GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



Grace Allen 



THE DIXIE BEE ^-'-vi..e,Ten„. 



Does anj'body know a better way 

 to celebrate a holiday than picnick- 

 ing out in the hills, visiting a 

 beeman or two on the way? It 

 was by far the best thing we 

 could tliink of to do on the Glo- 

 rious Fourth. There were four of 

 us. the other two also with bee sympathies, 

 one to the extent of five colonies as a nest 

 e^g down in Alabama. The day (Monday, 

 the 5th) was perfect, the country fresh and 

 beautiful from recent rains. Out in the 

 hills, to be reached only by a delightful 

 drive, Ave came to one apiary of one hundred 

 and twenty odd colonies, 

 the strongest-looking 

 colonies I ever saw. But 

 the crop was as dismal 

 as our own, only on a 

 larger scale — practically 

 a failure; viewed in the 

 light of expectations, a 

 distinct failure. After 

 watching the bees and 

 talking shop awhile, we 

 drove back out of the 

 hills to the pike again, 

 and turned off to the 

 ri\er. There we were 

 ferried across stream, 

 and headed according to 

 the ferryman's direc- 

 tions toward another 

 bee-yard. The road ran 

 along the river, between 

 a tangle of growth that 

 brushed our faces on 

 the right, and an appar- 

 ently interminable field 

 of corn on the left. 

 Neither one seemed to 

 have an end; and as it 

 was getting late, and we 

 were all developing a 

 prodigious interest in 

 the generous lunch-bas- 

 ket and the freezer of 

 jieach ice cream, and were reminding one 

 anothei' of the ferryman's ominous remark 

 that we had better be back by sundown if 

 we wanted to get back to our own side, we 

 gave up and turned back. Whatever that 

 farm may or may not yield as to a honey- 

 crop, there are four of us prepared to testify 

 to the excellent corn ])rospects. 



Unfortunately, this honey-crop failure 

 seems uniformly true of the immediate 

 Nashville vicii'ily. The winter stayed too 

 long, the bees built up too late, the clover 



SONG OV THE VOUNG QL'KENBEE. 



Out of the warm, close, waxen cell 



I have come, I have come ! 

 Out of mysterious silence and growth 

 Straight into life I have sprung! 

 And the far, dim past of my an- 

 cient race 

 Leaps in my blood, and I know my 

 place 

 In the midst of the motion ami 

 hum. 

 All the.se, they are thousands, and I 

 am but one — 

 I am queen — queen ! 

 Vivid and slender, with gossamei 

 wings 

 Woven of shimmer and sheen. 

 And something within me, with ur,; 



ing and thrill. 

 Makes me a-quiver my fate to fulfill. 



I am queen, queen, queen ! 

 Not you, royal sisters, astir in your 

 cells, 

 But T — I ! 

 Who willed it? I know not; but thi.s 

 thing I know — 

 I shall live, you must die! 

 You too are slim-bodied with cob- 

 webby wings, 

 But passionate life surges through 

 me and sings, 

 " It is I, I, I!" 



came too early, the rains came too late, 

 there was too much bad weather during the 

 clover bloom. 



And perhaps there wasn't much nectar in 

 the clover blossoms anywa3\ Of that I'm 

 not quite sure. Anyway, the most of what lit- 

 tle honey there is seems to be locust. And 

 there are many disappointed beekeepers. 

 One man says he will not sell enough honey 

 to pay for the supplies purchased last win- 

 ter. " Bees haven't done a thing," others 

 say. Our own crop is practically nothing; 

 and as we have been making some nuclei, 

 we expect to be feeding soon, which, indeed, 

 is likely to be tlie lot of 

 many of us here. I hope 

 this disastrous shortage 

 may be quite local. Some 

 parts of the state, our 

 inspector reports, show 

 veiy fair results. 



I not only agree with 

 Mr. Doolittle- page 486, 

 about saving bee-jour- 

 nals, but I would espe- 

 cially emphasize the 

 thought of reading theia 

 thoroughly before you 

 save them. Read them 

 thoroughly, and, unless 

 you object, mark thera 

 too. At the end of the 

 year you will get an in- 

 dex; but you may want 

 to refer to them many 

 times before that. Read 

 with a pencil in your 

 hand, and you can check 

 the things you care es- 

 ])ecially for. Tlien make 

 an abbreviated notation 

 on the white margin of 

 the cover, and then how 

 easily you can find 

 thing's ! Glancing at ran- 

 dom through our 1915 

 copies of Gli:anings, T find one copy 

 marked 242, inc (increase) ; 236-7, f. b. 

 (foul brood) ; 240 bnd'g jrnls (binding 

 journals. Some of them, evidently marked 

 hurriedlv, show merely page numbers, as 

 291, 307, 381, 397, etc., while on the pages 

 themsehes are checkmarks calling attention 

 to the paragraphs of articles of particular 

 interest. The July 1st cover says, " Doo- 

 little on TToney- getting, page 259." None of 

 us are in danger of knowing too much, and 

 constant study is surely well worth the effort. 



