76 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Local Convention Directory. 



Time and place of Meeting. 

 I8S5. 

 Keb.4.— N.E.Michigan, at Vassar. Mich. 



W. Z. Uutchinson. Sec, Rogersville, Mich. 



Feb. ll.-SenecaCo.. N. y..atOvid,N. y. 



Ira Wilson, Sec, Ovid, N. Y. 



Feb. 17.— Ohio State, at Columbus, Ohio. 



C. M. Kingsbury, aec, Mt. \ ernon, O. 



Keb. 18, 19.— Eastern New York, at Albany, N. Y, 

 Solomon Vrooman, Pres., Seward, >. i. 



Feb. 24-26.— International, at New Orleans, La. 



Mar. 1 1 .—New Jersey and Eastern, at N . Y. City. 

 W. B. Treadwell, Sec, 16 Thomas St., New \ork. 



April 3.— N. E. Kansas, at Hiawatha, Kans. 



L. C. Clark, Sec, Granada, Kans. 



May4.— Linwood. Wis., at Rock Elm Centre, Wis. 

 B. Thomson, Sec, Waverly, Wis. 



May 28.— N. Mich. Picnic, near McBride, Mich. 



F. A. Palmer, Sec, McBride. Mich. 



June 1».-Willamelte Valley, at La Fayette, Oreg. 

 E. J, Hadley, Sec. 



Dec. »— 10.— Michigan State, at Detroit. Mich. 



H. D. Cutting, Sec, Clinton, Mich. 



|y In order to have this table complete, Secre- 

 taries are requested to forward full particulars of 

 time and place of future meetings.— ED. 



which are sure to make the apiarist smile 

 in the spring wlien he unpacks his l)ees 

 and finds them lively and happy. But, 

 alas, how many find it exceedingly hard 

 to set their faces in sliape when they find 

 that each locality must have its own rule 

 to work by. Tlie pollen theory may be 

 all correct, but it does not bother me half 

 as mucli as our long, cold winters. What 

 w^e need ino.st is good judgment to con- 

 sider the locality in which we are located, 

 handling the bees carelullv during the 

 summer, feeding them early in the fall it 

 they need it, packing them early, keeping 

 the entrances open, disturbing them as 

 little as possible, and ninety-nine times 

 out of one hundred we will succeed. 



that they got during the season, as bass- 

 wood was nearly a failure. As we had no 

 fall bloom, the bees did not secure enough 

 honey to live on, so 1 had to feed .5 barrels 

 of sugar. My surplus was 2,700 pounds of 

 honey of the very best quality, nearly all 

 of it being in one-pound sections. 1 am 

 wintering 130 colonies in good condition. 



1^ Henry Stark, Plier,($ Wis., on 

 Jan. 17, 1885, reports thus : 



I began the season with one colony of 

 bees, and increased it to 3 colonies by 

 natural swarming. X sold .610.07 worth of 

 lumey. Home think that honey has poison 

 in it. To-day one of my neighbors, Geo. 

 Kurtz, ate 1}4 pounds of comb honey in 20 

 minutes. 



1^ W. Z. Hutchinson, Rogersville, 

 6 Mich., writes thus concerning cor- 

 respondents giving their number of 

 colonies after their names : 



I wish that all contributors of the Bee 

 JocHNAi, would indicate, by numbers 

 after their names, their number of colo- 

 nies ; and thus give us at least an inkling 

 in regard to the extent of their experience. 

 I am much pleased to see that the number 

 who practice this plan is increasing, and I 

 hope that the number will increase until 

 the practice becomes universal. 



^- A. Reusch, Chariton, ? Iowa, 

 on Jan. 24, 1885, reports thus : 



On Dec. 16, ISSi, I put into the cellar 

 30 colonies and one nucleus with a select- 

 tested queen, which, to all appearances, 

 are doing well, and but few bees are 

 dying, in the fall I ted them back about 

 17.5 pounds of honey in frames which 1 

 had saved for that purpose. The bees in 

 this county are in a deplorable condition. 

 Six different bee-keepers, who had in all 

 159 colonies, have lost 108 for the want of 

 stores and proper care. 1 have had good 

 success in wintering my bees in the cellar 

 having never lost but one colony, and that 

 starved. 



1^- Prof. A. J. Cook, Agricultural 

 College,? Mich., on Jan. 26, 1885, 

 ■writes thus about Texas horse-mint : 



In reply to Dr. J. K. Baker, page 43, let 

 me .say that, as stated in ray " Manual," 

 on page 20.5, the Texas horse-mint is Mon- 

 arda aristata. So we see that it belongs 

 to the same genus as does our horse-mints, 

 M. listulosa and M. punctata ; but it is a 

 different species. 



1^ H. A. Goodrich, Massey,0Tex., 

 on Jan. 24, 1885, gives the following 

 report : 



Myself and 13 other bee-keepers of this 

 county (Hill) began the season of 1884 

 with 163 colonies, and produced 14,707 

 pounds of extracted honey, being an 

 average of about 90 pounds per colony. 

 The most of this amount of honey was 

 gathered from horse-mint during 13 days, 

 from June 8 to June 20. The 163 colonies 

 were increased to 377. Bees are wintering 

 well. The weather, so far, has been cold, 

 being 2" above zero. 



^ Chas. Mitchell, Molesworth, 

 Out., on Jan. 26, 1885, gives his report 

 as follows : 



During the season of 1884, 1 obtained 

 3,000 pounds of honey from 53 colonies,, 

 spring count, and about 40 first-swarms 

 which I sold, thus making me a fair profit 

 notwithstanding the poor season. 



