January, 1914. 



American Hee Journal 



tol Building, Madison, Wis., Feb. 3 and 

 4, beginning at 10 am. Tuesday. The 

 headquarters for beekeepers will be at 

 Simons' Hotel. We are preparing an 

 interesting program, and looking for a 

 large attendance. Gu.s Dittmer, Sec. 



A Belgian Opinion on the Italian Bee 



— Belgium is one of the most thickly 

 settled, if not the most thickly settled 

 country in the world. It has also the 

 best agricultural system. In beekeep- 

 ing they are leaders, and their monthly 

 magazine, " Le Rucher Beige," is often 

 quoted for its practical way of treating 

 modern bee questions. 



Mr. A. Wathelet, its editor, whose 

 portrait we reproduce in this number, 



Mr. a Wathelet. of Belgiim. 



Editor of the "Rucher BelEe:" one of the 



foremost bee-papers in the French 



language. 



is a large practical apiarist, and- his, 

 opinion is of value. He writes us as 

 follows concerning the Italian bee: 



" I read, in L'.-Vpiculteur, your expres- 

 sion of opinion concerning the Italian 

 bee. As a rule, the beekeepers of the 

 Basin of the Meuse are of the same 

 opinion, and the Italian bees pure or 

 mixed, are to be found in almost all 

 our apiaries." 



••• 



More Improvements in Parcel Post — 



According to bulletins recently sent by 

 the Department at Washington to Post- 

 offices over the country, commencing 

 with Jan. 1,1914, there is to be a change 

 made in the parcel post. 



After that date the weight limit for 

 parcels to be sent within the loO-mile 

 zone will be increased from 20 pounds 

 to 50 pounds with the same rates apply- 

 ing, 5 cents for the first pound and 1 

 cent for each additional pound. This 

 would make the charges on a .5ii-pound 

 package 54 cents within the zone limit. 



Outside of the 150-mile zone the 

 weight limit is to be increased from II 

 pounds, as at present, to 20 pounds. 

 There are also material reductions in 

 rates for these zones as compared with 

 formerly. The department still con- 

 tinues the plan, however, of a varying 

 rate increasing with the distance. 



.\nother important change is that 

 after March Ui, books will be admitted 

 to the parcel 'post at the regular rates 

 except that on books of 8-ounce weight 

 or less the rate will be % cent an ounce. 



The reader will probably realize the 

 importance of these changes. It will 

 mean that the consumer can order a 

 large number of things to come to him 

 by parcel post, at least things which he 

 is in a hurry for. For instance, within 

 the 150-mile zone, a beekeeper who 

 needs a crate of sections and a pound 

 of foundation in a hurry, can order 

 them sent by parcel post at a cost to 

 him of about 40 cents. If he lives on a 

 rural free delivery route the advantage 

 will be all the more apparent. 



Gradually we are approaching the 

 system of most European countries 

 where the limit is 100 pounds, and the 

 rate is the same for the whole country. 



Below is a list of the rates as they 



will apply after Jan. 1. As stated above, 



the limit of weight will be 50 pounds 



for the first fwo zones, and 20 pounds 



for the othe'rs : 



First Each 

 lb addi'nal lb. 



Zone 1 and 2 5c Ic 



" 3 6c 2c 



" 4 Vc 4c 



" 5 8c 6c 



" 6 9c 8c 



" 7 11c 10c 



" 8 12c 12c 



New Jersey Meeting. — The annual 

 meeting of the New Jersey Beekeepers' 

 Association will be held at New Bruns- 

 wick, N. J., Jan. 22 and 23, 1914. 



E. G. Carr, Sec. 



A Reprint of the Original Book of L. 

 L. Langstroth The American Bee Jour- 

 nal is preparing, jointly with Gleanings 

 in Bee Culture, a reprint of the "Hive 

 and Honey-Bee" just as it was first 

 issued over 60 years ago, by the man 

 who is called everywhere "the Father 

 of American ."Xpiculture." The reader 

 will find this work mentioned in the 

 advertising columns. The book will 

 be ready within a few weeks. Below 

 we give the introduction prepared for 

 it by the editor : 



Reprints of old text-books are very 

 unusual things. Few works of this 

 kind have that honor, while novels and 

 histories are republished bythe million. 

 It takes works likes t^ose of Virgil or 

 Aristotle, or quaint writings like "Isaak 

 Walton's Compleat Angler " to interest 



the later generations. In the case o 

 Mr. Langstroth's original " Hive and 

 Honey-P.ee," the student of apiculture 

 and the book lover are both interested, 

 and men of these two classes, though 

 few in number, are worthy of consid- 

 eration. 



Three qualifications have centered 

 the interest upon Mr. Langstroth, his 

 accuracy of observation, his interest- 

 ing diction and his invention of the 

 most practical hive the world has ever 

 known. 



His accuracy of observation is no- 

 ticeable to this day by the student of 

 the honey-bee's habits. Many things 

 that some of us have just discovered 

 are to be found in Langstroth. We 

 make over again the mistakes which 

 he has made and corrected. 



He was careful not to oppose popular 

 fallacies without argument. Read his 

 introduction to the subject of the " Bee 

 Moth." After having stated, as a fact, 

 what was firmly believed wherever 

 bees were kept, that: " so fatal have 

 been its ravages (the moth's) in this 

 country that thousands have abandoned 

 the cultivation of bees in despair," he 

 slowly leads his reader to the truth 

 which he had discovered, that the moth 

 is harmless in well-kept apiaries, that : 

 "When a colony has become hopelessly 

 queenless, then, moth or no moth, its 

 destruction is certain. Every year, 

 large numbers of hives are bereft of 

 their queen, most of which are either 

 robbed by other bees or sacked by the 

 bee-moth, while their owner imputes 

 the mischief to something else than 

 the real cause. He might just as well 

 imagine that carrion birds or worms, 

 which are devouring a dead horse, were 

 the primary cause of its untimely'end." 

 This was one of the most difficult facts 

 to impress upon the average bee-mas- 

 ter, but every year has better shown 

 the truth of this vigorous statement. 



His interesting style and diction 

 make the original book read like a 

 novel. Mr. Langstroth followed no 

 regular text-book method, and for that 

 reason many of his statements are 

 difficult to trace. When revising his 

 book, at his request, after some 33 

 years of publication, and because his 

 impaired health prevented him from 

 keeping up the work, we added some 

 two-fifths new matter, and arranged 

 his writings in such an order that it 

 became easier for the student to find 

 the information he seeks. But we did 

 this at the expense of the novel-like 

 feature of the work. 



The invention of the Langstroth hive, 

 the most practical in existence, a hive 

 which may be " taken apart like a pup- 

 pet show," has revolutionized bee- 

 keeping. The inventions of the honey 

 extractor by Hruschka, and of comb 

 foundation by Mehring, the latter ren- 

 dered practical by A. I. Root, would 

 have been of but little use without such 

 a hive. The very fault which a leading 

 apiarist, R. L. Taylor, once found 

 against it, that it is a rattle box, is a 

 proof of its great convenience in ma- 

 nipulations. Too many new hives, fine 

 when just emerged from the carpen- 

 ter's hands, proved anything but "mov- 

 able " when occupied and glued up by 

 the bees. 



After nearly 30 years of successive 

 revisions, and some 20 different edi- 



