52 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Jan. 



for winter, on the plans recommended by 

 Bingham, Doolittle, Boardman, and others ; 

 second, having bees build comb between the 

 brood and the entrance. This is an idea 

 that was strongly advocated by Gallup and 

 Adair, as much as 15 years ago. It was 

 given in connection with what they called 

 the "New Idea" hive. Third and last, 

 cutting out drone comb from the brood-nest, 

 and putting in surplus boxes. Mr. W. B. 

 House made a very large crop of comb hon- 

 ey by this means, some years ago. He took 

 both drone and worker comb, however, as 

 fast as the bees built it in the brood-cham- 

 ber, cut out the pieces, and put it in surplus- 

 boxes. The greatest objection to this 

 course would be the trouble and time. 



A BETTEK RECORD FOR THE ITAL- 

 IANS. 



AVERAGE YIELD PEH COLONY, 3H1 LBS.", LABOEST 

 YIELD FROM ONE COLONY, 660 LBS. 



fN pag-e 977, Gleanings, 1886, Mr. E. France, 

 after g-iving " The Record of Two Students " 

 for the year just closed, concludes as follows: 

 "It seems to me T hear you say, ' They must 

 have been a strain of pure Italians, or some 

 other fancy breed." Well, they were a pure race of 

 blacks, or brown liees, as you ohouse to call them — 

 those fellows that some writers say live from hand to 

 mouth— poor despised blacks;. They are not so poor 

 a bee after all. Who has got 49 colonics of any other 

 race that has done any better (take a whoi<' apiary 

 through), not pick out 49 of the bestV" Well, Mr. 

 France, I have an apiary, not of 49, but of 41 colo- 

 nies, that did much better than that of your stu- 

 dent. They were about as pure Italians, too, as are 

 to be found in this country, several of them eon- 

 tainiog imported queens. Here is the record: In 

 April, 1883, I took 41;colonies in rotation, without se- 

 lection as to strength, from my home apiary at 

 Nauvoo, 111., to a small prairie village five miles 

 east of me. The spring was cold and backward, 

 and the whole season unusually wet. No tim- 

 ber was within three miles. 8orae fruit and a 

 few black-locusts were the only floM'ers they had to 

 work on before white clover;' and although the col- 

 onies were in good average condition, with a great 

 plenty of stores, when removed I was compelled to 

 feed them the last week in May and the first two 

 weeks in .June, to prevent starvation, one colony 

 being almost starved before [ discovered that they 

 were short. But such a mass of bees ! I never saw 

 the like before, nor have I seen it since. The ten 

 large Qulnby frames were.falmost a solid mass of 

 brood, and the hive and surplus t)ox were overtiow- 

 ing with bees. The removal seems to have stimu- 

 lated them to excessive breeding. The white-clover 

 honey-flow began about the middle of June, and 

 lasted all through July, followed by buckwheat and 

 heart'8-ease in August, and ending with Spanish 

 needle, wild artichoke, goldenrod, etc., September 

 30. The total yield from the 41 colonies was 11,.550 

 lbs. of extracted honey, or an average of 281 lbs. 

 per colony. Greatest yield of any one colony, .560 

 lbs. I had no swarms— at least, none were seen. 

 I followed the tiering-up plan, always being watch- 

 ful that each colony had plenty of room for storing 

 honey. 

 T began the season with 63 surplus boxes, with 



frames full of empty comb. I ended the season 

 with 95. I used full sheets of foundation built out 

 in frames. My plan was, as soon as the first box 

 was about half full, to raise it up and put an empty 

 one under it. They continued to woi-k mainly in the 

 upper box ; and when the combs wore about three- 

 fourths sealed we extracted them and placed the 

 box with the extracted combs below again, next to 

 the brood-chamber. During the first 24 days of July, 

 each 14 colonies gave us one barrel of honey (3,50 

 lbs. net) every eight days. This aj)iary is located on 

 the premises of Mr. William Thornbur, Powelton, 

 Hancock Co., 111. Mr. Thornbur received one-fifth 

 of the honey as his share, for location, etc. 



1 have had large yields from some of my other 

 apiaries, but none have ever equaled this one. 1 

 have had considerable experience with the Italians, 

 the black (or brown), and the Cyprian bees, and I 

 can truly say that T would not have either of the 

 latter breeds as a g-ift, for the productiou of ex- 

 tracted honey, conditioned that 1 must not Italian- 

 ize them, although 1 much prefer the Cyprians to 

 the blacks. 1 find but one fault with the Cyprians 

 —their unconquerable crossness. Were it not for 

 this I should prefer them to the Italians, as I find the 

 former equal to the latter in every other respect, 

 and much more prolific— one <if the best qualities of 

 a profitable race of bees. Emil J. Baxter. 



Nauvoo, 111. 



Friend B., we are very much obliged to 

 you for coming forward in defense of the 

 Italians. Other ctrciimstances, however, 

 may have had something to do with your 

 enormous product. Five hundred and six- 

 ty pounds from one colony, in one season, 

 is one of the greatest reports ever put on 

 record. The locality must be excellent, and 

 the season was probably very favorable. 



DOOLITTIiB'S QUEEN - CELL PRO- 

 TECTOR. 



ALSO SOMETHING 



FROM AWAY 

 AFRICA. 



OFF IN SOtTTH 



§OME months ago I wrote you a few items about 

 bees and honey in this vicinity, and my own 

 experience in changing from vicious hybrids 

 to Italians. Before the work was finished, 

 Mr. G. M. Doolittle gave us the description 

 of his wire-cloth cell-protector, and that " Yankee 

 notion " was worth more to me than the cost of 

 your journal, for it settled three colonies that had 

 previously destroyed queens and cells most provok- 

 ingly. So much time was lost by rearing and intro- 

 ducing (jueens, when the boney-tiow was best, that 

 my increase was only from i:! to •M\ colonies, and 

 my honey-crop only twenty - seven fj'iillons; but it 

 seems that, in at least one part of the world, that 

 passes for fabulous success. I reportt^d it to a lady 

 who was once a member of my household, but has 

 been some years a missionary in ("ape Colony. Yoti 

 may be interested in an extract from a reply re- 

 ceived a few days ago: 



" What a nice lot of honey t(j gel fi-oni 13 stands! 

 and that reminds me that we are reveling*' in honey 

 just now. We had fine i-ains this spring, sf) the 

 bees found plenty to work on, and the honey is very 

 delicious. The honey-plant is evidently a variety of 

 what we call caudy-tul't. 1 1 grows i n great profu- 

 sion in the fields, spring! njr up after every slight 

 •hower. The honey is whiter than our white-clover, 



