20 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



ry, niigiioniiette, catnip, etc. Tliese seeds 

 may be strewn in fence corners or any ini- 

 cullivated places about tiie garden, tarni, 

 and road. 



It was further suggested that bee-lceepers 

 in this vicinity should not keep as many 

 bees, or if they do, should try to spread 

 them over more country; they should also 

 prevent swarming, if possible, and not in- 

 crease their stocks in numbers but raise 

 more honey. 



After the discussion of this subject, it was 

 conceded by all bee-keepers present, that 

 bee-culture will pay y(>t, if the above men- 

 tioned honey plants are cultivated more 

 freely by bee-keepers and farmers, giving 

 bees a continuous t'oraje and an opportunity 

 to gather as nuich honey in the future as iii 

 the past. C. Guimm. 



Jefferson, Wis., Dec. 14, 187(5. 



For the American Bee Journal 



Letter from Kansas. 



Editor Jouhxal.— It is some time now 

 since I have written anything for the Jour- 

 nal, 1 don't know as I am as much of an 

 enthusiast in bee-cullure as formerly, but 

 still I make it a specialty and I read the 

 Journal, yet jjrobably with not as much 

 zest as formerly, because i don't find as 

 many new things in it as when 1 was new 

 in the business^ still it is quite interesting 

 at times and even amusing. The take off 

 on H's new apiary is good. The fact is, Mr. 

 Editor, new things and great discoveries in 

 our favorite pursuit are too old foggish in 

 their movements. We shall all be tlead be- 

 foi"e any great discovery will make us all 

 rich— that really is the' goal to which all 

 aspire. We do hot mean that all aspire to 

 the same kind of riches, but the almighty 

 dollar is the motive ])ower to the great bulk 

 of humans. (Some have higher and nobler 

 motives, but the coming bee is what we are 

 after now. 



There is no use of discussing the question 

 of the coming hive, that question is already 

 exhaus.ted, as an examination of the records 

 at the Patent Office will show. Great men 

 like Adair and Gallup have exhausted their 

 inventive genius on this question and sunk 

 into obscurity. But the field is open for 

 the coming bee. The Italians were a great 

 improvement on the black, so thought 

 many bee-keepers, and more especially 

 those that had queen» to sell. The Albino 

 is the latest invention to catch a few pen- 

 nies from the uninformed. The idea that 

 it will be any improvement on standard 

 Italians and blacks is not to be/ entertained. 

 This coming bee must be insect and bird 

 proof, in fact it must be large enough to 

 gobble up a toad and kinf»-bird, as those 

 "birds" now gobble up our little bee of the 

 present. They must have tlie hardihood 

 and agility of our Kansas locusts. They must 

 be able to carry several pounds of honey, 

 the more the better: and all the bee-keeper 

 will have to do will be to fill his yard full 

 of empty barrels with a hole in the same 

 for the bees to dump in the honey; and this 

 bee will neither need hives nor build comb, 

 the expense of the hives and honey extract- 

 ors will be saved. 



Now when tliis bee is produced it must be 

 owned by only a few trusty and honorable 

 bee-keepers in each State, that have sense 

 enougli to keep a good thing to themselves. 



i Then C. O. P. and A. J. K. will have the ex- 

 clusive privilege of manufacturing comb 



•and putting the honey intf» it, as it sells 

 best in that shape; and when the formfer 

 would be relieved from the arduous work 

 of manufacturing honey (as he is now ac- 

 cused of doing by some), no doubt his skill 

 and ingenuity would soon enable him to 

 produce full grown combs in all their 

 beauty and loveliness. But we learn by the 

 proceedings of the Mo. Valley bee-keepers' 



I meeting that all honey is manufactured. 

 This opinion would have greater weight 

 with bee-keepers if the great entomologist 

 had not shown a presistency of sticking to 

 an error in relative to bees injuring fruit, 

 worthy of a greater man. lie will persist 

 in this error, no doubt, until he actually be- 

 lieves he saw bees roosting on the grape 

 trellis chewing down grapes and flipping 

 the seeds at each other. 



He has no doubt read many works on 

 entomology, and has a smattering of that 



I science and he maybe able to tell a bee 



I from a grasshopiier. But as a grasshopper 



; prophet he proved an entire failure. His 



I excuse was that the brood of locusts that he 

 predicted would not visit Kansas this sea- 

 son did not, but a new brood that he had 



i not seen, was what devastated the country. 



I If Congress had created a commission and 

 sent him up to the Northwest, he would 



i have seen this new brood and become ac- 

 (piainted with them and advised them to 



! '"Go West, young 'hopper, go West," and 

 Kansas would have been saved. See what 

 the parsimony of Congress has done in 

 witholding a few paltry thousands from 

 this enterprising chap. 



■'Patent" is another thing that creates a 

 smile as we read. We are told in an article 

 in the last Journal that T. F. Bingham 

 has letters patent on three little sticks nail- 

 ed together. Now this is enough to make 

 anyone that is not of a religious turn of 

 miiid, laugh right out in meeting. Now, Mr. 

 Editor, it ought to be the mission of an inde- 

 pendent bee journal to expose this humbug 

 patent business. If the bee fraternity are 

 generous enough to encourage everybody to 

 go into bee-keeping, and thus reduce their 

 own income by an over-supply of honey, 

 they ought to be honest enough to try to 

 shield the new beginners and the uninform- 

 ed from being duped by patent vendors. 

 Mr. Gallup once obtained great notriety as 

 a humbug exposer. Since his day we have 

 had no regular humbug ventilator. Proba- 

 bly the sad fate of chat worthy brother has 

 deterred others from entering the field. 



A few more words about i>atents and we 

 will close, although we wanted to say some- 

 thing on another subject which we will 

 have to reserve for another time. We have 

 our doubts whether there is a single patent 

 on bee hives or anything in connection with 

 them that is wortli a cent, but to the vendor 

 that will catch their dupes. A great ma- 

 jority of them could not be sustained in 

 "court. Most of them when simmered down 

 to the real point — patented — if it could ever 

 be ascertained, that if understood no one 

 would be fool enough to pay money for it. 

 To illustrate, a man wants a patent, and he 

 paints a white stripe around the bee hive a 

 few inches from the bottom, and he claims 

 a patent on the hive as moth proof. He 

 claims that the white stripe attracts the 



j miller, the same as a light, and it flies 



I against the liive and knocks its brains out, 



