230 



TTHl© MMERIC'Mff BM® JO^RKSI,. 



^— ^■^■■^'--■~*-~-^-^^^^i»«^*^»^><fc< 



its editor and type-setter, and the 

 work is all done at his home by the 

 assistance of Mrs. H. and their chil- 

 dren. It is well gotten up, beautifull}- 

 printed, ably edited, and deserves a 

 liberal support. 



Best Kind of Fuel to Use in Bee- 

 Smokers. 



Written for the American Bee Journal 



Query 624.— What kind of fuel do you 

 consider tiie best to use In a bee-smoker ?— 

 Bee-Man. 



Half deca3"ed hard maple. — J. M. 

 Shuck. 



Elmwood slightly decayed, and 

 thoroughly drj'. — R. L. Taylor. 



Any dry wood, and sometimes a 

 little green wood. — Dadant & Son. 



Partly deca3-ed maple, beech or elm. 



G. M. DOOLITTLE. 



Rotten or dozy wood. — C. H. Dib- 



BERN. 



I use coarse cotton rags, corn-cobs, 

 or anything that I can get to burn. — 

 J. P. H. Bro^vn. 



I use elmwood. It is the best I have 

 used. — H. D. Cutting. 



Dry hickory for sugar-tree wood; 

 corn-cobs do very well. — ^M. Mahin. 



Rotten wood, or " punk" thoroughly 

 dried ; cotton rags, properly tied in a 

 roll. — Mrs. L. Harrison. 



On the whole, I prefer decaj^ed 

 wood — a sort of dry-rot. This makes 

 much smoke, with little heat, and 

 burns long. — A. J. Cook. 



Dry rotten elm, should j-our work be 

 limited ; but for an all-day's job, hard- 

 wood chips of almost any kind.— J. M. 

 Hambaugh. 



Dry rotten wood. I keep some 

 chopped up, ready for use, in a box 

 behind the cook-stove, where it is al- 

 ways dry. — Mahala B. Chaddock. 



I prefer the fine ribbon-like shav- 

 ings obtained in sawing sections. It 

 makes a great amount of smoke, and 

 is always at hand. — G. L. Tinker. 



Rotten pine, soaked in sali>petre, 

 with a little "excelsior" (fine shav- 

 ings) to start up with. — W.M.Baknum. 



I use decayed apple-tree stumps ; 

 but any fuel that will burn, and give 

 "lots of smoke," is good enough. — J. 

 E. Pond. 



Really, I do not know. It is largely 

 a matter of convenience. One of my 

 apiaries is in an evergreen grove, and 

 there we like pine cones best, because 



we can pick them ofi^ the ground. 

 Elsewhere, planer shavings are mostly 

 used. Rotten wood, sound wood, rags, 

 corn-cobs, peat, etc., are good. — C. C. 

 Miller. 



Pine shavings have given me just as 

 good satisfaction as anything. They 

 should be well packed. — E. Secor. 



The best I ever had was the rotten 

 wood of the willow ; but for several 

 years I have been using rotten elm. — 

 A. B. Mason. 



The best fuel I have ever tried (and 

 I have used nearly everything) is de- 

 cayed elmwood. Some other woods 

 are nearly as good, but the elm gives 

 more smoke, with less heat, than any- 

 thing I have tried. — G. W. Demaree. 



Dry hickory, half-decayed hard 

 maple, punk, planer shavings, corn- 

 cobs, peat or rags are all well suited, 

 besides other things, for fuel for bee- 

 smokers. — The Editor. 



Distance Between Apiaries of 

 Different Races. 



Written for the American Bee Journal 



Query 625.— About what is the nearest 

 that two apiaries could be approached to each 

 other, one containing Italian, and the other 

 black bees, and keep the Italians pure ?— J. L. 



About ten miles. — H. D. Cutting. 



Probablj' one-half mile. — Mrs. L. 

 Harrison. 



We cannot assert, but we would say 

 about five miles. — Dadant & Son. 



Eight or ten miles, I think would be 

 required to make it sure. — R. L. Tay- 

 lor. 



