Oct. 22, 1903. 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



681 



About a week or ten days after our basswoods blossom, 

 they begin to blossom on the shore of Mille Lacs, about a 

 mile away. So, in a good year, we have a long basswood 

 season. The bees work hard on the corn and catnip. There 

 is not much buckwheat raised near our home, though I 

 think it pays to have a few small patches near the hen- 

 house. Then the bees can gather the honey, and the poul- 

 try will harvest the buckwheat. It would piece out nicely 

 between basswood and goldenrod, for the alsike is uncer- 

 tain, and blossoms only by spells. 



There are lots of wild asters, and we get a great many 

 pounds of bright goldenrod honey, and dandelions blossom 

 till the bees are put away for winter. 



We put our bees in the cellar about the last of Novem- 

 ber, and we have found that a swarm that goes into winter 

 quarters in good shape is pretty sure to be all right in the 

 spring ; most of them are rearing brood and have young 

 bees hatching when they leave the cellar. 



We keep our bees in the cellar under the house, with the 

 potatoes and other vegetables. We kept the temperature 

 about 38 degrees last winter, and we have had better suc- 

 cess at that temperature than warmer. We look at the 

 thermometer every time we go down cellar, and open or 

 close the ventilator to keep it right, and it does not take 

 much time, while the better the cellar is for bees, the better 

 it is for the vegetables and apples. 



We got our first three swarms of bees four years ago ; 

 and we don't know of any in the county before that. Now 

 we have 36 colonies, and about half of our neighbors have 

 from two to five colonies. 



We sell more than half of our honey at home, and the 

 rest in Aitkin. I believe the extracted honey sells best, but 

 it all sells readily at 12'. to IS cents a pound. It is very 

 seldom that a neighbor comes in without inquiring about 

 the welfare of the bees, and the prospect for honey, even if 

 there is not time to ask about the corn crop, or the melons 

 or apples. 



Whatever helps to make this world and humanity better 

 and sweeter is always a blessing. We always love and ap- 

 preciate anything that is sweet, and it seems to be the duty 

 of the bee to search out and gather sweets that would other- 

 wise be unnoticed and wasted, just as it is the duty of every 

 human being to search out and remember the mercies and 

 blessings so abundantly bestowed by our Heavenly Father. 

 — Read at the Minnesota State Convention. 



Aitkin Co., Minn. Alice Hazblton. 



[ Hasty's Afterthoushts ] 



The " Old Reliable " seen through New and Unreliable GlaBsee. 

 By E. E. Hasty, Sta. B Rural, Toledo. Ohio. 



BEESWAX-BXPERIMKNTS. 



The Texas wax-experiments, page 564, told us what we 

 already knew, for the main, that the percent of dirt in a 

 comb increases with age. Like a spoiled child, I'm going 

 to cry for what they didn't tell us. I want to know whether 

 the total amount of wax in a comb doth with age increase, 

 decrease, or remain stationary. If they had told us that it 

 would have been something like. Until we find out that it 

 isn't so, we naturally suppose virgin comb to be all wax. 

 'Spects that lots of the brethren still need to be informed. 

 Texas finds that virgin comb has 88 percent of wax. But 

 they used foundation in their virgin comb ; and I incline to 

 protest pretty loudly against such hybrid virginity. 



EXPERIMENTS WITH HIVE-COVERS. 



That any well-made cover with a shade-board added 

 protects better than a complicated cover alone, is a conclu- 

 sion of value — and a conclusion that seems reasonable, also. 

 They didn't find out exactly how much heat went through 

 each individual cover in a given time. That's quite an im- 

 portant item. Perhaps you don't get my idea. Like this : 

 Two tubs each has a small leak ; but one small leak is only 

 half as large as the other small leak. Sink these two tubs 

 half down in water, for it to leak in, and let them alone long; 

 enough, and you'll fail to find out any difference in the 

 leaks. Water will rise nearly to level in both. Similarly 

 in these left-all-day empty hives, temperature finally got to j 



nearly the same level in most of them ; but I fear the cir- 

 cumstance is misleading. Suppose they try next time how 

 much ice melts in each chamber in one hour. Page 564. 



