300 



During the summer not more than six colo- 

 nies showed any signs of disease. These 

 were carefully treated, and later in the sum- 

 mer a careful examination showed onh' one 

 colony diseased, which was a fine Italian, 

 the queen of which I had purchased and in- 

 troduced in July to a healthy nucleus, 

 which showed that not all Italian bees are 

 resistant to European brood disease. 



This apiary was now short of brood combs, 

 for many of them had been melted up the 

 previous season in the process of treating 

 the disease. Wishing to increase the num- 

 ber of these colonies, and to rear queens for 

 my other yards, this apiary, during the sea- 

 son of 1911, was run for comb honey, queen- 

 rearing, and increase. A carefully selected 

 queen was used as a breeder (immunity to 

 disease and good wintering being the main 

 points considered) . From this queen as a 

 breeder every colony except eight was sup- 

 plied with a young "queen, the best of those 

 substituted being used in other apiaries. 

 The result of the season's M'ork with this api- 

 ary was increase to 107 colonies, the rearing 

 of "a goodly number of queens for this and 

 my other apiaries, and the production of 2500 

 sections of honey, some colonies finishing 

 as high as six o2 - section supers, or 192 sec- 

 tions. Only the stronger colonies were run 

 for honey; the weaker ones were used for in- 

 crease and queen-rearing. Considering the 

 very unfavorable season, the showing of 

 honey was very satisfactory. 



The practicability of producing honey in 

 diseased apiaries has got to he a foregone 

 conclusion. It is the only thing to do for a 

 goodly number of apiarists. There is no as- 

 surance to an absolutecertainty thatan api- 

 ary is without germs of disease, after it has 

 once been infected; but that the honey from 

 such apiary is wholesome for human food 

 seems to be undeniable. There is just one 

 simple direction to be followed in the pro- 

 duction of honey from diseased apiaries: 

 Use the queen-excluder on all colonies run 

 for surplus honey, and extract no honey from 

 brood combs. As an adjunct to this direc- 

 tion, let it be stated that the expert apiarist 

 will not long have about his apiaries the 

 brood diseases in noticeable amount, and 

 but one or two seasons will suffice to make 

 them free from disease to all intents and 

 purposes. 



There is surely a bright and hopeful side 

 to this question of brood diseases. Has it 

 not been in existence in Europe since the 

 time "when the memory of man runneth 

 not to the contrary " ? And are not Euro- 

 peans about as well, supplied with bees as 

 ever? It is not likely that the diseases will 

 be more malignant here than in other coun- 

 tries. The brief manner in which some 

 European writers of the past have referred 

 to it and its treatment impresses us with 

 the idea that it was not considered so very 

 formidable. At any rate it has lost its ter- 

 rors for me, and I regard it as a blessing in 

 disguise. For me it has resulted in bees 

 that are vastly superior in wintering, in 

 handling, and in honey-gathering qualities. 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURF 



What at first api)eared to be a calamity is 

 turning out to be a money-maker. As a re- 

 sult of it, the apiculturist of the future will 

 be a bee expert instead of a mere beekeeper. 

 From these view points it may truly be 

 said, "Blessed be European brood disease.' 

 Ken more, N. Y. 



MORE ABOUT TOBACCO HONEY 



BY J. K. GOODRICH 



Mr. E. H. Shattuck's article, "The To- 

 bacco Industry in the Connecticut Valley," 

 p. 162, March 15, was of much interest to 

 me — first, because of the thousands of acres 

 grown in this section; and the constantly 

 increasing acreage from year to year. All 

 opposition to tobacco as used by the human 

 race seems to be of no avail, for the use has 

 increased steadily up to the present time, 

 and is still on the increase. But I have 

 wondered how honey made from nectar 

 gathered and stored from tobacco bloom 

 could be wholesome for food. Not until the 

 last few years has the tobacco plant been 

 allowed to flower while in cultivation, so 

 that tobacco honey is of quite recent pro- 

 duction. The tobacco plant may be of in- 

 terest to all beekeepers as being a new 

 source of nectar for honey. 



My boyhood days were spent in this lo- 

 cality, and the honey made by my fathers 

 bees was a necessary part of my lunch, 

 which was composed of bread and butter 

 and honey. 



If I have been rightly informed, in my 

 younger days the first tobacco grown in the 

 town of Granby was a small plot on my fa- 

 ther's farm in 1850. One of his employees 

 suggested to him the raising of tobacco 

 more as an experiment than otherwise, and 

 the permission was granted; and from that 

 time to the present the industry has devel- 

 oped to thousands of acres in a comparative- 

 ly small area of Hartford County alone. 

 New Tariffville, a few miles from Granby, 

 is now the metropolis of the tobacco culture 

 and business; eighty-four acres in one field 

 alone is under canvas, and this field only 

 one of many of the same kind on their plan- 

 tation to-day. 



When on a visit at Granby last summer, 

 Mr. Shattuck very kindly gave me a large 

 sample of tobacco honey for comparison 

 with the honey stored by my bees in the 

 fall season at Waterbury and Middlebury. 

 I found it equal to the fall product gathered 

 in my locality. I might say in passing, 

 that I think there is no danger whatever of 

 contracting the tobacco habit by eating the 

 honey as one would by smoking or chewing 

 the weed. 



This plant belongs to the nightshade fam- 

 ily {Solanacur), the members of which re- 

 semble each other very much — as the pota- 

 to, tomato, and egg-plant, all of which have 

 a nauseous, disagreeable odor. The honey 

 is dark, with a brownish cast in color, and 

 there is an absence of a rank strong odor, so 

 that it tastes and compares favorably with 



