1887 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



357 



peach-trees are quite full of peaches. Some of 

 them are as largre as a hulled walnut, and they will 

 be ripe in May. ^'es. there are orang-e-trees all 

 around the apiary. Ours are not old enouffh to 

 hear yet. Tliere is a ^Hrden at the otiier side of the 

 picket-fence, hut the house conies first. I will ex- 

 plain that I have c-lmntjed the name of my apiary 

 to Oak-(irove Apiary, and my address to Barber- 

 ville, instead of Volusia. Bees are doing' pretty 

 well, and we are having some swarms. When you 

 come to Florida, don't lorget to make us a visit. 

 Barberville. Fla., Mar. 21, l^<87. O. E. Heacock. 



^K<)^■K-^:ATl^G chickkns also woukek-eaters. 



I think Mr. Cather will find, if he allows his chick- 

 ens to catch drones, they will soon become as good 

 worker-eaters, and, despising the sting, they will 

 learn to handle them in as easy a manner as they do 

 the poor helpless drone. 1 killed a chicken last fall 

 that became an expert at the business. On opening 

 the crop I did not find over three drones, but about 

 ten times as many workers. My experience teaches 

 me to keep the chickens out of the bee-yard. They 

 dirty and scratch up the ground we have taken 

 pains to lay out and level off; and on a fine winter 

 morning (when it is too cold for the bees to come 

 out) you may fine them on the sunny side of a hive, 

 jabbering- off their chicken-talk, which must be 

 very annoying to the inmates who are trying- to pass 

 away the cold winter in quiet. Grant Scofield. 



Ridgway, N. Y., April 8, 1887. 



THE FIKST DRONE. 



Bees have been gathering pollen at times for two 

 or three weeks, although we have had several quite 

 severe freezes during the time. Yesterday they 

 were very active, almost as thick around the hives 

 as in summer. 1 thought at first I had a case of 

 robbing on my hands, but some were busy carrying 

 in pollen, and probably the others were young bees 

 at play. I noticed one drone, the first I ever saw so 

 early in the season. Am 1 to expect a swarm from 

 that hive soon? It is a Langstroth chaff hive, con- 

 taining a last year's first swarm. Or was I mistak- 

 en, and, instead of a drone, was it one of P. Ben- 

 son's bees that he had fed up with his nursing 

 bottle'? S. 0. Gordon. 



Georgetown, ()., Apr. 9, 1887. 



The presence of drones may indicate that 

 the bees are thinking of swarming; but as 

 tliey often start a montli or two before they 

 swarm, it does not indicate any thing very 

 positive. 



riDKK, AND ITS EFFECT ON BEES IN WINTER- 

 ING. 



Mr. Dunn's remarks in last Gi-e.^nings, on the 

 effects of cider on bees, induce me to relate my 

 experience with it. In the fall of 1884 I had 37 col- 

 onies in winter quarters, packed on summer stands. 

 We have a eider-mill within 30 rods of my apiary. 

 The fall was warm, and they took large quantities 

 of cider, .\bout the 20th of November I found large 

 quantities of brood in all the hives. That season, 

 you will remember, was very productive of honey- 

 dew, and the winter was very cold. When the Feb- 

 ruary thaw came I had lost eight colonies, then six 

 weeks cold, and I l! st hi more— 24 out of 27. From 

 the combs I extracted over 4()0 lbs of honey-dew. 



In 1885 I put 2S colonies into winter quarters. 

 They took a great deal of cider, and in the last part 

 of November I found the hives well filled with 

 brood. I lost one colony, starved, because, though 



they had plenty of honey, It was at the other side of 

 the hive. 



In 1886 basswood blighted, and then drongrht came. 

 A good deal of honey-dew was carried in, and but 

 little honey from autumn flowers. The tall was 

 warm, and the bees worked at the cider, taking a 

 great deal. Brood-rearing had stojjped in Septem- 

 ber, but began again; and on the 19th of November 

 there was a good deal of brood. All my friends pre- 

 dicted heavy loss. The bees being short of stores, I 

 fed about ISdd lbs. of granulated sugar, in hard 

 candy, laid on the frames. The work in the cider- 

 mill interfered with feeding them early enough 

 to make syrup. I |)acked 25 colonies with pine 

 planer shavings; 18, including 3 so weak that 1 

 hardly expected to winter, I jnit into a clamp, 



.Tan. 31 there came a thaw, and I opened the clamp 

 so as to give the bees flight. They spotted the 

 snow no more than others wintered on natural 

 stores without cider. I took them out on the 7th of 

 April, having closed up the clamp again on the 

 eveningof January 21. All were in good condition 

 but one; they having some packing one side, dug- 

 it out and so stopped up the entrance, and smother- 

 ed. All on summer stands wintered well. T ex- 

 tracted all unsealed honey from about half the 

 hives, in the fall; part of these were in the clamp, 

 part out. I did not see that it made any difference. 



Nelson, O., April. 1887. S. .T. Baldwin. 



HONEY - POISONING ; HONEY SUPPOSED TO HAV* 

 BEEN GATHERED FROM POISON HUCKLEBEKR Y. 



I was raised in the central portion of Texas, 

 and lived there 35 years, when I moved to this coun- 

 try two years ago, on account of poor health. 1 had 

 liver disease, which baffled the skill of several phy- 

 sicians in Texas. 1 have improved so much since I 

 came here that I feel as sound as ever; but when 1 

 undertake heavy work I soon become exhausted. I 

 believe if I were to remain here it would finally 

 cure me. 



The country is very rough here — too much so to 

 make any speed at farming. It is a heavily timber- 

 ed country, consisting chiefly of oak and pine- 

 some basswood on the river, three miles east, but 

 little land under cultivation. Water is abundant. 

 Nearly all the little branches between the moun- 

 tains run eight months in the year. There are a 

 good many wild bees in the woods, but yet very few 

 people here have tried raising bees at home. They 

 say they would rather hunt for the " wild" honey in 

 the woods than to he bothered with bees at home. 

 Several persons have been poisoned with honey 

 in this part in the last two years. It is unknown 

 what the cause is of the honey being poisonous. 

 Some say it is strychnine which the bees got from 

 bait put out for wolves. Some say it is poison 

 huckleberry, but both seem improbable when we 

 consider that there is not a tenth as much strych- 

 nine put on now as there was six or eight years ago, 

 and the huckleberry Is no more plentiful now than 

 several years ago As before stated, the first case 

 of poison was two years ago. In a few hours after 

 eating the honey, the persons poisoned begin to feel 

 a tingling in the fingers, which finally extends over 

 the whole body. In some cases it has caused partial 

 paralysis, lasting several weeks. ( )ne case occurred 

 ten or twelve miles from here, where a whole fami- 

 ly of four persons were poisoned, and died within 24 

 hours. They lived in the low bottom country. .\t 

 all of the places I have visited, where poisoned hon- 



