1889 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



811 



toes on me. I have neighbors who get stung very 

 often, and one sting on the face will swell the eyes 

 almost shut and they still have rheumatism. The 

 stings did help my rheumatism, though, until I got 

 .myself separated from the bees, but it is no better 

 since than it was before. 



BLUE HONEY ; JAPANESE A BETTER HONEY-PLANT 

 THAN SILVEHHULL BUCKWHEAT. 



Well, did you ever see blue honey? My bees 

 gathered blue honey, I think honey-dew, off the 

 green leaves. 1 saw the bees licking sweet dew in 

 the morning on chestnut leaves. They all quit the 

 buckwheat and went to licking the leaves. Japan- 

 ese buckwheat is a little better than silverhull, as 

 the blossoms are more in bunches, and don't dry 

 out as quick as silverhull, and the bees work longer 

 on the Japanese than on silverhull; but I don't 

 think a bee gets a load on one any quicker than on 

 the other; but the Japanese is the best buckwheat 

 for the farmer to raise. It grows larger on poor 

 soil, and stands up better on rich soil, and yields 

 more per acre than any other grain in bulk. I 

 don't think there is any more grain on a stalk than 

 on a silverhull stalk; but Japanese grains are about 

 four times as large as silverhull, and of course a 

 bigger yield, and the stiff thick stalk on Japanese 

 makes it more valuable for cutting and gathering. 



Seth Nelson. 



Wistar, Clinton Co., Pa., Sept. 8, 1889. 



We should hardly hope that bee-stings 

 would be a permanent remedy for rheuma- 

 tism. If it answers in warding it off from 

 season to season, we ought to be thankful. 



THE CONE-CASE BEEESCAPE, AGAIN. 



FRIEND filtEEN PROPOSES A PLAN TO REDUCE THE 

 LABOIt OF EXTRACTING TO A MINIMUM. 



ITH regard to the Reese bee-escape, I do not 

 mean to say that it will invariably remove 

 all the bees. Generally the super will be 

 left entirely free of bees, but often there 

 will be a few left— so few that they are not 

 worth considering. I take the super into the honey- 

 house, stand it on end on the floor, and in a few 

 minutes all are gone. When there is any brood in 

 the combs to be removed, I know of no way to get 

 all the bees off except brushing, or the use of a 

 very liberal amount of smoke. There should be no 

 brood in comb honey, though, and perforated zinc 

 will easily keep it out of extracting-combs. Just 

 think how much easier and nicer this makes the 

 production of extracted honey I No shaking or 

 brushing of bees, with the attendant stinging and 

 daubing! no brood to' bother; and where there is 

 no brood there is seldom pollen, so that the quality 

 of the honey is not injured by either of these 

 causes. Now, if I thought I could ripen the honey 

 properly I would extract it before any of it was 

 settled, thus doing away with the uncapping. I 

 would have one of your new-fangled extractors 

 that would hold all the combs in one super and 

 throw out all of the honey at one operation. 

 Wouldn't that be getting down to business? In 

 this way it would not be a difficult matter for one 

 man to extract all the honey from quite a large 

 apiary every day, if desirable, thus leaving the bees 

 nothing to do but to gather nectar. Seriously, I 

 have half a mind to try it. 

 I have corresponded with manufacturers of evap- 



orators, but have not found any thing that seems 

 to be what is wanted. It may be that honey would 

 not be greatly injured by being evaporated in the 

 common evaporator, such as is used in making ma- 

 ple syrup. Indeed, I think basswood honey might 

 even be improved by it. White-clover honey is in- 

 jured, and heart's-ease ruined, by boiling. 1 know 

 there is a great deal of speculation in this, but I 

 should like to see an apiary of, say, a hundred col- 

 onies run on this plan in a first-rate locality for 

 basswood. James A. Green. 



Dayton, 111., Sept. 20, 1889. 



CUCKOO-BEES. 



PROF. COOK GIVES US SOME TRUTH THAT IS 

 STRANGER THAN FICTION. 



SN page 34 of my Bee-keeper's Guide I thus re- 

 fer to these curious insects : 

 "Other bees— the numerous species of the 

 genera Nomada and Apathus are the black 

 sheep in the family Apidic. These tramps, 

 already referred to, like the English cuckoo, and 

 American cow blackbird, steal in upon the unwary, 

 and, though all unbidden, lay their eggs; in this 

 way appropriating food and lodging for their own 

 yet uuborn. Thus these insect vagabonds impose 

 upon the unsuspecting foster-mothers in these 

 violated homes, and these same foster-mothers 

 show by their tender care of the merciless intru- 

 ders that they are miserably fooled; for they 

 guard and care for infant bees which, with age, 

 will in turn practice this same nefarious trickery. 

 The apathus species steal into the nests of bombus; 

 the nomada species, which are small bees, often 

 beautifully ringed, into the nests of the small 

 black andrena?." 



Now, Mr. Editor, I am wondering if I should not 

 have said in the last sentence, the apathus species 

 steal into the nests of bombus, and into the hives 

 of our honey-bees. Several times this summer I 

 have received letters from Indiana bee-keepers, 

 complaining of the presence in their hives of black 

 bees, often in considerable numbers. Several have 

 written that the black bees were not honey-bees. I 

 have written repeatedly for the bees, and now 

 comes a box with two bees. I wish there had been 

 ten or a dozen (or, better, 50), wrapped in cotton, 

 so they could not have been injured; and the fol- 

 lowing letter from Mr. Perry Moore, Hortonsville, 

 Indiana: "I send you by to-day's mail two insects 

 that I found in a colony of bees. The bees are hy- 

 brids, and in good condition. These bees have not 

 been without a good laying queen for more than a 

 year. There are one hundred or more of these 

 bees in this colony. Although I have kept bees for 

 the past twelve years I never saw any thing like 

 this before." 



Now, Mr. Editor, this is interesting. I find this to 

 be a species of apathus. It is about the size of a 

 worker, but resembles more the bumble-bee. Like 

 all bees of this kind— cuckoo-bees— there are no 

 pollen-baskets. Its thieving habits make such 

 organs unnecessary. Tf we, by hook or crook, get 

 others to do our work, then we need no tools. 

 Heretofore we had not supposed that these insect- 

 thieves pilfered from our hive-bees; but now our 

 suspicion is fully aroused. Note that Mr. Moore 

 says that there are one hundred or so in the colony. 

 Does this not look as if these bees were reared in 



