776 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



Dec. 6, 1900 



Chateau (or Castle) De Btonay. 



place in winter. The young- lady tells my daug-hter that it 

 is just a hundred steps from her bedroom to the kitchen. 



We were welcomed with the usual hospitality. We 

 visited the apiary, some IS hives with movable frames, on 

 one of the numerous terraces, the vegetable g:arden, the 

 flower garden ; and on every terrace we saw the walls cov- 

 ered with trellist trees, especially pear trees laden with 

 fruit. Mr. De Blonay is also a lover of exotic trees and 

 shrubs, and I saw an American black walnut side by side 

 with a fig-'tree, and tasted American blackberries as large 

 as my thumb, and as sweet as those they raise in the United 

 States, which put to shame the little dwarf, sour, worthless 

 European blackberry. 



After the meal we had the treat of a small martial dis- 

 play. A squad of Swiss soldiers was passing on the public 

 road below the castle on their way to an annual parade at 

 Bern, and as they stopt for their meal, our host had a big 

 flag brought down from the attic, and unfurled at the win- 

 dow. This called for cheers and a salute, and it lookt for 

 all the world as if we might yet be in the middle ages, but 

 the steel armors, instead of being on the breasts of those 

 men, were asleep and rusting in the little chapel, where we 

 had the pleasure of seeing them a little later, together with 

 ancient arms and a big closet full of parchments in drawers 

 carefully labeled, and dating back 800 years. And yet this 

 gentleman takes no false pride in his ancestry, but modestly 

 signs his name " H. de Blonay, Engineer." Why can't our 

 American heiresses look at those empty titles of nobility in 

 the same democratic style ? 



How about the "oubliettes ?" Of course, we must see 

 the oubliettes. A big key was produced, a torch procured 

 besides a lantern, and we started down thru the basements 

 and the cellars. 



" And deeper still the deep down oubliette, 

 Down thirty feet below the smiling- day "—(Tennyson.) 



■was revealed to us by the removal of a few bunches of 

 fagots. Then I understood the need of the torch, which I 

 could not perceive since we had a lantern. The torch was 

 lighted and thrown down the hole, so we could see the in- 

 side of the oubliette, which is made just like a cistern, the 

 only opening being at the top. To think that, perhaps, 

 people had been buried in that place alive ! What a story 

 those old castles could tell, if stones could speak ! 



It was with a sigh of relief that we came up to the light 

 again, and past thru the laundry, where they do the wash- 

 ing once every six months. Yes, once in six months ! What 

 a pile of linen those Europeans must have I For it was not 

 only here, but nearly everywhere, the same way. And they 

 have a way of ironing by passing the linen thru what they 

 call a " calender," consisting of two big rollers some four 

 or five feet long, similar to an enormous clothes wringer. 

 It seems quite practical. 



After sitting down to tea with our kind hosts we took 

 our leave, and walkt back to Vevey by short paths, follow- 

 ing the little stream of water which tumbles down the hill 

 a short distance from the castle. In another hour the train 

 landed us again at Nyon. 



The Premiums oS'ered this week are -well woarth work- 

 ing for. Look at them. 



Light Honey Crop— Basswood Failure, Etc. 



BY C. DAVENPORT. 



ANOTHER honey season is a matter of history. The 

 crop in this State was, on the whole, a light one. It 

 was, however, very irregular. In some localities a fair 

 crop was secured, in other places but a few miles distant it 

 was nearly a failure. We had a great drouth during the 

 summer, and locality formed an important part, with what 

 little rain there was, for when we needed rain the most 

 good showers would fall in some places, and in others but a 

 few miles away it would not rain for weeks. 



In my own locality white and alsike clover yielded well 

 while they lasted, but it was so dry they did not remain in 

 bloom long. Basswood was a total failure ; there were no- 

 blossoms, and it would be of great interest to me to know 

 why. There were no frosts late enough in the spring to 

 have injured the buds if they had started, and the dry 

 weather had nothing to do with it, for there was plenty of 

 moisture in the ground early in the season, at the time the 

 buds should have formed. There were no insects that 

 workt on the foliage, as has been the case some seasons be- 

 fore. The yield from basswood here seems to be coming 

 more and more uncertain of late — a matter to be regretted, 

 for while the honey from this source is not equal in quality 

 to that from clovers, there is nothing here in the North, at 

 least, that bees can in the same length of time secure the 

 quantity from that they can from basswood when it yields- 

 well. 



GATHERING HONEY AND POLLEN AT THE SAME TIME. 



I noticed a statement in one of our journals some time 

 ago — I forget now which one, and also who made it, but it 

 was a Prof. Somebody — which was to the efi^ect that bees do- 

 not carry or gather honey and pollen at the same time. I 

 expected that many would refute this statement, but I be- 

 lieve no one has done so. I wonder if locality can play any 

 part in this ; it would seem so, for here bees often gather 

 both pollen and honey at the same time, not merely a few, 

 but a large part of the field-force does when working upon 

 certain flowers. 



I have caught in the fields, and at the entrances of the 

 hives, hundreds of bees that were loaded with both pollen 

 and honey. As a rule, they will not when carrying both 

 have nearly as large a load of pollen as when gathering 

 pollen alone, but will apparently have a full load of nectar; 

 that is, they will eject, when prest, a large drop that looks 

 to be as much as can be obtained from one loaded with nec- 

 tar alone. But sometimes the conditions will be reverst, 

 and those carrying both will have a good load of pollen and 

 but a small one of nectar. 



Here there are different sources from which bees gather 

 both pollen and nectar on the same trip, but it is most 

 noticeable from clover, especially alsike, and during the 

 forenoon, tho I have noticed them carrying both as late as 

 4 o'clock in the afternoon on cloudy days. 



GETTING EXTRACTING-SUPERS CLEANED UP. 



The past season I run 40 colonies for extracted honey. 

 Two full-depth upper stories were used. This gave 80 ex- 

 tracting-bodies, and after the last extracting this fall, in- 

 stead of putting them back on the hives in order to get the 

 combs cleaned up, I piled up the hives containing the combs 

 crosswise of each other in the extracting-house, opened the 

 windows, and the bees did the rest. The house sets right 

 in the yard, and there were 156 colonies, many of which had 

 become pretty well stirred up over the removal of the upper 

 stories. Not a drop of honey was to be obtained in the 

 fields, and the way they piled into the house and those hives 

 was a sight and sound worth going many miles to see. It 

 was the greatest uproar among bees that I have ever seen, 

 and I was afraid that the extracting-combs would be badly 

 torn, but they were not injured, and this is the method I 

 shall practice in the future in order to get the combs, as. 

 well as the house itself, cleaned up after the last extracting. 



The air in and around the yard was black with flying 

 bees for two or three days, and two queenless colonies were 

 cleaned out. I presume every colony in the yard was attackt 

 by robbers, but all except the two queenless ones were amply 

 able to protect themselves. I expected that I would have 

 to contract the entrance to some of the hives, for a few were 

 XYz inches deep, and the full width of the hive, but it was 

 not necessary in a single instance. 



Aside from the two mentioned, which I did not try to 

 save, the rest were all strong colonies. Of course there 

 were thousands of bees killed in the rush and general up- 

 roar, but I believe this to be a good thing, for the most, if 



