(320 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Aug. 



ans are sometimes troubled with robbers ; 

 but in ordinary seasons, and with ordinary 

 good care, we believe there is no excu.se for 

 letting robl)ing get started to any very great 

 extent. Of course, a disposition at this 

 time of tlie year, with part of the bees, to 

 pilfer, can not be avoided; bat we can pre- 

 vent this pilfering leading to very bad re- 

 sults, as a general rule. 



DRONE-GUARDS AND ALLEY TRAPS. 



DOES THE USE OF PEUFORATED METAL HINDER 



THE BEES ENOUGH TO DECREASE THE 



NUMBER OF POUNDS OK HONEY 



PER COLONyV 



}H AVE a sniaU apiary, 9 colonies, one mile north 

 of town, on the creek— good pasture, basswood 

 included. The pasturag-e is better than at 

 home here, where I have 51 colonies. My home 

 apiary is made up of what I consider good 

 stock— pure Italians and good hybrids. The 9 colo- 

 nies north are common stock, or Italians run down 

 to wicked 3;3d (?) blood. On these '.i I placed the 

 "guards"! purchased of you, to prevent swarms 

 from absconding. On examination to-day I find 

 some colonies with not one pound of honey in the 

 brood-chamber, and all will want about l.'i lbs. of 

 syrup each, to winter them, while one good large 

 colony of hybrids, in the same kind of hive, and in 

 the same location, owned by a farmer, has the 

 brood-chamber well filled with honey, the same as 

 my home apiary. Here my colonies had " plenty 

 and to spare," to the extent that I divided (having 

 no swarms) a few days since, and increased my 

 stock considerably, giving all new colonies nearly 

 enough honey to winter them, with plenty of brood 

 and bees, and leaving some to spare in all colonies. 

 From some of the latter I got some surplus also. 



Now, all this talk centers in the question. Did 

 those "guai-ds" (which were partly clogged with 

 dead drones) interfere with the workers, or was it 

 the " blood " that told? The colon5' in the same lo- 

 cation referred to did not have a guard on. If I 

 were certain it was the " blood " which caused the 

 " break " in this heretofore energetic and well-dis- 

 ciplined army, I would depose the pi-esent female 

 incumbent and Inaugurate a new dynasty. 

 Nevada, O., Aug. 5, 1887. Wm. M. Young. 



I am rather inclined to believe that both 

 the blood and the guards were responsible 

 for the difference in results. The guards 

 which you purchased, we tind, on looking 

 up in our bill-book, were what we call en- 

 trance-guards, and are designed not so much 

 to catch queens when they are about to is- 

 sue with the swarm as to prevent drones 

 from passing the entrance. During the 

 time that drones are tiying they should be 

 removed occasionally, and cleaned of drones 

 which may have become lodged in the met- 

 al. If you had used the Alley drone and 

 queen trap combined there would be no 

 trouble from drones clogging the metal. 

 J Jut even these mnst be removed occasion- 

 ally to dump out the drones that may be 

 "upstairs."" From our experience thissea- 

 son I am not sure but even the Alley trap 

 (if kept at the entrance during the whole 

 season) might so hinder the bees as to af- 

 fect appreciably the honey crop. 



FROM DIFFERENT FIELDS, 



DO BEES EVER TRY TO DECEIVE EACH OTHER? 



T HAVE been feeding up a weak colony, and rob- 

 (£|f bers were attracted by the food. Some of them 

 ^r forced their way into the hive. I contracted 

 ■^ the entrance to three-fourths of an inch, and 

 then they defended themselves. After half an 

 hour or so I noticed what I believed to be a number 

 of robbers coming with just a little pollen on their 

 legs, by which they expected, as I suppose, to gain 

 admittance into the hive. Some with pollen on 

 their legs were readily admitted, while others with 

 just a little pollen would act just like I'obbers, by 

 tiying all around about the entrance, and dodging 

 whenever called upon by the sentinels for the pass- 

 word. Were these latter bees robbers? 



Corn is in full tassel and pollen -is plentiful, but 

 honej' is scarce. White clover, which is our main 

 honey crop, gave us but little honey this summer, 

 owing to the long severe drought in May and June. 

 June 23d I sowed the bushel of buckwheat that I got 

 of you, and on the 19th of July it began to bloom- 

 just 37 days after sowing. The alsike clover seed I 

 got of you was sown April 1st, and perished in the 

 drought. I shall sow earlier next year. I have a 

 thought of raising buckwheat in the future, instead 

 of common wheat. It will give me pasture for my 

 bees, and make more money as grain than wheat. 

 We get from 10 to 30 bushels of wheat per acre, and 

 get 60 cts per bushel for it. Now, if buckwheat will 

 yield 10 bushels per acre, and sell for $1.00 per bush- 

 el, it will pay as well, or better, than wheat. Then, 

 too, it is such a trouble to get our wheat thrashed 

 out. They don't like to come to thrash unless you 

 have 300 bushels or more— at least, they charged me 

 $1.").00 to come and set a machine in my field. I want 

 to get some instructions as to the cultivation and 

 harvesting of buckwheat. No one here knows any 

 thing about it. J. G. Nance. 



Belleview, Ky., July 38, 1887. 



Friend N., I have spent a good deal of 

 time in trying to determine just the point 

 you make; that is, whether bees have 

 enough brains to attempt to obtain honey 

 (not money) by false pretenses. Although 

 appearances, as you have shown, would 

 seem to suggest' at first that they do, I 

 think it is a mistake. The bees that had 

 a little pollen on their legs did not place it 

 there in order to make believe they were 

 honest: they belonged to a chtss that had, 

 by daily robbing, got uneasy and discon- 

 tented. They were not ready for honest 

 labor ; but finally finding notlling to steal 

 they put out for the fields for the purpose of 

 gathering pollen, like the rest. The day, 

 liowever, was hot, and the lab(n- fatiguing— 

 especially to bees that had had a taste of 

 the excitement of robbing, and so they came 

 back home with half a load, and flevv about 

 the apiary to see if there were not a chance 

 for some excitement. Now, under such cir- 

 cumstances they would be seen trying hard 

 to rob. with little hits of pollen on their 

 legs. (Jther robbers which you saw catching 

 hold of robbers, seemingly just to make be- 

 lieve the> were sentinels, were likewise of 

 this class of demoralized old fellows. They 

 were hanging around, as we sometimes see 



