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THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Antrim, Minn., Sept. 2d, 1877.—" Tlie Sep- 

 tember number of Journal is received, 

 tilled with interesting articles from nearly 

 all the States. Why do we not see reports 

 from Florida, the land of flowers? Are 

 there no live bee-keepers in that State? 

 The fine dry weather here the past two 

 months has been very favorable for bees in 

 this part of the State, and though we have 

 but little increase in swarms, considerable 

 surplus honey has been gathei-ed. of excel- 

 lent quality. L. M. Lindley. 



[There are several energetic bee-keepers 

 in Florida, but there is room for many more. 

 —Ed.] 



Brunswick, Germany, Aug. 20th, 1877.— 

 "We have had in Germany up to this time 

 a very poor season. I have feci from spring 

 till now more than 1000 pounds of honey. 

 On the 8th of August the most of my Blacks 

 had scarce a single cell of honey. 1 re- 

 moved on this day my colonies twenty miles 

 from here to the heath, where buckwheat 

 aud the Erica vulgaris are now in full 

 blossom. As the weather since that day 

 was not very favorable I fear my bees are 

 to day as hungry as on the 8th of August, 

 and so it is possible that I may have some 

 nests of mice in my stocks instead of honey, 

 when I shall remove them homeward." 



C. J. H. Grave NHOKST. 



Madison, Ind., Sept. 7, 1877.—" I find by 

 reading the Journal that the honey har- 

 vest has not been first-class this year. The 

 honey harvest in this locality has been 

 about half a crop. 1 have 21 colonies of 

 Italians all in good condition. I use the 

 Faulkner bee-house, and I like it very 

 much, but I think his out-door hive is bet- 

 ter for the extractor; the house is very 

 handy for box honey, and good for winter- 

 ing bees. I can sell extracted honey here 

 for a better price than for box honey. I get 

 25c. per ft. tor extracted, and 20c. for comb 

 honey. So if extracted honey don't pay 

 best, I would like to know? I can get more 

 of the extracted than of the comb. I use 

 the 6-ft and 3-& glass boxes, and they are 

 nicer." Henry C. White. 



Lawrence, 111., Sept. 10, 1877.—" Mr. C. 

 Hotchkiss, in the Sept. number, page -313, 

 asks— where my bees are, by the side of Mr. 

 Palmer's? I did not intend to brag over 

 my bees. My experience has been that 

 when bees have the swarming fever, as 

 mine had it this year, that they lay i.ip but 

 very little surplus honey. I imagine there 

 is some difference between July 9th— the 

 date of my letter— and Aug. 8th— the date of 

 his visit. That month is the one in which 

 Mr. Palmer got 4,000 fts. of honey, and I got 

 only 100. Up to Aug. 1st I got 1,000 fts. of 

 white clover honey, and for the next 3 

 weeks I only got about 15o lbs., for the 

 reason that we had no rain from July 1st to 

 Aug. lOth. the consequence was that every- 

 thing suffered— my bees included. Since 

 Aug. 10th they have done very well, but I 

 shall only get 1800 lbs. in all, this year, and 

 1500 lbs. of that will be from my new 

 swarms, as my old ones did but little be- 

 sides swarming, and 5 of them swarmed out 

 entirely, and I have just "brimstoned" 

 them; the rest have plenty of bees and will 

 winter all right." J. Lee Anderson. 



Marshall, 111., Sept. 12, 1877.— " My bees 

 are doing finely, storing honey faster now 

 than at any time during the season." 



N. B. Devol. 



Hopkinsville, Ky., Aug. 28, 1877.— "En- 

 closed is a specimen of the greatest honey- 

 producing plant in this part of the State. 

 It never fails to yield a fall supply, but is 

 very strong and not altogether salable. For 

 the benefit of tlie honey-jiroducing interest, 

 I wish you to tell me what it is. as I can 

 find no one here that knows anything about 

 it. My crop this year will reach 1.000 fts. 

 comb honey in sections." 



R. M. Anderson. 



[It is Eupatorium Serotmum. It has no 

 special common name, but is one of the 25 

 bone-sets or thorough-worts which are found 

 east of the Mississippi. The bone-sets are 

 all bee plants.— w. j. b.] 



Cincinnati, O., Sept. 8, 1877.—" I have had 

 a hard time with my bees since the honey 

 season ended, owing principally to careless- 

 ness on my part. W'hen the honey season 

 was about over I had seven good nuclei; 

 but one evening after looking at one of 

 them I left some honey on the hive and 

 forgot it; next day I looked at my hives I 

 found all my young hives being robbed. I 

 immediately stuffed a lot of new haj^ in 

 front of the hives, but this not answering, 

 I took some gum camphor and put around 

 the entrances but that did not stop it. I 

 then went through them taking away all the 

 frames, the bees could not cover thick and 

 closed up the entrances so that only one or 

 two bees could enter at a time. Finally, 1 

 stopped the robbing, but they tore down 

 several of my queen cells, and in several 

 hives the queens were lost when they went 

 out to meet the drones, so now I have iny 

 seven old hives and five young ones which 

 are doing very well. I took nearly 300 fts 

 slung honey this year." N. T. Horton. 



Pike Co., Ky., Aug. 30, 1877.—" Being a 

 reader of the American Bee Journal. 

 and seeing nothing from this part of the 

 State in vour valuable paper, I will send a 

 few items. Bees nearly all died last win- 

 ter, what few remained have done well this 

 summer, both in swarming and making 

 honey. Early flowers are plenty here. The 

 first are peach and apple blossoms, then the 

 black locust (a very rich bloom). Our main 

 blooms are poplar and linn, from these bees 

 store honey very fast. We have but little 

 white clover, but think it excellent for bees. 

 Have tried alsike clover; bees work on it 

 very well, but we want some kind of bloom 

 that will come in about July 1.5th and con- 

 tinue until Aug. 15th— this being the time 

 our bees are idle. I have tried buckwheat, 

 but it does not seem to do much good. Bees 

 work on it early in the morning, but as soon 

 as the sun gets up they quit it. I shall try 

 melilot. I have had colonies make 80 lbs. 

 of box honey, mostly from poplar and linn, 

 this summer." Julius C. Williamson. 



i^The Jersey county, 111., Agricul- 

 tural Society will hold their tenth an- 

 nual Fair, Oct. 9th to 12th, 1877. 