^" Wilson Sherman, Chester Cen- 

 ter.© Iowa, on Jan. 27, 1885, reports 

 thus : 



The past season has been a very poor 

 one in this locality. I had 4 very strong 

 colonies of bees in the spring, and I in- 

 creased them to 11 strong colonies, and 

 captured another large swarm. They 

 gathered enough honey to vcinter on, and 

 some produced 25 or 30 pounds of surplus. 

 My 12 colonies were put into winter quar- 

 ters in splendid condition. I am winter- 

 ing them in a cellar with the temperature 

 from 40= to 45° above zero. My bees have 

 been in the cellar 63 days, and they have 

 been so quiet that one would not know 

 that any bees are there, if he could not 

 see them. Once a day, generally, I see 

 that every thing is all riiht. I have win- 

 tered bees in this way for three winters 

 without vet losing a colony. The winters 

 are usually pretty cold here, but we almost 

 always have an early spring. 



1^" S. M. Hicken, Delaware City, 5 

 Del., on Jan. 27, 1885, reports as fol- 

 lows : 



The spring of 1884 was very unfavorable 

 for bees, being too wet and cold. I had 

 no early swarms, but mv colonies started 

 queen-cells at 3 different times, preparing 

 to swarm, but a cold spell would come and 

 they would then tear down the queen- 

 cells. So they did not swarm until about 

 the middle of white clover bloom, which 

 spoiled everything for surplus ; for before 

 they got the brood-chambers lull, the 

 short flow of white clover was over, and 

 there was no more flow until goldenrod 

 bloomed ; then they crowded the queens, 

 and would not go into the sections. So my 

 colonies were not very strong in the fall 

 when 1 put them up for winter ; yet, with 

 all the mistakes that I have made, I got 

 from 14 very weak colonies, spring count, 

 300 pounds of comb honey, 100 starters, 

 and 200 pounds of extracted honey. 



^- S. B. Brillhart, Kendallville.d 

 Ind., on Jan. 24, 18.S.5, gives his report 

 and writes concerning methods and 

 theories as follows : 



The past season has been almost an en- 

 tire failure with us, so far as surplus 

 honey was concerned ; but the bees man- 

 aged to " board themselves" and lay up 

 enough for winter stores. I have 45 colo- 

 nies packed with sawdust on the summer 

 stands. The hives are ventilated at the 

 bottom. This has proven a successful 

 method with me during the past 12 years. 

 A good many methods and theories are 

 advanced in the Bee Journal, all of 



^' E. J. Smith, xVddison,*o Vt., on 

 Jan. 22, 1885, reports as follows : 



In the fall of 1883 I put 134 colonies into 

 winter quarters and lo.st 3 colonies with 

 bee-diarrhea and 4 by loss of queens. 1 

 cnmiiifnced the season of 1884 with 75 

 good cdlouies and 43 weak ones. The 

 siiriug was good until the last of May; the 

 bees had built up fast, and some colonies 

 had queen-cells started, when, during the 

 last days of the month, it froze hard, and 

 a great deal of brood was chilled. It put 

 the brood back 3 weeks, and the bees had 

 to be fed till clover bloomed, which did 

 not last at its best tor more than 2 weeks 



1^ J. W. Vance, Madison, ? Wis., 

 writes the following to Wisconsin 

 bee-keepers : 



At a meeting of the local bee-keepers, 

 on Jan. 15, 1885, held in Madison, Wis., 

 it was decided to make a call for a meet- 

 ing of bee-keepers on Feb. 6, to organize 

 a State Bee-Keepers' Association. Ac- 

 cording to the programme of the farmers . 

 meeting to be held Feb. 0, 1885, a paper is 

 to he read on that day, entitled " Forty 

 Years' Experience in Bee-Keeping," by T. 

 T. English, of Baraboo, Wis. After the 

 discussion of the paper, an opportunity 

 will be had to organize such an associa- 

 tion as is contemplated. Hereafter the 

 meetings of the association can be held 

 in connection with the farmery' meetings, 

 and the programme can be so arranged as 

 tn'give the bee-keepers one day for the 

 reading of papers and discussions. The 

 Madison bee-keepers consider this a 

 happy juncture for the institution of a 

 Slate organization, and have earnest and 

 confident hope that the cause of progres- 

 sive bee-culture shall thereby be encour- 

 aged and promoted. They appeal to the 

 wide-awake as well as to the indifferent 

 and plodding apiarists of the State to 

 come to the meeting and aid them in their 

 endeavor to build up a strong association. 

 They accordingly adopted the following 

 call : 



We deem this a suitable opportunity to organize 

 a State Bee- Keepers' Association, in yiew of the 

 fact that the farmers' annual meeting will be m 

 session from Feb 3 to <5, 1885. on which occasion 

 there will be many farmers present who are like- 

 wise engaged in bee-keeping. We. therefore, 

 make this call for all who are interested in bee- 

 culture to attend and assist In organizing a State 

 association. 



'mere are few States in the Union of the same 

 age as Wisconsin that have as many people en- 

 gaged in bee-keeping, and almost all have their 

 State associations. It Is needless to speak of the 

 importance of such organizations; the fact that 

 in almost every State bee-keepers have organized 

 and are keeping up their annual meetings is sut- 

 aclent evidence that their beneBl is acknowledged 

 and appreciated. Railway arrangements 



have 



not last at its best tor more than 2 weeks, ,,een made for the return of members at one-Ufth 



when the bees stored about all the honey I of the regular fare. J- \v. \ A^cE, i>ec. 



