AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



741 



honey. Then I took the bees out of the 

 cellar about April 15, and I should have 

 left them in until the 21st of May. Mr. 

 T. C. Kelley thinks that out-door win- 

 tering is best. I would prefer out-door 

 wintering in Pennsylvania, where the 

 mercury seldom gets below 18° below 

 zero. Here in Minnesota it has been 

 down to 52° below zero, but of course 

 the atmosphere is very dry, and we don't 

 notice it at all at 20^' below, when there 

 is no wind. You sec this is a large 

 country, and what will do in Pennsylva- 

 nia or Florida won't do in Minnesota, 

 Dakota or Wisconsin. I have lots of 

 good hives filled with comb and honey, 

 to give my young bees, if I have any. I 

 see some young bees and drones. 



Mark D. Judkins. 

 Osakis, Minn., May 21, 1892. 



Salvage from the Wreck. 



There are a great many substantial 

 blessings connected with bee-keeping. 

 To be sure, I have lost 200 colonies out 

 of 800, fall count, but then it will be 

 much easier to mow the bee-yard now, 

 than with the hives so thick around. I 

 won't have to spend a lot of money on 

 bee-supplies, and I have my hives left ! 

 The queens are all "out on a strike," 

 and practically no brood is being reared. 

 It is very wet, but when the sun shines 

 the weak colonies desert their hives 

 about as fast as one man wants to carry 

 the deserted boxes into the honey-house. 

 B. H. Standish. 



Evansville, Wis., May 20, 1892. 



Stealing- Eggs to Rear Queens. 



Do qucenless colonies of bees ever go 

 into neighboring hives and get eggs to 

 roar for themselves a queen '? Last sea- 

 son I had 2 colonics of black boes ; in 

 August I procured an Italian queen, and 

 introduced her into one of them with 

 success. They bred up finely during the 

 fall. I examined them yesterday, and 

 could find no queen and no brood or 

 eggs, with the exception of two queen- 

 cells capped over (another in process of 

 construction), one of which I picked 

 out, and it contained the lava of a 

 young queen. I could see no possible 

 way for them to get the eggs but by 

 going to the other hive, which was about 

 4 feet distant. Would you advise let- 

 ting this colony of bees remain and see 

 if they get a queen from the cell they 

 have ? or had I better procure a queen 

 immediately for them ? I have quite a 



curiosity to find out if they can rc-queen 

 themselves in the way they seem to be 

 doing. I presume I should have time to 

 get them a queen after finding out 

 whether they have succeeded or not in 

 their efl'ort. Geo. E. Fellows. 



Salisbury, N. II., May 16, 1892. 



[We have never heard of such a thing 

 as bees going into other hives and taking 

 away eggs. They must have come in 

 some more natural way. Yes ; by all 

 meaiis we would let the colony do any- 

 thing the bees choose to, and watch re- 

 sults. There will be time enough to get 

 a queen for them after they have failed 

 to rear one. — Eds.] 



Unfavorable Weather for Bees. 



Last fall I put in 48 colonies cf bees, 

 and when I took them out there were 

 only 20 colonies ; now I have only 10. 

 Some starved with plenty of stores, but 

 I think the trouble was that when I put 

 them into the cellar they had no young 

 bees, and did not have any last October. 

 It was a poor year here for the bees in 

 this locality ; and there was no honey 

 last fall for them to gather. We have 

 had awfully wet and cold weather this 

 spring. I like the Bee Journal very 

 much. B. M. Savage. 



Independence, Iowa, May 20, 1892. 



Bee-Keeping in Tennessee. 



In answer to many letters which I 

 have received, inquiring as to the pros- 

 pects and chances for bee-culture in this 

 part of the country, I will say that I 

 believe this to be as good as the best, 

 besides being a very healthy climate. 

 My hives, which have 11 frames 1'2,%-k- 

 Sli inches, are all chock-full of bees. I 

 use a top section-case, which contains 

 33 one-pound sections. I have quite a 

 lot of hives with the sections full of 

 honey, and nearly all capped ready to 

 come off. As to color, our early spring 

 honey is of a bright yellow, the most of 

 which is gathered from black locust and 

 poplar, although the woods is full of 

 various other flowers. Our linden begins 

 to bloom about June 5, and lasts for 

 quite awhile, and the honey is of a beau- 

 tiful white, from about June 5 until 

 July 20, which time is our best honey 

 flow; although I had some hives with 

 27 one-pound sections, which I emptied 

 on July 20, that were afterwards nicely 

 filled. Our late honey is bright yellow, 



