has the right bees in the right hive. With 

 nini, it is bees first, and recreation and 

 hunting afterwards. Sucli a man Avill suc- 

 ceed in a greater or less degree in any local- 

 ity where fortune may place him in. 



The enemies of bees are: Toads, spiders, 

 woodpeckers, king birds or bee martins, as 

 some call them, the moth miller, and man. 

 But the moth miller is the most destructive, 

 if we except man. 



Think of the colonies so arranged in the 

 apiary that the young queens fail to enter 

 the right hive, and thus are lost, wliiletlie 

 stock has no means of raising another; 

 thus becoming a sure prey to the moth 

 miller or to be robbed by other bees; and if 

 not robbed, the whole inside of the hive 

 becomes one solid mat of webb and worms; 

 and after ail, the whole damage lies at the 

 door of the self-styled bee-keeper; with a 

 little knowledge on his part, nine-tenths of 

 the damage might have been averted.— 

 Look at the increased destruction of bees 

 for the past few years, brought about by the 

 construction of clap-trap hives, by those 

 utterly ignorant of the first principles of a 

 good hive ! Some moth nurseries; some 

 smothering pits, during tiie winter ! 



Is it, then, any wonder that man should 

 be called the greatest enemy of the bee? 



Andalusia, 111. C. Hotchkiss. 



(Bxn%ciUK^ox. 



Millersville. III., Feb. 10, 1878. 

 " I have .50 colonies of Italians, and 1 have 

 taken from them 4.500 lbs., actual weight, 

 being an average of 90 lbs. to the hive; all 

 sold at an average of 12^ cts. per lb." 



J. E. Walchee. 



Abronia, Mich., March 8, 1878. 

 " Bees have gathered honey and pollen all 

 day. I never knew bees to get honey so 

 early, before, in Michigan. They seem in 

 fine order." T. F. Bingham. 



Owosso, Mich., Feb. 25, 1878. 

 "The cause of %ths of the deaths of bees 

 in winter, is that their honey is volatile, 

 and gatliers water; the bees being compell- 

 ed to eat so much water with their honey, it 

 physics them, and as it extends them so 

 much, they cannot contain it, and die- 

 often coming out of the hive in the coldest 

 weather to die, rather than to stay in the 

 hive and pollute it. Remedy.— Throw out 

 all the uncapped honey at the beginning of 

 winter, and l^,t them have honey that is 

 sealed up, to live on. That gatliers b>it little 

 water. Poor honey may be given them in 

 the spring." M. Richardson. 



Glenwood. III., Feb. 14, 1878. 

 "I put 102 swarms into the cellar, about 

 Jan. 1 ; 14 are in box hives, the rest in 

 Quinby frame hives. The box thives are 

 inverted; the frame hives are right side up, 

 on the bottom boards, with the entrance at 

 bottom open. The 3 spaces in the honey 

 boards are open. They are so arranged 

 that Idead bees can be swept out. The 



cellar is 16x24 feet, and is under the kitchen; 

 it has an outside entrance, double doors> 

 with chimney from the bottom. I put iii a 

 stove but had no occasion to use it, since 

 the first few days after putting in. I wann- 

 ed them up well then, to dry the hives. — 

 The weather had been very wet for some 

 time before, but it was cold when I put 

 them in; the boards of the hives were full 

 of frost. They seem to be doing well. The 

 extractor you selected for me, last summer, 

 works well, also smoker." €. L. Frost. 



Garland, Pa., Feb. 11, 1878. 

 " Bees did very little here in the line of 

 surplus honey, the past season; those that 

 were well housed came out in the spring 

 strong and healthy; swarmed early, and did 

 well till the first of July, then wet weather 

 began and they gathered no more clover or 

 raspberry honey. The chestnut and bass- 

 wood failed to yield honey, although they 

 bore heavy bloom, and the weather was 

 fine. Buckwheat and fall fiowers yielded 

 abundantly; in consequence, some hives 

 were crowded in the brood chamber, and 

 went into winter quarters witii lighter 

 swarms than we like to winter; but up to 

 date, they appear to be in as fine condition 

 as one could wish. For want of room in 

 the bee house, we are wintering 14 swarms 

 on their summer stands, packed in chaff. — 

 The first we have tried in chaff, since the 

 fall of 1867; that fall, we packed nearly all 

 our bees in chaff. All that were so prepared 

 came out in the spring in good condition. — 

 We built a house the following season, and 

 have wintered in that since then, with the 

 exception of few swarms that have stood 

 out every winter, with the caps filled with 

 straw as their only protection, and have lost 

 very few bees, excepting in the winters of 

 1874-5; (then we lost one-half; we wintered 

 in). 1 think the old-bee theory correct, 

 with regard to the mortality among our 

 bees and those of our neighbors, that died 

 the same winter. I took the trouble to 

 examine the hives in 15 different apiaries, 

 where the loss was from one-fourtii to all 

 they contained; and, in every case, found 

 little or no pollen and no signs of brood, 

 and came to the conclusion that it was for 

 the want of young bees to supply the place 

 of old ones, that caused them to dwindle 

 down and die out so rapidly." 



J no. F. Eggleston. 



Charles City, Iowa, Jan. 23, 1878. 

 " Last summer we had a good crop of 

 honey from basswood and white clover. — 

 The spring was wet and a late frost injured 

 the fruit blossoms, and a drought cut the 

 fall crop short, but our honey was all thick 

 and of good quality. On May 1st, I had 14 

 colonies. I doubled my number and aver- 

 aged nearly .50 tbs. per colony, of comb 

 lioney, in 2}4 lb. sections. I have 7io 

 extractor; my bees are mostly Italians. My 

 Italians have always done the best. One 

 ne^v swarm filled a large hive, and made 90 

 Rs. in sections, on top. Another old stock 

 (with a dollar queen, bought of J. II. Nellis, 

 in the fall of 1876,) made 11.3 lbs. of surplus, 

 in sections, tiered up, on top. I bought 6 

 more colonies last fall; making -34 now in 

 the cellar, with the caps and top boards all 



