THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



133 



any native bees. If bee-culture is to 

 return to ttie keeping of black bees, 

 then he would retire from the pursuit. 



Mr. Killo (Texas) said that native 

 bees were not so prolific as the Ital- 

 ians. 



Judge Andrews said that he totally 

 disagreed with Mr. Ileddon's essay, 

 and would not keep bees at all, if the 

 Italians were to be discarded. 



A general discussion ensued, on 

 the black bees, moth-worms, and a 

 variety of subjects, not to the point. 



The President remarked that as it 

 had been suggested that many wanted 

 to see the Exhibits in the World's 

 Exhibition, it might be desirable to 

 decide upon the number of meetings 

 to be held each day. Upon motion, 

 the meeting adjourned until 9 a.m., 

 Wednesday, when many more bee- 

 keepers were expected to arrive. 





Bees Are all Rieht.— A. W. Fisk, 

 Bushnell,*olll.,ou Feb. 26, 1885, writes 

 as follows : 



The last season was a very poor one 

 for honey and bees in this locality, 

 and we are having a very severe win- 

 ter with a great quantity of snow. I 

 am in hopes, however, that the deep 

 snow will help to protect the bees 

 through the coldest weather ; for many 

 bee-keepers in this section leave their 

 bees on the summer stands with little 

 or no protection. I put 2S colonies 

 into the cellar and have a few colonies 

 on the summer stands in double- 

 walled, plastered hives. So they are 

 all right. We are expecting wonders 

 from our bees next season, for we have 

 had two poor seasons in succession. 

 Bee-men in this vicinity are waking 

 up to the subject of bee-keeping, and 

 last fall they organized a society called 

 the "Progressive Bee- Keepers' As- 

 sociition of Western Illinois." Being 

 its " executive,'' I am much interested 

 in its welfare, and I may inform the 

 readers of the Bee Joukn.^l concern- 

 ing its progress. We shall try and do 

 our " level best " at progressive bee- 

 keeping. 



Report, from David Watterson, 

 Bristow,(5Iowa, on Feb. 21, 188.5 : 



Last spring I had 14 colonies of bees 

 and during the season I increased 

 them to 28 colonies, and took .500 lbs. 

 of comb lioney. 



Report, etc— 11— J. E. Cady. (68- 

 20-5), Medford,cx Minn., on Feb. 24, 

 188.5, writes as follow-s : 



My bees are wintering finely. I 

 have failed to find one dead colony 

 thus far. The mercury at present is 

 42^ above zero in my cellar. On Aug. 

 7, 18.S4. I bought an entire apiary of 

 13.3 colonies of bees, with the knowl- 

 edge that they had no honey. The 

 fall being a very poor one for lioney, 

 I had to feed 70 out of the 111 colonies 

 of the bees which I have in my cellar. 



The combs were very heavy with pol- 

 len and I have purposely left those in 

 the hives of the colonies which I fed. 

 I fed two barrels of colfee A sugar, 

 giving 10 lbs. of sugar and 4 lbs. of 

 water each, to the most of them All 

 of them had a little honey, perhaps 4 

 to 10 pounds. About .30 colonies had 

 honey enough of their own on which 

 to winter, and to the remaining 11 col- 

 onies 1 gave honey from my old 

 apiary. I find that by dropping the 

 frame proper .5-6 or % of an inch be- 

 low the top-bar (as illustrated on page 

 9, in Mr. Heddon's article) and mak- 

 ing the top-bar IJg inches wide, it 

 makes a very convenient and cheap 

 honey-board in connection with a re- 

 versible frame. 



Ureat Loss of Bees. — Wm. Malone, 

 Oakley, 9 Iowa, on Feb. 23, 188.5, says : 



Last fall there were 231 colonies of 

 bees in Liberty township (Iowa), and 

 I am satisfied that there will not be 

 •50of them alive on May 1, 188.5. Every 

 one that I have heard from has lost 

 all of his colonies, I have lost 18 col- 

 onies out of 30. I have 8 colonies in 

 a " clamp " that I have not yet exam- 

 ined. The trouble is starvation, with 

 honey in the next comb. There were 

 no signs of bee-diarrhea until brood- 

 rearing commenced. AVe all winter 

 our bees on the summer stands with 

 10 combs in each hive. If the bees 

 had been on 6 frames with the same 

 amount of honey, they would have 

 wintered all right. The present win- 

 ter beats that of 1880—81. 



The Weather and Bees.— F. A. Bur- 

 rill, Cuba, N. Y., on Feb. 2-5, 1885, 

 writes thus : 



We are having a severe winter here. 

 My bees are all on the summer stands 

 with straw packed over the brood- 

 chambers. It is my first experience 

 of wintering bees in that way and I 

 do so from necessity. To-day the 

 weather is quite warm and it is thaw- 

 ing some. 



