228 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Mar. 



or getting less than they expected. But 

 there is a great open field— a big unexplored 

 region — for business and happiness and 

 peace of mind in giving not only all you 

 agree to give, but " good measure, pressed 

 down.' 1 



Every boy or girl, under 15 years of age, who writes a let- 

 ter for this department, containing some valuable fact, not 



GENERALLY KNOWN, ON BEES OR OTHER MATTERS, will receive 



one of David Cook's excellent five-cent Sunday-school books. 

 Many of these books contain the same matter that you find in 

 Sunday-school hooks costing from 81.00 to 81.50. If you have 

 had one or more books, give us the names that we may not 

 send the same twice. We have now in stock six different 

 books, as follows; viz.: Sheer Off , Silver Keys, The Giant-Kill- 

 er; or. The Roby Family, Rescued from Egypt, Pilgrim's 

 Progress, and Ten Nights in a Bar-Room. We have also Our 

 Homes, Part I., and Our Homes, Part II. Besides the above 

 books, you may have a photograph of our old house apiary, 

 and a pliotograph of our own apiary, both taken a great many 

 years ago. In the former is a picture of Novice, Blue Eyes, 

 and Caddy, and a glimpse of Ernest. We have also some pret 

 ty little colored pictures of birds, fruits, flowers, etc., suitable 

 for framing. You can have your choice of any one of the 

 above pictures or books for every letter that gives us some 

 valuable piece of information. 



THE CALK AND THE BEES, IN TWO ACTS. 



We have 13 hives. My teacher is cross. She lives 

 near us. We have a little calf; and next summer, 





when we let her out, she will go by the hives and 

 tip one over, and they will sting her nearly to death. 



I have sent you these pictures. 1 drew them my- 

 self. Louie Michael, age 13. 

 East Buffalo, N. Y., Feb. 7, 1889. 



Your drawings, friend Louie, are very 

 good. We reduced them, and made them 

 almost fac-similes of yours. What is a fac- 

 simile V Well, that means a " make-like," 

 or something just like the original. 



BEES HAVE ALWAYS PAID WELL. 



My father had 48 stands of bees, but he has sold 

 them all but 4. We left these to our renter, on 

 shares. When we put them in the cellar they were 

 heavier than ever before. We have rented our 



farm, and we are packing up to move ; but we mean 

 always to keep bees wherever we go, for they have 

 paid us well. We have taken Gleanings for so 

 long 1 can't remember when we didn't take it. We 

 like it very well, and we are going to keep on taking 

 it, for we should miss it very much. 

 Traer, Iowa, Feb. 21, 1889. J. L. Pkovin, age 14. 



A CRIPPLED BOY WHO HELPS PAPA. 



I am a little crippled boy, 12 years of age. My pa 

 has 63 stands of bees. I help him tend them. 

 Newbern. la. David C. Malone. 



BROTHERS' BEES. 



My two brothers keep bees, and have 11 hives. 

 They keep them in the cellar. They carried them 

 in their arms. My grandfather says that the bees 

 in the cellar ought to be kept at 42 degrees in the 

 winter. In warm days they make a great noise. 

 We had six in the spring. The wheat crop was 

 poor last year. Robert Dawson. 



East Dayton, Mich. 



papa's wintering-cellar. 

 DPapa winters his bees in the cellar. He commenc- 

 ed last spring with 10 swarms, increased to 24, and 

 got 600 lbs. of extracted honey and 100 lbs. of comb 

 honey in 1-lb. sections. Three hundred and fifty 

 pounds was from mammoth clover, and the rest 

 was from buckwheat. The cellar that papa keeps 

 his bees in is a place dug out under the house, 

 about 3y 2 feet deep, not plastered. Nothing was 

 done to it but to bank up the house well. But he 

 winters successfully in it. 



Bertha Boardman, age 9. 

 Weston, O., Feb. 22, 1889. 



hauling bees twelve miles in a two-horse 

 wagon. 



My pa has 14 hives of bees, and [ have one. The 

 14th of last May the levee broke, and on the night 

 of the 14th pa hauled our bees 12 miles without 

 breaking any comb. The 11th of August he 

 brought them and 15 of grandpa's back to the bot- 

 tom, without breaking or damaging the comb. To 

 prepare them for hauling he nailed cleats over the 

 entrances, then he set them in the wagon and 

 packed clover hay all around them tight. We did 

 not have a very big honey-flow last year. We got 

 about 360 lbs. for home use. They have from 60 to 

 70 lbs. to the colony now. We are wintering on 

 summer stands. They are all right so far. We use 

 A. I. Root's Simplicity hives. I am an A B C scholar, 

 and read Gleanings. Abbie Hoskin, age 14. 



Louisana, Mo., Feb. 19, 1889. 



HOW PAPA FEEDS BEES. 



I am a little boy seven years old. I was paralyzed 

 three years ago, and have never gotten over it en- 

 tirely. I have a pony and a little saddle. I can go 

 to town and get the mail, or any little thing that 

 papa or mamma wants. We live a mile from town. 

 My papa feeds bees two ways. One way he takes a 

 little square piece of board and cuts small grooves 

 in it, two of them crosswise, from corner to corner, 

 one from top to bottom, and one from side to side. 

 Then he takes a goblet, with the bottom broken off; 

 fills it with sugar syrup; puts the board on it, and 

 turns it bottom upward and sets it in the hive. 

 The bees take up the syrup as it runs out in those 

 grooves. But he likes the other way best. It is 



