THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



693 



With us, black locust rivals the 

 linden as a honey-pnxlucpr, am 

 grows more rapidly than does tlie 

 latter. It blooms here just before the 

 white clover, and Hlls up the hives 

 ready for the clover liarvest. Linden, 

 here', blooms before tlie white clover 

 dries np. and this makes the tree of 

 less value to tlie l)ees than it would be 

 ifitbloiuned later in the season.— G. 

 W. Demauee. 



The bassvvood or linden is the best 

 for Northern latitudes— i he sourwood 

 for Southern. Five years since I 

 planted ;i basswood trees (i feet high 

 in my garden; they are now lo feet 

 high, and the past season they were 

 loaded down with fragrant bloom — G. 



L. TiNKEK. 



It will be of little use to set out 

 any trees with the expectation of 

 gaining any immediate benefit. The 

 basswood is probably the best for the 

 purpose.— .J. E. Pond, Jk. 



I find linden and locust the best. 

 The latter are objectionable as they 

 are so apt to be destroyed by borers. 

 The linden is par excellence in every 

 respect— for beauty, utility, and free- 

 dom from insect attack. — A. J. Cook. 



K^plaiiiitury — The ng-ures before the 

 naiufs iiujicatu the nuinberoC years that the 

 person has kept bees. Those after, show 

 the number of colonies the writer had in the 

 previous spring and fall, or fall and sprinjf, 

 as the time of the year may require. 



This mark O indicates that the apiarist is 

 located near the centre of the State named: 

 6 north of the centre ; 9 south ; O* east ; 

 •O west; and this 6 northeast; ^ northwest; 

 (^southeast: and P southwest of the centre 

 of the State meutioued. 



For the American Bee JoumaL 



Review of Current Literature. 



W'JI. F. CLARKE. 



Honey-Plants for Bees. 



Query. No. 151. -What seed is best to sow 

 this fall or next spring for honey-planta for bees ? 

 Delaware City, Del. 



Melilot.— C. C. Miller. 



Alsike clover, all things considered, 

 is the best.— G. M. Doolittle. 



Alsike clover and buckwheat. — W. 

 Z. Hutchinson. 



Melilot or sv^'eet clover. It will 

 grow in all waste-places, and is very 

 easily destroyed if you want to get rid 

 of it.— Dadant & Son. 



I know of nothing better than 

 Alsike clover. I do not know of any 

 seed that will pay to sow for honey 

 alone.— J. E. Pond, Jr. 



The seed of the basswood may be 

 collected now and covered on the 

 ground wiih a few leaves. In the 

 spring it may be planted in drills or 

 where wanted. The golden honey- 

 plant, sweet clover and cleome may 

 also be sown on top of the ground 

 now, and are valuable in the localities 

 where they tiourish.— G. L. Tinker. 



Alsike clover is splendid. Rocky 

 Mountain bee-plant is excellent. This 

 has to be idanted in autumn or it 

 fails. Rape and the mustards are 

 good.— A. J. Cook. 



1 am more and more convinced that 

 it will not pay to sow seeds of any 

 kind for the honey alone— except in 

 waste places. Alsike clover is a good 

 honey-iirodiicer, but it blooms here at 

 the same time white clover does. — G. 

 ^V. De.mauee. 



Pleurisy-root, if on light soil, and 

 melilot clover for heavy soils, are the 

 best.— James IIeddon. 



To give aivay a copy of " Honey as Food 

 and Medicine" to every one who buys a 

 packapreof honey, will sell almost any quan- 

 tity of it. 



As I have now more leisure to de- 

 vote to bee-keeping than I have had 

 for several years past, so much so, 

 that perhaps I may before long take 

 rank with others as a '• specialist," it 

 has occured to me that I might render 

 some service to the apicultural fra- 

 ternity in the line of review or criti- 

 cism ; and I propose to mount a kind 

 of crow's-nest perch, from which I 

 can take a general survey of the bee- 

 world and ■' say my say " on such 

 matters and things as come within 

 the sweep of my observation. 



