1880 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



391 



the honey yield should be constant, or feeding- made 

 to take the place of it, and the little colony should 

 be kept going thriftily, right along, during the fall 

 months. One of our small boys got such a nucleus 

 one season, and although he said he had taken good 

 care of them, I found them really weaker in Octo- 

 ber, when he wanted to sell them back to me, than 

 when he first purchased them; so you see that bees 

 will not, as a rule, take care of themselves under 

 such circumstances. On the other hand, I have 

 often made strong colonies from not more than V 2 

 lb. of bees and a queen, when started in June ] 



Friend Rout: -Our specialty in the bee business is 

 queen raisins', but honey gathering receives its 

 share of attention also. Up to date we have taken 

 between 3,000 and 4,000 pounds of honey and the har- 

 vest still continues. On the :50th ult. with one ma- 

 chine, we extracted 1,153 lb. of honey. Isn't that a 

 fair day's work for one machine? Good wishes to 

 you, and to all enterprising- bee men. 



S. D. McLean & Son. 



Culleoka, Tenn., July 3, 1880. 



TRANSFERRING CLASPS MADE OF WIHE. 



Why would not wires bent like your transferring 

 clasps, but made long enough to come even with the 

 bottom of the frame, be an improvement in the 

 transferring line? I have used them this spring, and 

 like them the best of any thing tried yet. You can 

 lay a frame on a board and fill it full of small bits of 

 comb, then slip the wires on, and they are secure. 



Donahue, la., July 5, 1880. Geo. Cuhtiss. 



[[ have seen the same thing used, friend C, but as 

 I hey were more expensive than the clasps, and no 

 better unless you have many small pieces, they were 

 finally dropped. Since the advent of fdn., very few 

 care to fuss with small bits of comb, which at best 

 never make a really nice, and profitable comb to 

 raise brood in.] 



I will thank you for an Italian queen of your best 

 quality, my colony being- without the necessary pa- 

 rental influence. J. B. Simmons. 



Louisville, Ky., July 5, 1880. 



Bees doing nothing. White clover is a failure. 

 Dundee, 111., June 25, 1880. J. Oatman & Sons. 



ASILUS MISSOURIENSIS OR BEE KILLER. 



Yesterday, as I was eating my dinner in my apia- 

 ry, a bee-killer alighted on my arm, having part of 

 a bee in his claws, and he was sucking it with his 

 bill thrust into the abdomen of the bee. It was of 

 the family Asilus. I had a good chance to observe 

 him, and he answers the description in Cook's Man- 

 ual. I was not before aware that they were found 

 here. J. E. Crane. 



Bridport, Vt., July 9, 1880. 



If you can not supply my order now, let me kuow, 

 as [ need the articles immediately. We always wait 

 till we get hungry before we cry for bread, and then 



you know . The bees are coming in fast with 



double sacks filled. J. B. Graves. 



Richmond, Mich., July 7, 1880. 



NATURAL ()UEEN cells. 

 Some time ago I wrote, in reference to getting 

 natural queen cells, that if you thought they were 

 any better we would try for some. I have tried in 

 ten different instances, and succeeded in obtaining 

 natural cells, or have had the queen lay in them eve- 

 ry time. The last hive was set on Monday, and this 



afternoon 7 out of 8 were containing eggs or larva'. 

 Of the cells used this spring, 7(1 out of 100 were natu- 

 ral, or the eggs were laid in them by the queen, and 

 I have 40 queens raised in that way now. 



H. L. Jeffrey. 



Woodbury, ft., June 2!i, 1880. 



[By the above, I suppose we are to understand 

 queen cells built under the influence of natural 

 swarming. Now, friend J., I hope you and others 

 will carefully note whether these queens are more 

 prolific and longer lived than those reared during 

 the same season, from cells built where queens had 

 been removed, or by forcing the bees to build queen 

 cells. It is an old question, and, in years back, it has 

 been up for discussion a good many times.] 



MEETING THE DRONE MORE THAN ONCE. 



That imported queen died last Sunday night. 

 They now have a young queen; she mated to-day 

 the second time. I have known three queens to do 

 this. The last queen you sent is doing finely, so 

 your earnest wish is granted. I have about 20 cells 

 from her,- great, long, nice ones. O. F. Bowen. 



Randolph, N. Y., July 8, 1880. 



SAVING BEES THAT ARE TO BE KILLED. 



I want to transfer a lot of bees that my neighbors 

 are going to kill. I want to know whether I can 

 save them or not by using combs or brood. 



J. H. Burr age. 



Concord, Cabarrus Co., N. C, July 5, 1880. 



[You can, my friend, make the best kind of colo- 

 nies by taking bees that are to be killed and giving 

 them combs of sealed stores. If there are plenty of 

 bees, you do not need any brood, for almost any sort 

 of a queen will quickly furnish combs of brood if she 

 is supplied with bees and combs of stores in warm 

 weather. By all means, take the brood if you can 

 get it. I should call sealed brood worth a little more 

 than bees, because it soon will be bees, and young 

 bees too. You will want a pretty good supply of 

 bees with each queen, especially if you have no 

 brood, as many of the bees will be old, probably, and 

 soon gone. Start them to brood-rearing, and keep 

 it up until cool weather. It may cost something for 

 feed, but still, it is much cheaper than buying bees 

 in the spring.] 



BASSWOOI) HONEY. 



Basswood has given us a good yield of excellent 

 honey, the best I have tasted for ten years. It is 

 now about ripe. F. M. Milliken. 



Indiauola, Warren Co., Iowa, July 7, 1880. 



FROM OUR OLD FRIEND FRANK BENTON. 



Friend Root : — I meant to have written to you be- 

 fore Mr. Jones left, but was very busy. Now I have 

 ophthalmia and cannot. If my "better half" were 

 here, she might write bee articles. I sit in a dark 

 room much of the time, and think of dear old Amer- 

 ica. Kind regards. Benton. 



Larnaca, Cyprus, June 22, 1880. 



EARLY AMBER SUGAR CANE. 



The early amber is booming. It is the admiration 

 of all who see it. It is heading, and will be ready to 

 make up the last of this month or the first of Aug- 

 ust, which is at a time when the cotton crop is laid 

 by. The sorghums in use here ripen about the time 

 cotton-picking begins. Bees throughout the coun- 

 try are doing well. C. C. Shipp. 



Spring Dale, Miss., July 0, 1880. 