Mj- experience says from four to five 

 miles. — G. M. Doolittle. 



Italian 'and black bees will cross 

 where distant four miles. — J. P. H. 

 Brown. 



It would be perfectly safe at six 

 miles. A shorter distance may do, but 

 I am not certain. — C. H. Dibbern. 



I do not think that any one knows. 

 I should prefer to have the apiaries at 

 least five miles apart. — A. J. Cook. 



I suppose that six miles would be 

 considered a safe distance. — Mahala 

 B. Chaddock. 



I cannot say positively, but I would 

 hate to risk them any nearer than five 

 miles. — J. M. Hambaugh. 



I think that three miles is a safe dis- 

 tance. Others will put it further, but 

 I think that they are mistaken. — G. 

 W. Demaree. 



That puts me in mind of a question 

 once asked as to how far apart Lom- 

 bardy poplar trees should be set. The 

 i-eply was 50 miles. That about an- 

 swers this query. Not that bees will 



fly 25 miles, but with runaway swarms 

 flying 8 to 10 miles, as I have known 

 them to do, anj^ one can readily see 

 how liable to mix they may be, when 

 we think that they are at a safe dis- 

 tance. — Eugene Secor. 



I do not know. Consult the back 

 volumes of the American Bee Jour- 

 nal, and the standard works on bee- 

 culture. — A. B. Mason. 



To make the matter certain, I would 

 not want them nearer than five miles. 

 I have reason to believe that they will 

 sometimes cross at that distance. — M. 

 Mahin. 



From four to five miles ; though I 

 am inclined to think that three miles 

 would practifally insure no inter-cross- 

 ing. — Will M. Barnum. 



Some think half a mile, and more 

 think two miles or more. Possibly the 

 shorter distance may be nearer right. 

 — C. C. Miller. 



I do not know. Cross-mating may 

 occur if the two apiaries are a hundred 

 miles apart. The woods are full of 

 bees, and the wild bees cannot be con- 

 trolled. Satisfactory results have been 

 obtained were the apiaries were five or 

 six miles apart. — J. M. Shuck. 



About seven miles. The queen, in 

 my opinion, never flies far from the 

 hive, but the drones make long flights 

 on warm days, when the air is still. If jj 

 the the apiarist does not mind an oc- v 

 casional hybrid, it will do to locate the 

 apiaries thi-ee miles apart. — G. L. 

 Tinker. 



At least three miles ; at 2J miles 1 

 have had them mix. Four miles in a 

 direct or " bee-line " would be pref- 

 erable to myself. — J. E. Pond. 



We should not feel safe if they were 

 nearer than five miles — though in some 

 localities they may be nearer and not 

 deteriorate. — The Editor. 



Convention IVotices. 



1W There will be a meeting of the Susquehanna 

 County Bee-Keepers' Association at TarbeU House 

 in Montrose, Pa., on Saturday, May 4, i hh9, at 10 a.in. 

 H. M. Seelet, Sec. 



IW The DesMoines County, Iowa, Bee-Keepers* 

 Association will hold its annua) convention in the 

 Court House at Burlington, on April l';j. 1889, at 10 

 a. m. All bee-keepers are invited. John Nac, Sec, 



JW The 11th annual session of the Texas State 

 Bee-Keepers' Association will be held in the apiary 

 of W. R. Graham, of Greenville, Hunt Co., Tex., on 

 May 1 and 2, 188y. All bee-lieepers are invited. The 

 last meeting was held here last May, and was the 

 best ever held. So we look forward to a good time 

 next May. A cordial welcome and hospitality will 

 be tendered to all who come. G. A. Wilson, See. 



many Pliysicians are among our 

 subscribers, and to such we may say that 

 one of our valued correspondents, G. P. 

 Hachenberg, M. D., intends to publish a 

 new medical work, called a "Medical Con- 

 sultation Book," which will be very valu- 

 able to physicians everywhere. He will 

 send a prospectus upon application. His 

 address is, P. 0. Box 616, Austin, Texas. 



