12 



January, 1914. 



American ^ee Journal 



is cooling, dissolve the acids in the 

 spirits and add the essence. When the 

 first mixture is cold, put the two to- 

 gether and stir until thoroughly min- 

 gled. 



With this treatment administered at 



the very beginning of a cold your time 

 of affliction will be brief. And there- 

 after don't forget to keep the body at 

 an even temperature and so ward off 

 the " keyhole colds." — C/iica^'O Record- 

 Ih-rald. 



clover seed is now worth more than 

 alfalfa seed in some markets. 



E^ Western ^ Bee-I^eping 



Conducted by Wesley Foster. Boulder. Colo. 



A Visit to Marengo 



Early in December the writer was in 

 Chicago and decided to call on Dr. 

 Miller at Marengo. But neither he 

 nor Miss Wilson were at home, which 

 was quite a disappointment. Dr. Miller's 

 house stands upon a slight rise of 

 ground, and was recognizedat once from 

 the picture I have seen. I saw a small 

 patch of sweet clover which the Doc- 

 tor evidently is trying. The bees were 

 in the cellar under the house beside 

 the furnace room. The weather was 

 warm, and the thermometer in the cel- 

 lar at noon registered 52 degrees, but 

 the bees were quiet, only a few being 

 found on the floor. 



I noticed that the Doctor has no 

 paint on his hives, as I have previously 

 read. If he should try that no paint 

 scliemc in Colorado, he would be unable 

 to keep his hives from gaping open at 

 all the corners, and how badly all his 

 sections would look after being wet 

 through the cracks that would soon 

 appear in those covers. When the 

 Doctor finds out that the inside of his 

 hives are all varnished by propolis, 

 closing all the pores, as Mr. Parsons 

 mentions, perhaps he will invest in 

 some paint. 



Sweet Clover 



In cleaning sweet clover seed there 

 is a large amount of leaves and fine 

 bits of stalks thrown out by the seed 

 cleaner. This resembles alfalfa meal 

 very much and equals it in feeding 

 value. It is worth a cent a pound. Our 

 cow has given a larger amount of milk 

 since feeding this than any time since 

 she could run on green grass. Almost 

 enough of this sweet clover meal (I 

 will call it) is secured to pay for the 

 cleaning of the seed. At the Land 

 Show in Chicago I saw a bale of sweet 

 clover hay in the United States Gov- 

 ernment Exhibit with this explanation 

 printed on a card: "Hay of sweet 

 clover is much less bitter than the 

 green plant and stock will become ac- 

 customed to it and develop a liking 

 for it if they are forced to eat it for a 

 few days. It is practically equal to 

 alfalfa in feeding value." 



Also in this exhibit were enlarged 

 photographs of hulled alfalfa and sweet 

 clover seed, showing how to tell when 

 one or the other is adulterated. Micro- 

 scopes and samples of seed were also 

 placed so one could examine the dif- 

 ferent seeds and thus get a first-hand 



knowledge of how to judge seed. If 

 the present sweet clover agitation 

 keeps up in the farm journals and farm- 

 ers' institutes, sweet clover growing is 

 going to assume the proportions of a 

 rage. 



One experienced seedsman told me 

 that he thought it a mistake to ofi^er 

 anything but unhulled seed on the 

 market. His reason is that unhulled 

 sweet clover seed cannot be adulterated 

 without easy detection. When the seed 

 is hulled it can be easily adulterated 

 with weed and alfalfa seed unless alfalfa 

 is higher than sweet clover seed, in 

 which case adulteration would doubt- 

 less go the other way. Hulled sweet 



Heavy Snow in the West 



December 4 and .') northern Colorado 

 was visited with one of the heaviest 

 snowfalls in the memory of the oldest 

 residents. It was a heavy wet snow, 

 and measured about 4.j inches at Boul- 

 der. The writer was on his way home 

 from Iowa, and it took 4 days to get 

 through, being delayed 3 days in Kan- 

 sas and Colorado on account of the 

 snow. The bees wintered outside are 

 covered completely with snow meas- 

 uring 12 to 15 inches over the tops of 

 the hives. A number were shoveled 

 out a week after the storm, and a 

 space was found about 5 inches wide 

 all the way around each hive, and the 

 bees themselves were in fine condition. 



The fall of snow was so heavy that 

 many roofs were broken in, and travel 

 all along the highways was very slow 

 to be resumed. The snow was even 

 heavier in the mountains, where from 

 .5 to 7 feet fell during the storm. This 

 makes a heavy fall of snow for the 

 mountains so far this year with inevit- 

 ably more to follow. It is my belief 

 that a large crop of honey will be pro- 

 duced in the West this coming year if 

 conditions continue favorable. We 

 have more bees than in 1913, and other 

 conditions are just as favorable. 



Bee-Keeping 



In Dixie^ 



Conducted by J. J. Wilder. Cordele. Ga. 



Seme Common Questions Aslted and 

 Answered 



" Me. Wilder : — I am an amateur bee- 

 beeper, and like all such have trouble- 

 some problems, and I must turn to my 

 more experienced friends for advice. I 

 have 15 colonies in modern hives and 

 15 in box-hives which are badly scat- 

 tered around, and I want to arrange 

 them in a more systematic manner. 

 How shall I proceed ?" 



Answer. — I would prepare the stands 

 and place them where you want to set 

 the bees, and then move the colonies 

 on them. Do this during a very cold 

 spell, and there will be no loss of bees. 

 If you desire to arrange the hives in 

 pairs or in rows do so, and have as 

 many colonies as possible in the shade, 

 but if shade is plentiful, you can ar- 

 range them in rows that will best suit 

 your convenience. 



Question. — " How should I feed scrap 

 honey or sugar syrup ? Would it be a 

 good idea to take the feed away from 

 the apiary, say 200 yards, which is about 

 as far as bees go for water?" 



Answer. — I would dilute the honey 

 with warm water until it is about as 

 thick as thin sj rup, and use feeders of 

 sorne kind. You might do open feed- 

 ing, as you suggest, if your neighbors 



have no bees — but you should not put 

 out more feed than they would take up 

 during the warm part of the day, and 

 none should be put out on cool or 

 rainy days, as a lot of bees will be 

 chilled and lost. It would not be of 

 much advantage to set the feed some 

 distance away so far as robbers are 

 concerned, for they would soon be on 

 the scene. Of course, the feed should 

 not be placed very near a hive. 



Question. — "I have tried division- 

 board feeders and don't like them, for 

 I have not been able to nail and wax 

 them sufliciently to prevent leakage." 



Answer. — If they are nailed well 

 and do not split, then if very hot bees- 

 wax is run around the joints on the in- 

 side, they should not leak. 



Question. — "In October 1 had sev- 

 eral light colonies ; when I fed them 

 they were destroyed by robbers. How 

 could I have avoided this ?" 



Answer. — October is a bad time to 

 feed bees. It should have been done 

 about Sept. 1, when the bees were gath- 

 ering a little honey from fall flowers. 

 Then, too, you should not feed the light 

 or weak colonies, but take the best 

 frames of sealed honey from the strong- 

 est colonies and give them to the 

 light ones ; then contract the entrances 

 of the weak ones to about one bee 

 space, and feed the strong ones. 



Question. — " Last fall I bought 47 