The word " criticism " is very gen- 

 erally misunderstood. It is usually 

 taken to mean fault-finding. But the 

 true province of criticism is to note 

 excellence as well as defect. In fact, 

 that is the highest function of criti- 

 cism. AVhen the great Sir Robert 

 Peel, then i^oung man, was travel- 

 ing with his tutor on the continent of 

 Europe, they visited, among other 

 places, the world-renowned art gal- 

 leries, where the works of the great 

 masters are on exhibition. The juve- 

 nile statesman was very pert and free 

 in his fault-linding criticisms. At 

 length his tutor took him aside, and 

 said, " Let me remind you that any 

 fool can find fault, but it takes a wise 

 man to discern excellence." The well- 

 timed rebuke was not lost on the 

 youthful Sir Robert. I will try to 

 review " all and sundry " in this 

 spirit. It does not preclude the ut- 

 most freedom of speech compatible 

 with courtesy. I have never joined 

 that mutual admiration society whose 

 motto is the one often seen adorning 

 a receptacle for matches hanging on 

 the wall, " Scratch my back." I have 

 never intentionally penned an unkind 

 word about any one, and abhor mere 

 offensive personalities, but I have 

 always written frankly, and under no 

 other restraint than that imposed by 

 the law of love. I shall aim to be 

 g'uided by the maxim, "Nothing ex- 

 tenuate, nor set down aught in 

 malice." We read in a certain grand 

 old book. "• Faithful are the wounds 

 of a friend, but the kisses of an enemy 

 are deceitful." Should I inflict any 

 wounds, it will be " with all the love 

 and kindness of a brother." 



There are several bee-books before 

 the iMiblic. and their number is in- 

 creasing. IJeyond a brief mention of 

 the appearance of these works in 

 print, Sfv.ircely iiny notice is taken of 

 them in apicultural jiublications. 

 Why should they not be subjected to 

 cuni'lid and impartial criticism ; their 

 merits and defects pointed out, and 

 the views they advocate controverted, 

 as in the case of other books that 

 issue from the press V All beekeep- 

 ers cannot buy every apicultural work 

 that is published, any more than the 

 reading iniblic chu buy every book 

 that presents itself in the realm of 

 general literature. Few bee-keepers 

 feel able to subscribe for all the bee- 

 periodicals; yet the desire is natural 

 and proper to know something about 

 all publications relating to bee-culture, 

 in order to keep abreast of the limes, 

 and to be " ported," as the saying is, 

 in regard to what is being said and 

 done concerning the life and labors of 

 the useful little insect that gathers in 

 the honey-crop. 



Guelpli, Out., Oct. 12, 188-5. 



For the American Hee JoumaL 



Small Hives vs. Large Hives. 



JAMES HEDDON. 



If I have ever stated that the 

 strongest colonies always die .of bee- 

 diarrhea, as insinuated by Mr. C. P. 

 Dadant, on page ('(i6, I wish to retract 

 that statement. I think I have never 

 carried that idea, taut I have had evi- 

 dence that such strong colonies are 

 apparently more apt to have that dis- 

 ease than those that go into winter 

 quarters with only an average num- 

 ber of workers. This phenomenon 

 was so marked in the apiary of Mr. 

 Ilosmer, of AVisconsin, some years 

 ago, that he recommended the prac- 

 tice of reducing the colonies for win- 

 ter. Many others have also noticed 

 and remarked the same. However, it 

 should not be forgotten that what is 

 best in Mr. Dadant's latitude and 

 location, may not be best here. 



It was unnecessary for Mr. Dadant 

 to make a calculation regarding the 

 cost of different sizes of hives. In 

 my first article I stated that I could 

 house 40 Langstroth combs with 5 

 Langstroth hives nearly or quite as 

 cheaply as with 4 hives having 10 

 combs each. I gave as a reason the 

 extra-wide lumber needed to make 

 good bottoms and covers. But Mr. 

 D. claims that I have the extra labor 

 of manipulating o hives instead of 4. 

 To this I would say that I much pre- 

 fer the manipulation of the smaller 

 hives, even when one-fourth greater 

 number must be manipulated. Heavy, 

 cumbersome hives have not only dis- 

 couraged women, and some of our 

 less muscular men, taut they have en- 

 couraged a system of frame manipu- 

 lation to accomplish certain results 

 that could be much more easily and 

 expeditiously accomplished with a 

 proper manipulation of light and 

 easily-movable hives. 



We get better combs built in nar- 

 rower hives and surplus cases. When 

 removing filled cases from the hives. 