HYBRIDS OF I'l.ANTS AND ANIMALS. 



An incorrect statement, on page 566, needs spotting. 

 Very true (and an important " very true " ), that animals, 

 and plants also, have two diverse kinds of hybrids, accord- 

 ing to which way the cross is made. Not altogether unrea- 

 sonable to say that neither is the true hybrid, if the lack 

 could be remedied readily — as it can not. Mr. Newell's true 

 hybrid is not a true hybrid, either. The same cause of 

 diversity, only in much less degree, remains. C — I x I — C 

 must not be expected to be exactly the same as I — C x C — I. 



NUMBER OF BEES USED UP IN A POUND OF HONEY. 



Dr. Miller's estimate of 500 bees spent for a pound of 

 honey is good as a starter — with the admission that they 

 sometimes get much more. On similar lines I'll proceed to 

 say, the bees of a summer may total 100,000. If all are 

 spent, so as to average the rate named, it will be 200 pounds. 

 A good many of us do not get so much as the surplus off a 

 200-pound income. Page 568. 



OUT-APIARIES AND BRUSHED SWARMS. 



Stachelhausen, it seems, has run an out-apiary 11 years 

 by brushing swarms a little in advance of Nature. Still 

 thinks the method one of the best, but finds a great deal de- 

 pends upon locality and circumstances. 



And when he has a virgin queen in a hive and wants 

 her killed, he can attain that, nine times out of ten, by a sim- 

 ple temporary shifting of hives near the close of the day — 

 getting in a good lot of field- bees from a colony with a lay- 

 ing queen. The sweeping success of this, in Stachelhaus- 

 en's hands, surprises me. Perhaps he only expects it of 

 rather weak colonies. Page 580. 



SWARMING AND NECTAR-GATHERING. 



A. E. Hooker, on page 582, seems to have my experi- 

 ences pretty frequently. Not sure to escape swarming when 

 the flowers fail for a spell to yield nectar. And the dictum 

 of 8 or 9 days between prime swarm and after-swarm wholly 

 unreliable. He finds more cases less than 8 days than I do. 

 The average with my bees is more — in many individual 

 cases much more. 



In caging queens to prevent swarming, if the bees 

 swarm precipitately when their queen is released, that looks 

 to me like pretty good evidence that they were thinking 

 about swarming more than about honey-storing before — 

 I. e., not doing their best. 





Dr. Miller's Answers 





Send Questions either to the office of the American Bee Journal, 

 or to Dr. C. C. Miller, Marengo, 111. 



On the Mercy of the Court. 



This is to be an apology, but I'd like to offer a prize for a form of 

 words adequate to the occasion. Some of the questions answered in 

 this number should have been answered long ago, but were buried 

 under a mass of letters and papers where they slept until now resur- 

 rected to haunt me like accusing ghosts. To say I regret the delay 

 doesn't at all meet the case. Hi should burn the letters in hopes that 

 the writers would think Uncle Sam had lost them, it would hardly 

 help matters, for I'd rather stand all the reproaches that may be heaped 

 upon me than to bear the lashings of a conscience constantly remind- 

 ing me that 1 am a liar and a sneak. I'd like to promise thai I'll 

 never do it again ; but 1 don't dare to. I don't know but I may. The 

 trouble is, that I'm so crowded I don't do things as methodically as I 

 should. I'm told I ought to give up some of the things I'm doing, 

 but which ! Some of them I hardly <<i« give up, some of them I don't 

 like to, and some of them I won't. 



All I can do in the present case is to throw myself on the mercy of 

 the court, and although not deserving it, still to ask forgiveness. 



C. C. Miller. 



[We feel sure all who may have been unintentionally neglected 

 will he glad to accept Dr. Miller's humble apology. We know he is a 

 very busy man, and trying to keep up with his work as best he can. 

 We can sympathize fully with him, as for years we have had altogether 



