New London, Minn., April 21, 1878. 

 "Bees commenced to gather pollen and 

 some honey about the 1st of April, and also 

 to rear some brood. They now have whole 

 combs filled with pollen, and the queens are 

 laying profusely. Even' one of the 60 colo- 

 nies are doing well. They are all in the 

 North Star Hive. One that had been a 

 choice queen for 2 years now proves to be 

 only a drone layer. Apples and plums are 

 just commencing to bloom." 



O. W. Parker. 



Jesuit's Bend, La., April 14, 1878. 

 " I use in my father's apiary, a bee smoker 

 consisting of a roll of bagging about the 

 size of the wrist and a foot and a half long, 

 sewed up together. 1 make it of old oat and 

 bran sacks— one cut in half will make two. 

 By lighting the end of one of these you have 

 a splendid smoker which never goes out 

 and is very handy." Geo. E. R. Fox. 



West Chester, Pa., April 12, 1878. 

 " Bees are swarming in this vicinity 

 from the Centennial hive. A neighbor had 

 a fine swarm thrown otf, on the 2nd of 

 April, and another on the 3rd. Then there 

 was very little honey to be gatiiered. Now 

 we have abundance of blossom, — the peach, 

 plum and cherry ; also Norway maples are 

 giving considerable honey." 



E. Penn Worrall. 



Maiden, 111. 

 " I have handled bees more or less for the 

 past 58 years. Formerly, we got tiiem to do 

 all we could, and then brimstoned them. — 

 Last spring I had but 6 colonies, increased 

 to 20 last fall, in fair condition for winter, 

 besides having obtained over 300 lbs. of 

 honey. After willows and maples bloomed, 

 gooseberiies came, giving considerable 

 honey ; then dandelions, apples and rasp- 

 berries. In June white clover was good; 

 the drouth came in the first week in July, 

 lasting a month, during which the bees 

 gathered no more than they consumed. — 

 The bees visited buckwheat till about 9 

 A. M., then some went for the lady's-fiuger 

 and heart's-ease till about 3 p. m. They 

 were busy on melilot clover from morning 

 till night, preferring it to the golden rod. — 

 Buckwheat is good for honey. During the 

 drouth bees visited catnip. 1 have learned 

 more from the American Bee Journal 

 as to how to handle bees than from all other 

 sources, and wish it every success." 



R. Corbett. 



Otter Tail Co., Minn.. April 15, 1878. 

 " Having had considerable experience 

 with foul brood several years ago, I can say, 

 with much confidence, that there is no dan- 

 ger in using hives which have contained 

 foul brood if proper care is used in cleans- 

 ing them. The process is simply to scrape 

 the hives and frames and then scald them 

 thoroughly with boiling water. I have re- 

 moved bees and purified the hives in this 

 way, and returned the bees to the hives the 

 same day, repeatedly, without any recur- 

 rence of foul brood. The combs cannot be 

 preserved witliout taking more time and 

 labor than they are worth. But they need 



not be wholly destroyed. After cutting out 

 and burning the parts containing the dead 

 brood, the remaining portions of the combs 

 may be melted into wax and the honey 

 which they contained boiled and skimmed, 

 and then used in any way which the owner 

 desires, without danger." D. Burbank. 



Appleton, Wis., April 21, 1878. 



"Friend Newman: I have been ap- 

 pointed by the Commissioners of the Na- 

 tional Bee-keepers' Association to make a 

 statistical account and report of honey and 

 wax production of our State for the year 

 1877. My advantages for gathering such in- 

 formation is so limited that I think best to 

 secure the help of the Journal, requesting 

 all who have information in their county, in 

 this State, to send it to me before July 20th, 

 giving names of bee-keepers and county, 

 and tlie amount of honey and beeswax." 

 A. H. Hart. 



[This table will be of value, and our 

 friends in Wisconsin should respond 

 promptly to friend Hart's request. It will 

 be benefiting themselves in the end. — Ed.] 



Limerick, III.. April 18. 1878. 

 " I saw on page 76, of the March No., that 

 A. C. Balch had a swarm cluster out of reach 

 and remained there till next morning. A 

 friend of mine, when bees settle out of 

 reach, takes a looking-glass and throws the 

 bright rays of the sun on the lower edge of 

 the cluster and gradually move it down; 

 the bees conie down too. I never tried it." 



E. Pickup. 



Flatbush, L. I., April 20, 1878. 

 "Dear Editor: Will you allow me, in 

 your valuable Journal, to correct the re- 

 port of my paper read before the Nat'l B. K. 

 Association, in a part at which a gentleman 

 feels aggrieved(?) I commended a bee- 

 feeder, consisting of a small trough, with- 

 out float, under the top-bar of a comb 

 frame, but I said the device was patented. 

 This statement was omitted in the report 

 which, in its present form, the patentee 

 thinks, does him injustice, and is calculated 

 to mislead the public. I stated, however, 

 that I believed the patent was not valid, as 

 the same thing, in a slightly modified form, 

 had been used by others for a long time, 

 and, particularly, as I was informed by 

 what I considered good authority, by the 

 manufacturers of tlie State of Maine Bee- 

 Hive. Will some of your readers, who know 

 about that hive, tell us whether my in- 

 formation was correct, or who the proprie- 

 tors or patentees of that hive were?" 



Jared Hasbrouck. 



Modesto, Cal., April 7, 1878. 

 "Bees are doing well. I expect to have 

 sections filled in a day or two. 1 have mam- 

 moth stocks with a short shallow frame, 8x 

 IS}4, and hive 2 feet long. I take away all 

 the empty space in the brood apartment 

 that the queen does not occupy. 1 put my 

 sections close up to the brood nest. When 

 the bees are gathering freely, I lift them 

 out partly filled and put them into the upper 

 story." J. F. Flory. 



