1S80 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



481 



great interest. Mr. Pressey, as the result of an 

 awakened enthusiasm, built him a beautiful apiary 

 right in his flower garden, and transferred all his 

 bees— some 13 or more colonies— to the Simplicity 

 movable-frame hives. A professional was engaged 

 for the first day, and I was present by courtesy to 

 learn all I could; for by that time we had got three 

 colonies of black bees in old boxes on our place. 



I shall never forget that first day of transferring 

 in that pretty little apiary. It is, I think, about 12 

 feet square, and, long before the day's work was 

 done, it was the most sickening looking place,— hon- 

 ey "swobbed" pretty much every where, and the 

 floor literally black with dead bees! My whole busi- 

 ness all this day was rescuing bees imprisoned 

 in honey. The next day the work had to be contin- 

 ued without the professional, and I boldly offered to 

 go down and help. I got there quite early, but Bro. 

 Pressey had swept and washed the floor thoroughly, 

 and every part of the building was in exquisite order, 

 as it had been, indeed, the previous morning. We 

 both agreed that we could transfer bees in a neater 

 way than it had been done the day before, and that 

 with less murdering of bees; and the experiment 

 justified our belief. My part of the work was fitting 

 and tying the comb into the new frames, and help- 

 ing hunt for queens while getting the colonies into 

 their new Simplicities. It was certainly a hard 

 day's work, and I got one or two stings. The previ- 

 ous day there had been none. The professional 

 wore a bee veil; the rest of us, nothing. I do think 

 that transferring bees is one of the most distressing, 

 dirty tasks imaginable; but it is such a pleasure 

 when all is done. 



A week before I had had my first experience in 

 hiving a swarm. It was the first time I ever had 

 touched a bee. They hung on a low mulberry bush. 

 I just put the Simplicity on a chair under them, re- 

 moved the cover, and with a soft velvet brush swept 

 them down on the frames. My success was perfect 

 in every particular, only I did not see the queen. I 

 was too excited to think of but one thing,— getting 

 the hive closed and on its stand. How good the lit- 

 tle pets were! The next week, we transferred, unit- 

 ing without any trouble one weak, queenless colony 

 with a strong one. One colony was taken to a 

 neighboring town, where it is to be Italianized 

 and commence queen raising, I believe. I have 

 therefore two, fine, large, colonies,— one with a sec- 

 ond story, and we have had more honey than we 

 could dispose of, except by giving some away. The 

 merchants here sell the pretty little pound section 

 frames. Mr. Pressy will send to you, to-day I think, 

 for these little sections, and for fdn. for him and me. 

 By and by we are to have Italian queens. 



So much for two of your New Jersey ABC class. 

 Marie Howland. 



Hammonton, N. J., July 1, '80. 



FRIEND KEEKAN'S STORY. 



M'ERE is another vote for the cartoons. Let us 

 have a good one every month. Only last 

 — ' night, I had almost an exact duplicate of 

 friend Merry Banks' dream in Aug. No. of last year's 

 Gleanings, where he dreams he was invited to 

 speak at a bee-keeper's' convention. I was making 

 (to me) a splendid speech, when I was awakened by 

 the cry, "O Jamie!" and beheld my wife sitting up 

 in bed, wanting to know what I had hit her in the 

 face for. Everything was plain. I told her my 



dream, and wp had a good laugh, but it was some- 

 time before I could go to sleep. The last thing I re- 

 member, I was thinking how happy I would be to 

 have 100 chaff hives on a nice plat of ground, all ar- 

 ranged in hexagonal form, and each of them bring- 

 ing in honey at the rate of 63 lbs. per day, as they do 

 in S. C. Whew! 



Last fall I had 20 swarms, and doubled back to 18. 

 These I packed in chaff. All came through to spring 

 nicely, when one queen proved to be a drone layer. 

 I pulled her head off, and united her bees with 

 another swarm. These IT came through splendidly 

 to apple bloom, from which they gathered consider- 

 able honey, and built up fast. White clover proved 

 to be winter-killed, and basswood was a failure . 

 Few swarms have gathered enough to winter on, 

 and, as they seldom gather any more than they con- 

 sume after these are gone, I was thinking I would 

 have to write you a letter for Blasted Hopes, espe- 

 cially after examining a strong swarm about the 

 Kith of Aug., and finding not over 3 lbs. of honey, 

 and that not sealed. Thought I, "Here goes for a 

 good feed." So I spread the frames that they might 

 store considerable more than they would need for 

 themselves, which would do for others. I then got 

 my feeder ready, but I had no feed prepared. As it 

 was late, I put off making it till morning. 



UNLOOKED-FOR BLESSINGS. 



The next morning I was on hand early with 10 lbs. 

 of coffee A sugar for their first meal. Just before I 

 commenced to make my syrup, my mother asked 

 me if I had noticed how busy the bees were that 

 morning. I told her I had not, and thinking they 

 might be "on the rob," I went out to see. The first 

 one I noticed was the one I was preparing to feed; 

 and, sure enough, there they were dropping down 

 like grains of corn, they were so heavily loaded; 

 they were going in so fast I could not count them. 

 I went around to every hive, and they were all just 

 as busy. Thought I, "I'll not make that feed just 

 yet; maybe this means business;" and so it did. 

 The swarm I was going to feed has now got its hive 

 so full that they have crowded the queen for breed- 

 ing room. Another hive I can't weigh on steelyards 

 that pull 110 lbs. I have taken only a small quanti- 

 ty of section honey, as I had given up all hopes of 

 taking any, and therefore was not prepared for the 

 rush. 



heart's-ease as a honey plant. 



This honey came from Heart's-ease, and is very 

 good. I had three, three-frame nuclei, and by giv- 

 ing them empty frames ihey have gathered enough 

 to winter on, which is all my increase. I wish I had 

 some of the bees that friend Blanchard (of Wis.) is 

 going to kill. I could accommodate about a dozen 

 swarms very nicely with frame-* of solid sealed hon- 

 ey. I will go into winter quarters with 20 swarms, 

 and no queens much over a year old, except one, 

 and this one I thought the bees had superseded; but 

 to-day I found the old queen in the hive. Send me a 

 queen for this hive. I would like to compare her 

 with my young queens that I have raised from the 

 queen that I told you about on page 338, Sept. No., 

 last year's Gleanings,— the one of which you i ro 

 dicted that, if I attempted to rear queens from her, 

 1 would find the old, black blood cropping out every 

 now and then. Contrary to this, every queen has 

 been as large and bright as any Italian queen I ever 

 saw. I would like to have you see some of the 

 queens and bees, which I have succeeded in breed- 

 ing from bees that were almost black in the summer 

 Of '76. I would send you a queen but I haven't an 

 extra one in my apiary, and it is getting rather late 

 to rear any, 1 think. Taking the season through, it 

 has been the poorest we have had for several years. 

 If it had not been for the honey flow in Aug., few 

 swarms would have been left around here by spring, 

 unless fed. J. W. Keeran. 



Bloomington, 111., Sept. 10, 1880. 



