188.5 



GL^:AXL\c;s IN UEE cuLttilii:. 



4o0 



43 to 50, but some of the new swarms liave required 

 ^ u little lielp. 



Mr. Wheeler showed his seetion-closiii''- machine, 

 whicli can easily be made to fit any section. It 

 seemed to worli very well, closing- the section with 

 one le%-er and throwing- it out with another; simple 

 and eftectual. 



Mr. Decker brought to the notice of the meeting 

 a disease among his banded bees, not affecting- the ' 

 blacks. They become black and shiny, like old 

 robbers, and the strong bees having nothing else to I 

 do seem to be wholly occupied in dragging out and 

 ttnishing the sicli ones. None of our bee-men can 

 tell what it is. Can you enlighten us on the sub- 

 jects [See ABC book, " Diseases of Bees."— Ed.] i 



I notice that on pages Sm and m)i of last Gr.E.\N- 

 iNGS Mr. J. P. Israel thinks he has the largest 

 yield on record for his bees. If he refer to Glean- 

 ings for Nov. 15, 188:5, page 713, he will find my re- 

 port of VTT'j lbs. per stand, spring count, and no 

 account made of at least 50 lbs. to each hive 

 in lower box, which I never interfered with; 

 that over 20 hives to which the four had increased, | 

 I sold 2 and had 18 for 1884, which increased to 42, | 

 and gave only 11600 lbs., whicli I did not think woi-th ' 

 reporting, so perhaps my bees are ahead of his foi- | 

 1 he blue ribbon he speaks of. (Jkoiujk Hoim.ku. 



Hanford, Cal., June!), 1885. 



(iETTINC; I'OOK (-AND1ED HOXKV OIT UK OLD 

 CO.VIBS. 



Bees are doing tlnely; have conunenced on alsike 

 and white clover, and honej' is coming in fast. My 

 hives are all full of bees again, and I am selling 

 (|ueens and nuclei. All the black bees arc gone— 

 none but pure bees for miles around. Those wish- 

 ing to get poor honey out from the combs can do so 

 by uncapping and soaking the combs in water 

 twenty-four hours, and then throw f)Ut with e.\- 

 tractor. Mine will not come out without the soak- 

 ing. M. II. m-NT. 



Bell Branch, M icli., .luiic l.'i. ISK".. 



Friend Hunt, we are <j^\iu.l to know lliat 

 your liives are tilled up again, and that the 

 bees are once more booming.— Tliank you 

 for your suggestion in regard to getting out 

 eandied lioney. I thought I was up to al- 

 most all sucli '• tricks of the trade." but I 

 must confess you were ahead of me there. 



KXTIIACTING— DOES IT IN.U'KE THE EGGS':' 



Last week I did my first extracting, something 

 never seen before in this section. In two hives I 

 found some frames in the upper tier that had about 

 two-thirds of the cells with eggs in them. I ex- 

 tracted the honey from those frames, and replaced 

 them in the hives, intending in a few days to use 

 them for the brood-frames in dividing a very strong 

 colony that showed indications of swarming. Im- 

 agine my surprise this morning, on examination to 

 find that the bees are again filling- the upper third 

 of the cells, while the lower two-thirds still contain 

 those same eggs, unhatchcd that they did six days 

 ago; and there is no indication that they are going 

 to store honey in those cells that contain the eggs. 

 Those frames were out of their hive about thirty 

 minutes. Do you think that keeping them out that 

 long was the cause of their not hatching? ^r is it 

 possible that they may have become chilled some 

 cool night, by the bees all leaving the upper story 

 and clustering in the brood-nest':' I And nothing of 

 the kind mentioned in my ABC. Will not the bees 



appropriate those cells containing the dead eggs 

 this season at ally One thing more: In everyone 

 of the frames from which 1 extracted the honey, 

 there was a single i-ow of cells near one end, ex- 

 tending from top to bottom, out of which the honey 

 would not come. It did look strange to see this sin- 

 gle row of cells appear in every frame, while every 

 other cell in the frame would be empty. It is some- 

 thing- that I could not account for, any more than 

 the dormant eggs already mentioned. 



I want to ask you if cockroaches are an enemy to 

 bees. I scarcely ever lift the cover off from a hive 

 but that I see three or four of them hustling around 

 on the enamel sheet, sometimes diopping down 

 among the bees, Avithout, however, causing any 

 perceptible distui-bance. L. Hai.i.. 



Sparta, Miss., May 26, 1885. 



Friend II., I do not think the extracting 

 had any thing to do Avith the eggs mention- 

 ed. Keeping eggs out of a hive half a day 

 Avill not injure them at all. unless the weath- 

 er is (luite cool— much cooler than it proba- 

 bly was when you did the extracting.— Tiie 

 row of cells you speak of, from which the 

 honey would not come. I presume came op- 

 posite one of the tin bars on the extractor- 

 frame.— We do not have any cockroaches 

 here, but they liave been several limes men- 

 tioned. If I am correct, they do no partic- 

 ular iiarm. 



HEKS THAI WOHK ON RED fLOV EK. AND IW.V.S 

 THAT WONT DIE WINTEIUNG. 



Bees arc doing nicely at thi.* time— plenty of clo- 

 ver-bloom. 1 was out in the fields today, and saw 

 them on all kinds of clo\er— alsike, white, and com- 

 mon red clover. Our bees work on the red clover 

 from this time until frost, and many of them are 

 oidy. hybrids.' lean not but smile when I see rcd- 

 clovcr bees advertised as wintering without loss, 

 since that class was originated, etc. Now. we have 

 had them for over five years, and they die like 

 other bees- sting as hard and as nftni as any. 



We had a large swarm that came out and went 

 directii- to a hollow tree, without clustering; it was 

 about a mile away. Fully three-fourths of the bees 

 in this county died last winter. We left ours on 

 summer stamls without any i)rotcction, in single- 

 walled hives, and lost over half. Lee .Iob. 



Fillmore, liid., .Iiine 15, 18S5. 



WHAT AILS THE BEES'r 



The bees in this part of the country wintered well 

 —with the loss of hardly a single colony— if they 

 had any protection. But since thej' commenced 

 work this spring there has been a great fatality 

 among them. At first we thought it was spring 

 dwindling, but now we are half of the opinion that 

 it must be poison of some kind. When the bee is 

 first taken it rushes out, runs tumbling and rolling 

 over the ground as if in great pain or ti-ouble. Aft- 

 er a minute or so it will settle down, commence 

 rubbing its head with its fore-legs, then run out its 

 tongue and wipe it olf with its fore-legs, and then 

 it will rub its hind-legs together, and so it will con- 

 tinue going, just from one of those motions to the 

 other for a period of an hour or so, growing weaker 

 and weaker, when it will die. Occasionally one 

 will throw off its feces, fly away, and seem all right; 

 but others do not. Their feces smell like sour hon- 

 ey. After the bee is dead its tongue is extruded, 

 and the body dx-awn up rather than otherwise. In 