Report, from Aaron Jennings, Me- 

 dusa,o N. Y., on Feb. 17, 188.5 : 



I have 2.50 colonies of bees in my 

 bee-cellar, and the hives are tiered up 

 four high on 2x3 scantlings. They are 

 as quiet as need be, and the mercury 

 is from 40'-' to 45-' above zero. When 

 the weather gets warm, towards 

 spring, I put a tub of ice in the cellar 

 to keep the temperature do^'n. I 

 never take away the pollen, have 

 never fed any sugar syrup, and I never 

 lost any colonies with bee-diarrhea, 

 when put into the cellar about Nov. 

 1, or any time before we have had 

 very cold weather. In the fall of 1881 

 I bought 25 colonies of bees which 

 were left out until after we had 3 or 4 

 days of zero weather. I then put them 

 intomy cellar and towards spring they 

 had the diarrhea ; 8 colonies died with 

 it, 10 came very nearly dying, and the 

 other 7 were weak. I am satisfied 

 that the cold was what caused it. If 

 Mr. Norris, of Norrisville, Wis., will 

 take off the bottom-boards and set 

 his hives up on scantlings, he will not 

 have any water in them', nor any dead 

 bees in the way. 



Trouble in Wintering Bees.- L. 



Reed, Orono,© Mich., on Feb. 27, 

 1885, says : 



I have kept bees for .30 years, and 

 I thought that I knew all about it, 

 but I find that I can learn something 

 yet. I have been unsuccessful in 

 wintering my bees for the last 2 years. 

 Two years ago this winter I lost HH 

 colonies ; last winter I lost .33. Last 

 fall I built a cellar under my house 

 especially for bees, and I examined 

 them yesterday and found them in 

 good condition. Bees do well here. 

 We have any amomit of red rasp- 

 berry, basswood and white clover, the 

 only trouble being in wintering. 



Bees in Good Condition.— John Rey, 

 East Saginaw,© Mich., on Feb. 26, 

 188-5, writes thus : 



My bees have had good "flights" 

 dtiring the last 3 days, after I dug 

 them out from under the snow. They 

 had been under the snow since Jan. 

 17. I found 6 dead colonies, and the 

 remaining 50 seemed to be in good 

 condition. I was somewhat alarmed 

 about their being under the snow so 

 long. I never had bees under the 

 snow any longer than 2 weeks at a 

 time, but this time it was about 5 

 weeks. Of the 6 colonies that were 

 dead, 3 were queenless and the other 

 3 were smothered, the entrances being 

 completely frozen shut, with about 1 

 inch of ice on the inside, I notice 

 that all the colonies which have old 

 queens, are wintering the best ; they 

 seem to be the quietest, and did not 

 commence to rear brood as early as 

 the young queens ; neither do they 

 spot the snow so much as the yoimg 

 colonies. 



CLUBBISG LIST. 



We will supply the .^merlcim Bee tJonrnal 



one year, and any of the followinK Books, at the 

 prices quoted in the lastcolamn of flRures. The 

 flrat column Rives the regular price of both. All 

 postage prepaid. 



Price of both. Club 

 The Weekly Bee Journal f 2 00. . 



and Cook's Manual, latest edition 3 25.. 3 00 



Bees and Honey (T.G.Newman)cloth3 00.. 2 75 



Bees and Hnney (paper covers) 2 75. . 2 50 



Binder for Weeklv Bee Journal 2 75.. 2 50 



Apiary Retfister for I'H) colonies 3 25.. 3 00 



Dzierzon's New Bee Book (cloth) . ... 4 00. . 3 00 



Dzierzon's New Book (paper covers) 3 50.. 2 75 



Quinby's New Bee-Keepinp: 3 50.. 3 25 



liauKstroth's Standard Work 4 00. . 3 75 



Root's A B Cof Bee Culture (cloth) 3 25.. 3 10 



Alley's yueen Rearing 3 00.. 2 75 



The Weekly Bee Journal one year 



andGleaningsinBee-CulturefA.I.Rool; 3 00.. 2 75 



Bee-Keepers' Magazine (A.J, King). 3 00.. 2 75 



Bee-Keepers" Guide (A.G.Ilill) 2 50.. 2 35 



Kansas Bee-Keeper 3 00.. 2 75 



The ApicuUurist. (Silas M. Locke) . . 3 00. . 2 90 



The 6 above-named papers 650.. 6 00 



THOMAS G. NEWMAN, 



9S5 West Madison Street., Chlcaco, III, 



^° To give away a copy of " Honey 

 as Food and Medicine " to every one who 

 buys a pdcArtge of honey, will sell almost 

 any quantity of it. 



