the goods were goue, etc., etc. The fol- 

 lowing is just at hand : 



l>ear Sir:— I dend you to-day the 10 lbs. Foundations 

 ordered. IMease continiio the advertisement. ! have 



received hnmh-eds of letters saying they saw the ad- 

 vertisement in (iLKAMNGS. 



JoiJ.v lAiSii, 5i-2 Hmlson St., N. Y., Au?. l(>th, '7.5. 



At the usual ratfes our price should l>e 20c, 

 per line, and we hat] partly (decided to make 

 this our rate for the year 18T*>, yet for some 

 particular reasons we dislike to dO' so. As we 

 have said before, we like all our cusstomers to 

 feel that we always give an abundant equiva- 

 lent for all the money ?hat we receive, again, 

 we have many letters from those who do not 

 seem to think that, should we insert them, we 

 would be doing an injustice to those who pay 

 regularly for their advertising. It seems toO' 

 bad to ask one who oSers bees for three do&rr.s^ 

 to jor/i/ for the insertion of" the notice, yet in 

 justice we are oblig^ed to do tlii^sor repress the 

 address, as we do in the following : 



I have IS stiuids of bees that 1 will sell; )>rice S^J.Oi^ 

 each on the ground. Samuel Wilson. 



In advertising, as in all else, we must have 

 some pay for the work that we do, and this, like 

 other things where the profits are small,'//i(/.'<i; 

 l>e cash down, to avoid the tremendous task of 

 keeping accounts with so many little items. 



In conclusion we must say that we have 

 found the bee-keepers of our land the most 

 pleasant and accomodating people it has ever 

 been our lot to deal with, and that as soon as 

 they understand that one has no purpose of 

 "coming" some sharp game over them, they are 

 the most liberal and iinseltisb class of people 

 that ourcountrv affords. 



Dkak (iLKANi.v<is:— Herewith you have '2!)i:, for 

 which please send me larva? from Imported Queen. 

 The A. B. J., Am. A;;., NaVl Ag., and all the other 

 Monthlies I take, came this month by tjfia .Wth inst., 

 and when I returned from the train yesterday without. 

 Gleanings, I felt that if it did not (;on>e to-day, !'<? 

 have to go to Medina for it. for I couM not wait long 

 enough to write and have it come afterward by mail. 

 I rec'd it this a. At. and as usual read it over twice be- 

 fore laving it aside. I don't mean to I5atter you, bur, 

 mv wife and 1 both feel and often say that we would 

 not exchange Gi.kanings for all our other Journals 

 and papers together, so far as they treat of l>ee-culture. 



But desijite the excellence of your Journal. I owe 

 vou a severe scolding, first for the loss of S frames, 

 made too short for the hive you sent me in April. an(t 

 second for the verv great annoyance I have had with 

 the extractor. I tried to use the frames, and they 

 were not only 1-10 too short, but the comb guides were 

 not secured. When the extractor was rec'd I tried 

 your frames, and tho' they barely missed the east arnv 

 at the top, yet as they did not strike, I did not think 

 to try my own frames, which, of course, had to be 

 longer than yours, vet thei/ have =„ inch jday on the 

 rabbets, the result was that when I went to extract I 

 could not revolve a single frame. I had no pruning 

 shears, nor other implement, except a three-cornered 

 file with which to shorten the frames of 30 hives 's to 

 .3-16 of an inch. Several hives needed extracting, the 

 bees hung idly outside, while the hills were covered 

 with catnip and rattle-root blossoms; I had taken all 

 the frames from one hive into the extracting house ; 

 the flying bees had got a taste or scent of honey and 

 were "robbing my nuclei; the thermometer was at tM) \ 

 I could not find the tile ; my wife was scolding me be- 

 cause I had not given vou proper dimensions for the 

 extractor [but I had), a'hd if you are as tiuick temper- 

 ed and impatient as I am, vou can imagine how cross 

 and worried I was. I nearly forgot to ad<l that my 

 8tei)-father and his familv and a visitor were present 

 by invitafion to see the perfection of your extractor, 

 liowevcr after "a deal of frettin' and sweatin'," I got 

 the frames short enough, and then the way I slung 

 •2 gallons of beautiful white catnip honey out of that 

 hive, was enough to make my friends (as they each 

 and everv one did) exclaim "wonderful! wonderful I 

 beautiful !" "1 never saw the like." 



Ben. S. Cole, Tiltonville. O., Aug. 10th, '75. 

 [Moral. Be very careful to give full dimen- 

 sions of your frames, and we will be more care- 

 ful to work to them.] 



