AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



53 



Mr. J. E. Hand. I staid there from 

 noon to eve of the next day. 



Mr. Hand has three apiaries — one 

 about 9 miles north, on the Iowa river, 

 a small one at home, and a very fine one 

 about 7 miles southvi^est of town. We 

 visited the latter apiary in the after- 

 noon. It consists of 7() colonies, mostly 

 in chaff hives, and mostly Italians. 

 They were in excellent condition, and 

 very docile, as we went among them 

 without any protection. There was at 

 the time a dearth of honey, on account 

 of the drouth, and I got but one sting on 

 the finger. 



Mr. H.'s home apiary he intends de- 

 voting to queen-rearing. He seemed to 

 take great pleasure in showing me a 

 $10 queen. Her bees are beauties. 



The next day we visited Mr. Hand's 

 apiary north of town, going by the way 

 of Steamboat Rock, so named from a 

 large perpendicular rock on the Iowa 

 river at that place, which to the imagin- 

 ative mind may look some like a steam- 

 boat, but it was no "sight" to Mr. 

 Hand, he having spent from January to 

 April in California. 



At Steamboat Rock we visited Dr. 

 Caldwell's apiary, consisting of 86 colo- 

 nies. He uses the S-frame hive. I 

 think that he has about the nicest bees 

 I ever saw. The Doctor was not at 

 home, but Mrs. Caldwell seems to be a 

 lover of the bees, and I understand she 

 cares for them mostly herself. 



Mr. Hand's apiary north of town is a 

 house-apiary. He thinks he is going to 

 like it, but it has its objections, as we 

 found out to our sorrow. It was locked, 

 and the windows fastened down. On 

 putting his hand in his pocket for the 

 key, he found that he had left it at 

 home — not a very pleasant finding out, 

 after we had come 9 miles through the 

 hot sun and dust, to see the inside of 

 that house. But the bees spoke for 

 themselves from the outside. They were 

 blacks, and were awfully cross. But we 

 had to content ourselves by going up on 

 the hill, and looking at a 40-acre patch 

 of young basswood, which Mr. H. re- 

 served when he sold his farm. 



After dinner (at Eldora) we visited 

 the Industrial School for boys. There 

 are at present 447 boys there, that are 

 well cared for, and seem contented. If 

 more of our boys were cared for in the 

 same way, 1 think that we would have 

 fewer tramps. There are 1,000 acres 

 of land belonging to the institution. 



My stay with Mr. and Mrs. Hand was 

 one I will look back to with pleasure. 



In Grundy county I visited Mr. Roney 



and Mr. Stubbs. I staid all night at the 

 latter place. I think that each has 

 about 25 colonies of bees. They do not 

 make the bee-business a specialty. Each 

 has large farms that are much more 

 profitable to them. 



I arrived home on Friday, June 1st, 

 having spent two quite pleasant weeks 

 at both business and pleasure. 



I have two apiaries containing about 

 40 and 60 colonies respectively — one on 

 the north and the other on south of 

 Skunk river. Both apiaries are in 

 splendid localities for basswood, which 

 is blooming, I think, as full as I ever 

 saw it; but it has begun to rain, and I 

 am afraid that it will spoil our crop of 

 honey from that source. 



White clover was a failure on account 

 of the drouth. If basswood faijs us, 

 prospects will be discouraging, indeed. 

 Basswood began to bloom about June 

 21st. 



Lynnville, Iowa, June 25. 



StiiniilallYe FeeJlng of Bees. 



Written for the American Bee Journal 



BY C. E. MEAD. 



I have tried it for the past three sea- 

 sons, and it has been a positive loss. It 

 excites the bees, and they fly out in our 

 changeable weather, and get chilled and 

 never get back. I fed in 1892 some 

 extra strong colonies that I feared were 

 short of stores, and I could not unpack 

 them as the season was cold. Smaller 

 colonies with plenty of honey beat them 

 badly. 



In 1893 I fed to prevent starving, 

 as we had cold, rainy northeast winds 

 from May 10th to July 4th. My bees 

 were no stronger July 4th than May 

 10th, with no field bees, and not more 

 than two pounds of honey to the hive. 

 They did not increase in weight till 

 July 16th, as all of the old bees were 

 caught in rains and killed. 



This year I fed two colonies that I 

 felt a little uneasy about, and as we 

 have had changeable weather since, 

 they are weaker in bees and honey than 

 they were when I fed them. The colo- 

 nies that were not fed, and are strong 

 in honey, are the best. I have only un- 

 packed a few of my bees so as to clip 

 the queens' wings ; J-2 have queen-cells 

 started, and some are capped over. Four 

 nuclei are even stronger than the full 

 colonies wei'e last year. My experience 

 runs thus : 



Have from 30 to 40 pounds of honey 



