646 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



that soon a change for the better will 

 come. So far, maple, elm, buffalo-berry 

 and willow-bloom have not benefited the 

 bees one particle. On April 30 the 

 thermometer ranged 90° in the shade, 

 and bees were roaring in box-elder trees, 

 but since then we have again northern 

 winds prevailing, and a drizzling rain. 

 The result is hundreds, yes thousands, 

 of bees leaving their hives never to re- 

 turn. The prospects for bee-pasturage 

 is good. Sweet clover, alfalfa and white 

 clover are luxuriant, and fruit-bloom is 

 about ready to open ; but what does all 

 this amount too, when bees cannot work 

 on them, when they bloom ? 



Wm. Stoli^ey. 

 Grand Island, Nebr., May 3, 1892. 



Taste of Honey, Etc. 



In answer to a query asked by a sub- 

 scriber of the American Bee Journal, 

 I will say that there is a wide difference 

 in the taste of honey in the comb, and 

 in extracted-honey gathered from the 

 same flowers. In comb-honey we get 

 the beeswax flavor with the honey 

 flavor, and with the extracted-honey we 

 only have the honey flavor. There is a 

 wide difference in the taste. The weather 

 is cool and cloudy, with some very heavy 

 rains, which is a drawback to our 

 queens in mating. 



Mrs. Jennie Atchley. 



Floyd, Tex., April 29, 1892. 



The Season in Northwestern Missouri. 



I began the season of 1991 with 7 

 colonies, increased to 17, and obtained 

 150 pounds of comb-honey, and 100 

 pounds of extracted, mostly being gath- 

 ered from honey-dew, as white clover 

 failed from some unknown cause to 

 secrete any nectar. Through August 

 and September the bees stored a little 

 honey from the Fall bloom — Spanish- 

 needle and wild asters. The Spring and 

 Summer of 1891 was noted here for its 

 heavy, long-continued rain storms, and 

 the Fall months by a severe drouth (hot 

 winds from the southwest, which is 

 almost wholly unknown to the oldest 

 settlers) played sad havoc with the Fall 

 flowers, burning them to a crisp in a 

 single day, and the apiarists who failed 

 to supply the needed stores for Winter, 

 are reaping their reward, and there are 

 not a few, to my own personal knowl- 

 edge. I think they have paid dearly 

 for the lesson learned. My bees are 

 packed on the summer stands. When I 

 packed them away last Fall I doubled 



them up to 12 colonies, and all have 

 come through all right so far, except 

 one very weak colony. This has proved 

 to be one of the hardest Springs on bees 

 for many years — cold and backward, 

 with very high winds, keeping the bees 

 in the hives. All through March and 

 April, having had only six pieces of days 

 in which they could gather pollen, one 

 can easily guess the condition the bees 

 are in, and to-day the rain is falling, 

 and it is quite cool. If the bees ever 

 needed sunshine and flowers, it must be 

 now. W. R. Elwood. 



Humphreys, Mo., May 1, 1892. 



Prospect is Good. 



My 24 colonies of bees came through 

 the Winter all right. The prospect is 

 good for the coming season. 



P. H. Wheatley. 



Millwood, Mo., May 2, 1892. 



Ptmic and Carniolan Bees. 



On Oct. 19, I introduced six Punic 

 queens to as many colonies of black bees 

 in an out-apiary. Two of the colonies 

 died, and the other four are in good 

 condition. One of them is in a double- 

 walled hive, with closed-end frames, and 

 a better colony of bees cannot be found 

 in this country — not even in the South- 

 ern States, where they have no Winter. 

 I saw this colony on April 25, and it 

 was then in a condition to swarm. There 

 was capped drone-brood near the top of 

 the frames at the extreme corners, and 

 no less than seven frames filled solid 

 with brood. These bees had not been 

 troubled by any one since the queens 

 were introduced. The colonies in my 

 home yard were almost depopulated by 

 diarrhea, and for this reason I cannot 

 give as good a report as I would like. As 

 all these colonies were fed more or less 

 sugar syrup in the Fall, I cannot say 

 whether it was Fall honey, of which 

 they gathered some dozen pounds, or the 

 syrup fed to them that caused the diar- 

 rhea. I brought home some 25 colonies 

 of black bees late in the Fall, and these 

 all wintered nicely. I can show one 

 apiary of 10 colonies of golden Carnio- 

 lan bees, situated a few miles from 

 Boston, that would make the eye of 

 almost any enthusiastic bee-man twinkle. 

 The hives are full of beautiful bees, and 

 no doubt they will give the owner a 

 large income before the season ends. I 

 introduced the queens to these colonies 

 in June, 1891. From nearly 500 

 golden Carniolan queens which I reared 



