124 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Local Convention Directory. 



Time and place of Meeting. 

 1885. 



Mar. 3.— Southern Wisconsin, at Janesville, Wis. 

 J. T. Pomeroy,Sec., Edgerton, Wis. 



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

 W. B. Treadwell. Sec, 16 Thomas St., New York. 



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



L. C. Clark, Sec, Granada. Kana. 



Apr. 9, 10.— Western, at St. Joseph. Mo. 



C. M. Crandall, Sec, Independence, Mo. 



Apr. 28.— DesMoines County, at Burlinpton. Iowa. 

 Jno. Nau, Sec. Middleton. Iowa. 



May 4.— Linwood, Wis., at Rock Elm Centre, Wis. 

 B. Thomson. Sec, AVaverly, Wis. 



May 7.— ProRTessive, at Bushnell. Ills. 



J. G. Norton, Sec. Macomb, Ills. 



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



F. A. Palmer, Sec. McBrlde. Mich. 



Jane 19.— Willamette Valley, at La Fayette. Oreg. 

 E. J.Hadley. Sec 



Dec 8— 10.— Michigan State, at Detroit. Mich. 



U. D. Cutting, Sec, Clinton, Mich. 



^^ In order to have this table complete. Secre- 

 taries are requested to forward full particulars of 

 time and place of future meetings.- ED. 



stt^JW,MMM 



WmTEr. 



m'O'X''' 



Mass Convention. — II. D. Cutting, 

 Clinton, Mich., writes as follows con- 

 cerning the meeting to be held at De- 

 troit in 1886 : 



It is an excellent suggestion that 

 the " North Western " hold their meet- 

 ing at the same time and place as the 

 National Society. It will be a large 

 meeting and ample accommodations 

 will be furnished at greatly reduced 

 rates. We can get reduced rates on 

 the railroads so that all can come and 

 have a grand, good meeting. 



but before I used this method of heat- 

 ing it, I lost a great many colonies, 

 and since I have used it, I have not 

 lost a colony. I think that dry, pure 

 air and a proper and even tempera- 

 ture, are two jjrime essentials in suc- 

 cessful wintering. My bees are in hne 

 condition. 



Favorable Winter for Bees.— G. W. 



Hurwood, Waco, ©Tex., on Feb. 9, 

 188-5, says : 



Yesterday, after a warm spell of 

 more than a week during which my .50 

 colonies of bees had daily flights, they 

 were busy on the prairies all day, and 

 returned laden with pollen of a very 

 bright color. The flower from wliicli 

 it is gathered is a tiny white blossom 

 of such insignilicant size that it must 

 be sought for to be found, but it is 

 evidently very rich in pollen. In this 

 latitude the season opens about the 

 middle of February with great changes 

 in the weather, until the end of March. 

 The present winter has been a favor- 

 able one for bees in this section. 



Report, from J. W. Sturwokl, Ilay- 

 mond,o Ind., on Feb. 17, 1885 : 



My bees had a flight yesterday, the 

 first since Feb. 3. Only one colony 

 has died, and that was a small, late 

 swarm ; the rest are in good condition, 

 although the winter has been a severe 

 one, the mercury being between zero 

 and 20^ below. I use tne Ileddon hive 

 and one-half of them are packed a la 

 Heddon, the rest being protected only 

 on top. All are on the summer stands. 

 I have never wintered my bees in the 

 cellar, although I have" a good one, 

 and I have never lost but one or two 

 colonies since 1879-80. I never take 

 any honey out of the brood-chamber, 

 and 1 attribute my success to that -. 

 for I Ijelieve that if we leave the 

 brood-chamber to them, to prepare 

 for themselves, there is not much 

 danger of bee-diarrhea appearing. 



(Jooil.— Prof. A. J. Cook writes as 

 follows concerning the next meeting 

 of the National Society : 



I am glad that the date of the next 

 meeting of the National Society is 

 given and criticisms asked for. The 

 date is all right, unless it keeps away 

 our Southern bee-keepers. We want 

 them very much, especially Judge 

 Andrews, Dr. Blanton,Dr. Brown and 

 Paul Viallon. I am thankful for the 

 suggestion as to the " Northwestern " 

 also meeting at Detroit. I hope it 

 will be done. 



Extremely Cold.— F. M. Tain tor. 

 Elm Grove, ~oMass., on Feb. -5, 1885, 

 writes thus : 



I hope that bee-keepers who are 

 wintering their bees on the summer 

 stands, aie in a warmer climate than 

 this. We had a very warm fall, but 

 all through January it has been ex- 

 tremely cold, the thermometer rang- 

 ing below zero nearly all of the time, 

 and several times it was 20^ below. 

