1889 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



683 



0aR 0wn Jinnm 



CONDUCTED BY ERNEST R. ROOT. 



USES AND RED CLOVER. 



N the Question - Box department not 

 many issues ago, the value of red clover 

 was very lightly esteemed. This year 

 Neighbor II. had 15 acres of peavine 

 clover within an eighth of a mile, or 

 such a matter, of his Lafayette apiary. Our 

 bees had ceased working on white clover 

 and bass wood, and robbing was the order of 

 the day. But the bees in the Lafayette 

 apiary, some two miles south, instead of 

 robbing, were busy on red clover. Neigh- 

 bor II. thought they were just as busy on 

 this as he had ever seen them on white clo- 

 ver; and as he desired me to see it I hitched 

 up Hess (that is my new horse) and went 

 down, accompanied by Elizabef/i. Yes, there 

 was that same happy roar in the apiary that 

 we hear during our regular honey season, 

 and bees were tumbling down in front of 

 the entrances heavily loaded. The hives 

 showed that a large amount of this new 

 honey was being gathered. The flavor of 

 tlte honey was very pronounced. While 

 Elizabeth stayed by Bess to see that she did 

 not break off the end of the thill and kill 

 herself, as did my other horse, I started off 

 a few rods in the direction of the peavine 

 clover. I just wish that those who have 

 any doubt as to whether Italians will work 

 on red clover could have seen the sight that 

 I saw, have seen, and expect to see again. 

 There was the same contented hum of thou- 

 sands of bees here and there, stopping to 

 take a sip of those great big rosy heads of 

 clover. 



THOSE HONEY QUEENS. 



It may be that there are some Italians 

 that work better on red clover than others. 

 Perhaps it should be s:iid that the bees of 

 the Lafayette apiary are almost wholly 

 from those two imported honey queens, 

 spoken of in this department before. As 

 the progeny of these queens have shown 

 themselves to be greatly superior to the 

 progeny of other queens, Neighbor H. has 

 made the bees of this apiary almost entirely 

 the descendants of these queens, and the 

 drones are reared entirely from them. 

 While the particular strain of bees may 

 have shown unusual energy on the red clo- 

 ver, yet it is a fact that the average Italians 

 are red-clover bees— at least in our immedi- 

 ate vicinity. Even at our home apiary, 

 when there is a field of red clover within 

 range we almost always notice bees at work 

 on it to a greater or less extent. 

 smokers; now to make a clark smo- 

 ker GO ALL DAY WITHOUT GOING 

 OUT. 



I notice that our friend Dr. Miller has 

 some trouble with his smoker going out. 

 As he tills his smoker in much the same way 

 that we do, and as our smoker never goes 

 out after being set fully going, I must lay 

 the difference to the fuel. We use a kind 

 of excelsior, such as I have before explain- 

 ed, that comes from the hand-holes of hives 

 and crates. It is a rather spongy sawdust, 



lasts well, and, I think, it never goes out 

 when once fully lighted. Dr. Miller's plan 

 of filling the smoker now is, I believe, the 

 same as our own. We grab up a handful of 

 the excelsior, after having made sure that 

 the grate is clear ; shove it into the fire-box, 

 and cram in as much as we can, till we have 

 quite a solid mass of packed sawdust and 

 excelsior mixed. We then, with the point 

 of a pencil, or with the end of the finger, 

 punch a draft-hole centrally clear through 

 the fuel. A match is lighted, and the bel- 

 lows worked. The flame of the match will 

 shoot into this draft-hole, and ignite. The 

 bellows should be worked vigorously for 

 some little time, until the fuel is well on 

 tire. After that the smok? will last for 

 some two or three hours, and never go out. 

 At the end of this time we simply replenish 

 by cramming in more excelsior sawdust, 

 omitting, however, to make a draft-hole, 

 which is unnecessary, on account of the 

 remnant still burning from the first filling. 

 To help Dr. Miller out, and his able assist- 

 ant Emma, I have decided to send them a 

 bag of this kind of fuel. If it does not work 

 in his hands as it does in ours — well, I will 

 lay it to locality. 



SPECIAL DEPARTMENT FOR A. I. ROOT, AND HIS 

 FRIENDS WHO LOVE TO RAISE CROPS. 



OUR REPORT IN REGARD TO THE NEW 

 VEGETALLES. 



ITp UGUST 15.— The kidney wax bean has 

 ^rj^ once more proved itself so greatly su- 



jR» perior to both black German wax and 

 -*^** the golden wax bean, that we are 

 strongly inclined to drop the latter al- 

 together. The black German wax is per- 

 haps more tender and succulent when it 

 gets old than the new kidney wax; but it 

 rusts so badly that we feel almost like giv- 

 ing it up. The kidney wax is just as early 

 as either. The pods are much larger, in 

 greater profusion, and the one fact of hav- 

 ing great long tender pods of immaculate 

 whiteness, without a speck or blemish, is a 

 big advance. If the beans are hoed when 

 they are wet, they will be spotted, and show 

 something like rust. They answer also very 

 well for the first shell bean ; but unless 

 cooked immediately, the beans soon turn to 

 a brownish color which is very forbidding. 

 The white kidney beans are not nearly as 

 forbidding in this respect ; and as the York 

 State marrow is a little earlier than any of 

 them for a shell bean, we think we shallput 

 it back in our price list again. 



Henderson's bush lima bean is behaving 

 itself admirably. None of them are yet ripe 

 enough to show; but every stalk is loaded 

 with beautiful broad pods, about the size of 

 good-sized peapods, only having the appear- 

 ance of a regular pole lima bean. The foli- 

 age also looks exactly like that of the pole 

 lima. 



The beans received from Colorado, that 

 looked so much like Henderson's, all ran up 

 poles. They are therefore, without ques- 

 tion, the Seewee, or Carolina pole beans, 

 while Henderson's is the same thing dwarf- 



