APRIL 15, 1915 



261 



)t. C. C. Miller 



ITEAY STEAW! 



ireego. 



W. J. WooLLEY, p. 233, reports 

 nil average of 30 lbs. per colony. 



n 



L >- Jl Looks a little like small potatoes 

 |L^|l lUit when j-ou figure it at 18 cents 

 H^a (ikl) per pound, or $5.40 per colo- 

 MM >iy. some of us might be glad to 

 swap places. 

 I'm proud of my native state, good old 

 Pennsylvania, to think she has a governor 

 who would propose $50,000 for the benefit 

 of beekepcrs, p. 216. But then it's just like 

 Governor Brumbaugh. Do you know that 

 he's one of the leading Sunday-school men 

 of the land? 



Ought not that statement, p. 240, that 

 the building- of queen-cells is inseparably 

 connected with swarming, be cut just about 

 in two? Remember that under natural con- 

 ditions evei'i/ queen, when she closes her 

 career, has cells built for a successoi", with 

 no thought of swarming. 



G. ]\r. DoOLiTTLE, p. 224, my record-book 

 does get daubed with honey and glue, but 

 with a new book each j-ear the trouble is 

 pot serious. I don't understand the wind 

 blowing your book open at the wrong place 

 in spite of best endeavors. No trouble 

 worth mentioning here. Locality? 



E. S. !MiLES has covered the gTound as to 

 taking bees out of cellar exceptionally well, 

 p. 232. One thing just a little different 

 liere. "With a two-inch space under bottom- 

 bars, we can quickly clean out dead bees 

 after a hive is placed on its stand, and 

 close the entrance before bees wake up to 

 fly out. 



Young fellow, read carefully all that's 

 said, pages 133 and 135, about just exactly 

 how you're to make candy to feed your 

 bees, and then make up your mind decidedly 

 that only in extremities will you ever put 

 any of it in practice, but plan ahead to have 

 extra frames of sealed honey to meet all 

 emergencies. Take it from me, you'll never 

 be sorry. 



A GOOD deal is told about sugar, p. 214, 

 and what of it? Well, several thing's, and 

 chiefly that 86.85 pounds average annual 

 consumption. Do you realize what that 

 means? It means that inverting so large 

 an amount as that is too heavy a strain on 

 the digestive organs, hence a weaker nation. 

 It means something worse than that. For 

 that nvrrage means that, while some use 

 much less, others may use double that 

 amount, hence a lot of ])eople are practi- 

 cally killed by sugar-eating. Uncle Sam 



might do a good deal worse than to spend 

 a few thousands in a campaign to educate 

 the people so that at least half the sugar 

 should be replaced by honey. But in that 

 case could the demand be supplied? 



Uncle Joe Blunk, referring to my win- 

 tering, says I can keep the door of my bee- 

 cellar closed all the time if I connect a pipe 

 in the bee-cellar with the furnace chimney, 

 as " enough fresh air will seep in through 

 the walls of the cellar to feed the place." 

 I should have explained that I have a stove- 

 pipe-hole entering a chimney in the bee- 

 cellar. But no " seep " business is good 

 enough for my bees. They like the air to 

 come in a flood. 



" Besides there are many basswoods and 

 linden trees," p. 185 — which reminds me. 

 Years ago a man in Marengo had in his 

 yard several basswoods perhaps 40 years 

 old. Happening in that part of town one 

 day I noticed that they were taken down, 

 and that some little trees four or five feet 

 high had been planted. With some degree 

 of pride he said, " I had those common 

 basswoods taken out, and got from the 

 nursery some choice shade-trees — lindens." 



Surprising is that statement, p. 242, that 

 by using the Alexander plan, " putting the 

 queenless colony right on top with nothing 



but the honey-board between 



the chances are that the SAvarming tendency 

 would very rapidly develop into a mania." 

 Surely so good a beekeeper as Mr. Alexan- 

 der would have discovered if that were so. 

 Moreover, I have practiced it hundreds of 

 times where cells had been started, and 

 have always counted it a cure for the 

 swarming mania. What can make the dif- 

 ference ? 



Pounding home the truth that bees are 

 necessary for pollination, and that spraying 

 in bloom hurts the fruit, will do some good; 

 but no matter how intelligent a fruit-gi'ow- 

 er is, he will siDray before bloom is gone if 

 he is selfish enough unless the law prevents 

 liim. He says, " I know all about what you 

 say; but I can't get through spraying in 

 time unless I begin before all have gone out 

 of bloom. Even if I could I don't want to. 

 If I wait till all bloom is over, there is a 

 little danger that some of the oldest fruit 

 will be wormy. If I spray when two-thirds 

 of the bloom has fallen, and kill all yet in 

 bloom, there will still be left more fruit 

 than the trees can mature, and I'll have no 

 wormy fruit. Me for the earlier spraying." 

 Now what reply have you? 