 My bees are all in the cellar. I now 

 employ artificial heat in the cellar. 



Report, from John Monroe, South 

 Kent,^DConn., on Feb. 13, 188.5 : 



The season of 1884 was a very good 

 one for this locality. I commenced in 

 the spring with (i colonies of bees, 3 

 blacks and 3 Italians, increased them 

 to 11 colonies, and took 526 lbs. from 

 the old colonies. I am wintering them 

 on the summer stands, and all are in 

 good condition. I have kept bees for 

 3 years in the movable-frame hives, 

 and I have always wintered my bees 

 on the summer stands, never having 

 lost but one colony, and that died 

 from starvation. I do not pay any 

 attention to pollen, but give them 

 plenty of honey and they come out all 

 right. 



spraying the combs and bees once a. 

 week all summer, with salicylic acid. 

 It may have checked it, but it did not 

 cure them, as it continued all last fall. 

 Can any one prescribe a remedy V I 

 would rather kill them all than have 

 the trouble I had last summer. I 

 made 2 small nuclei on June 28, 1884, 

 and gave each of them an Italian 

 queen-cell. The cells hatched out on 

 July 2, and I saw one queen leave the 

 hive on July 7, which returned in 20' 

 minutes, having been mated in that 

 time. I looked at the other one and 

 fancied that I saw the queen fly from 

 the front of the hive, but I was not 

 sure, so I waited to see her come back, 

 which she did in 15 minutes, and was 

 mated all right. On July 11, both 

 queens were laying all right. Is there 

 anything strange in the above V I 

 never expected to see a queen go out 

 on her wedding trip. I mentioned it 

 to two bee-keepers and they told me 

 that they had never seen a virgin 

 queen leave the hive to be mated. I 

 obtained a virgin Cyprian queen and 

 introduced her to a small nuclei on 

 Aug. 1, and on Aug. 6 she left the 

 hive to be mated ; she returned in 10' 

 minutes, not mated ; so I sat on the 

 top of the hive to watch her come out 

 again, but by some means or other I 

 missed her, as I saw her come in in 

 about }i of fiH hour from the time she- 

 went out at first. I noted all that 

 happened to my bees last season, think- 

 ing it might be useful to some. I am 

 an invalid and cannot work much, so 

 I have lots of time to watch my bees. 

 I had 200 lbs. of honey. I do not know 

 how the bees are wintering here, but 

 mine are on the summer stands packed 

 in sawdust and chalf. We have had 

 a very cold winter ; on last Thursday 

 morning, the mercury was about 30° 

 below zero. 



[Try phenol, as recommended by Mr. 

 Frank Cheshire.— Ed.] 



Foul Urood, etc.— J. A. Noble, Nor- 

 val. Out., on Feb. 16, 1885, writes as 

 follows : 



Last spring I started with 3 colonies 

 and increased them to 6. I have rea- 

 son to believe that foul brood is in my 

 apiary, for early in the spring there 

 was lots of dead brood. I asked an 

 old bee-keeper if be knew the cause 

 for it, and he thought that it was 

 chilled brood ; but from what I have 

 read. I think that it was foul brood ; 

 for when I opened the cells they emit- 

 ted a bad odor, in fact I could smell it 

 when passing the hives. I kept on 



Winterlngr Bees.— O. B. Barrows,^ 

 Marshalltown, Iowa, on Feb. 17, 188-5,, 

 writes as follows concerning his bee- 

 cellar : 



My cellar has about 700 square feet 

 of surface on its bottom and is about 

 8 feet deep, 7 feet under- ground. It 

 has 5 windows 12x16x24 inches. I 

 never bank it up nor darken the win- 

 dows. It contains 66 colonies of bees. 

 I remove the l)locks from the fronts of 

 the hives which are facing the cellar 

 wall, and only a few inches away from 

 it. so that the light from the windows 

 cannot shine directly into the hives. 

 There is a chimney 33 feet high ex- 

 tending from the cellar bottom to the 

 top of the house. This chimney has 

 a 6-inch hole in it which is always- 

 open, and a draft of air is constantly 

 passing through it. I have wintered 

 my bees successfully in this way for 

 8 or 10 years. 



1^ The Southern Wisconsin Bee- 

 Keepers' Association will hold its sec- 

 ond annual meeting at the usual place 

 in Janesville, on the first Tuesday in 

 March 1885. All bee-keepers are cor- 

 dially invited to attend. 



J. T. PoMEKOY, Sec. 



C. O. Shannon, Pres. 



