•rmm mmmmiemm mm.m jowmi^miL. 



*-*-^*-*-*-^*-*-*-^* 



the President called the convention to 

 order. 



BEE-DIARRHEA — CAUSE & PREVENTION. 



Mr. Whittlesey said that it came 

 from pour honey. E.xtract, and feed 

 sugar. 



Mr. Rice thought that dampness and 

 poor ventilation had something to do 

 with it. 



President Highbarger said that it 

 was caused by poor honey. 



EXTRACTED VS. COMB HONEY. 



Mr. Blackburn said that his highest 

 comb honey yield was 112 pounds per 

 colony, while one colony stored almost 

 300 pounds of extracted. 



Mr. Whittlesey said that from 15 

 colonies he obtained 1,100 pounds of 

 extracted honey, and from 35 colonies, 

 1,500 pounds of comb honej-. It had 

 been a poor season for him. 



The election of officers for the en- 

 suing year was then held, and resulted 

 as follows : President, S. H. Herrick, 

 of Rockford ; Vice-President, A. J. 

 Sweezj-, of Guilford ; Secretary, D. A. 

 Fuller, of Cherry Valley ; and Treas- 

 urer, O. J. Cummings, of Guilford. 



The next annual meeting was voted 

 to be held at Rockford ; the May meet^ 

 ing at Cherry Valley ; and the August 

 meeting at Harlem. 



The Association instructed the Sec- 

 retary and Treasurer, after all ex- 

 penses were paid, to send the balance 

 in the treasury to Rev. L. L. Lang- 

 stroth. The amount, with some dona- 

 tions, was $5.85. 



D. A. Fuller, Sec. 



QUEEN-CELLS. 



Questions about £§;£§ Found 

 in Queen-Ceils. 



Written for the American Bee Journal 

 . BY ALLEN LATHAM. 



I was interested in what was said on 

 page 800 of the American Bee Jour- 

 nal for 1889, concerning the placing 

 of eggs in queen-cells. Mr. Dadant 

 says that the size of the cell governs 

 the sex, and thinks that the queen does 

 not lay eggs in queen-cells. I have 

 always been interested in this ques- 

 tion ; I believe it to be all nonsense to 

 say that the queen does not lay in 

 queen-cells. I have one or two queries 

 which I should like Mr. Dadant to an- 

 swer, viz : 



1. If the workers place the eggs in 

 old queen-cells, wh\' do we never find 

 them there when a queen is removed, 

 and the bees go to work to rear 

 another ? Surely it would be easier 

 to remove an egg than to build an en- 

 tirely new cell. 



2. Why, when foundation sometimes 

 sags and leaves the cells nearly as 

 large as drone-cells, does the queen 

 lay eggs in those cells, which eggs de- 

 velop into workers ? 



3. Has any one ever seen an egg in an 

 old queen-cell (not a queen-cell made 

 out of two or three worker-cells) in a 

 hive without a queen, unless such egg 

 ma}' have been placed there by a lay- 

 ing worker ? 



What I wish to bring out by the 

 above questions, is this : Eggs are 

 found in queen-cells ; they do not go 

 there themselves ; they are never 

 placed there except when a queen is in 

 the hive ; and if a comb containing 

 eggs is given to a queenless colony, 

 none of these eggs are transferred to 

 any queen-cells. 



The above statements are conclu- 

 sions drawn from my own experience, 

 and I may be " away oft"," yet I have 

 seen the same so many times that 1 

 feel pretty sure. 



Cambridge, Mass. 



WINTER. 



How the Bees in Winter Quar- 

 ters are Doins. 



Written for the Prarie Farmer 



BY MRS. L. HARRISON. 



It is a little past one p.m. and I 

 made a call on my bees to say " How 

 dy' do," and they answered only by a 

 happy murmur. O, how I wish all my 

 bee-loving friends could see mj' little 

 pets in their cozy winter quarters. To- 

 day, Dec. 8, 1889, the thermometer 

 stood at 48-' in the bee-cellar, and at 

 72'^ in the shade out-of-doors. The 

 bees were carried in Dec. 5, which was 

 a warm, pleasant day, and bees were 

 upon the wing. Those to be removed 

 were confined to their hives in the 

 early morning, hj closing their fly-en- 

 trance. It is so much nicer handling 

 hives when they are clean and dry, 

 than when covered with snow and 

 sleet. And if the hives are frozen 

 down they have to be loosened with a 

 jar, which is very irritating to the in- 

 mates, and a person can handle them 

 more quietly during mild weather than 

 when pinched with cold. 



There has been considerable said 

 about lugging hives in and out of cel- 

 lars, as though it was something ter- 

 rible. Our cellar has no outside door, 

 and the bees were handed in through 

 a window. Two men put down 56 

 colonies in about two hours, and the 

 assistant chai'ged 75 cents for his 

 labor. It would take several days to 

 make them as comfortable upon their 

 summer stands, and quite a job to un- 

 pack them another season and clean 



up the litter. The hives are two-story 

 Langstroth, and only the lower one, 

 containing the brood-nest, is put down. 



I have room for only about half of 

 the ct)Ionies of the apiary, and the re- 

 mainder are to remain upon the sum- 

 mer stands. At the present writing it 

 seems like folly to store any of them, 

 as this month thus far has been so very 

 mild ; but old Boreas may teach us, be- 

 fore long, that he has not entirel}' de- 

 serted this mundane sphere, and at all 

 events preparations should he made for 

 his coming. 



Some years ago I made chaff-cush- 

 ions to protect the bees during winter, 

 and by carefully housing them during 

 the summer, they are still tit for use. 

 Every fall new muslin sheets are 

 spread over the frames, above the de- 

 vices, and then the chafi-cushions are 

 put in. The bees propolize up the 

 muslin during the year, so that the 

 moisture will not pass through it, and 

 they will keep dryer if new is used for 

 winter. And if they have eaten holes 

 in the muslin, they will creep up under 

 the cushion and large numbers perish, 

 as they cannot find their way back. I 

 raise the cover slightly, so that there is 

 at all times a free circulation of air 

 above the cushion. 



Occasionally during a very cold spell 

 a cover has been shut down, and I in- 

 variably would And the cushion frozen 

 and the cap full of frost, while those 

 that were raised would be drj'. I pre- 

 fer to have the entrance fully open, 

 and the back of the hive as high again 

 as the front, so if frost gathers and 

 melts in the hive, it will run out, and 

 the bees can more readily carrj' out 

 their dead debris. 



Peoria, Ills. 



LIQUID HONEY. 



Tlie Production and ITIarketini 

 of Extracted Honey. 



Written for tlieAyncrican Bee Journal 



BY' C. E. WOODWARD. 



It has taken the American apiarists 

 a great while to decide that they have 

 real use for the honey-extractor. Ex- 

 perimenting has demonstrated that 

 honey-extracting is an economical pro- 

 ceeding, and, properly handled, is one 

 of the greatest inventions in the bee- 

 keeping world. 



The people of America seem to be 

 awakening to the fact that the honey- 

 extractor is suited to the wants of the 

 honey-produciug world ; and if there is 

 any one point that demands careful 

 study, it is the manner in which ex- 

 tracted honey is placed upon the mar- 

 ket, to meet the wants of the con- 

 sumer. Hence, too much attention 



