Feb. 23, 1905. 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



149 



Cast 'round a mist of spicy fumes. 



Thus kindly tempt the famished swarm to eat 



And gently reconcile them to their meat. 



TREATMENT AND REMEDIES. 



"Remove the cause, and the effect ceases." Practically 

 all the various methods of cure of the infectious diseases of 

 bees adopt this maxim more or less thoroughly. The various 

 starvation methods aim at g^etting rid of the infected honey 

 and the infected combs. The method of conquering the dis- 

 ease by feeding medicated syrups aims at the destruction of 

 the vegetating bacteria, or preventing them from growing and 

 the spores from developing. At the same time the action of 

 the medicine may in some way exercise a tonic effect upon the 

 bees. Treatment by means of disinfection by formalin or 

 other vapor destroys the greater amount of infecting material 

 which is present in the hives and in the comb, relying upon 

 the natural resistance of the bees to get rid of any micro- 

 organisms that may be present in or upon them. The bene- 

 ficial results obtained from any of these methods depend upon 

 the thoroughness with which they are carried out. 



Thus we have numerous instances of the starvation 

 method failing, because of failure to disinfect the hive. Medi- 

 cated syrups often fail because of methods of application; 

 the use of weak or feeble drugs, and not using the medicine 

 for a sufficiently long period at a time. 



We have also occasional instances of the failure of the 

 formalin treatment, perhaps due to improper methods of 

 application, not using strong enough formalin, or not disin- 

 fecting the combs and hives in an air-tight box. These fail- 

 ures should not be counted against the method of treatment, 

 for I am convinced that anyone of these methods, if prop- 

 erly and conscientiously carried out, will cure even the worst 

 case of foul brood, which of all the infectious bee diseases is 

 the most difficult disease to deal with. 



It remains for each bee-keeper to decide for himself as 

 to the method of treatment he intends to follow, and having 

 made up his mind, he should carry out that treatment intelli- 

 gently and thoroughly. F. C. Harrison. 



HOW TO manage the BEES. 



"A Season with the Bees and How to Manage Them," 

 by A. E. Hoshal, was next on the program. This was an 

 illustrated talk in which the speaker had the hive and imple- 

 ments with which to show just how he did the various things 

 described. He spoke to beginners rather than to old heads. 

 There had been three main systems of bee-keeping — the 

 box -hive system, the movable-frame system, and the case sys- 

 tem. The old-fashioned way required no description. The 

 second had for its root-principle the manipulation of indi- 

 vidual combs. The third was a system of manipulating cases 

 instead of combs. Mr. Hoshal believes the case system to 

 be the best. The first week in June go out to the yard with 

 smoker and veil. Get a good smoker; an experienced man 

 can do with a poor smoker better than a beginner. You 

 will soon discard the veil. Unpack the bees from their win- 

 ter boxes. Some will have double-case brood-chambers, some 

 single. When the honey starts, put on a slatted honey- 

 board and another case. A single brood-chamber colony will 

 give as much honey as a double brood-chamber colony in a 

 short season. 



A deep-frame hive gives tlie top third of comb filled 

 with honey. The honey will be crowded downward as the 

 season advances. The shallower the frame the less honey 

 is stored in its upper part. With the Heddon cases the honey 

 can be raised and empty combs put right over the brood. 

 These shallow cases with narrow top and bottom bars to 

 frames are accepted more readily than deeper ones. Then 

 the narrow top and bottom bars admit of seeing right through 

 between the combs to see the exact condition of things 

 without handling the individual combs. 



For clipping queens, about the 8th or 10th of June 

 drive the bees up out of the lower case and through the 

 excluder. The queen will be found on the top bars or on the 

 under side of the excluder. It is an advantage to clip when 

 the flow is on, as a smaller percentage of queens is lost. 

 Then the queen is returned to the empty lower case where 

 there are no bees to ball her. 



When swarming-time comes, have hive ready with two 

 cases, one empty and the other filled with combs. Catch 

 the queen in a cage when she comes out. Lift off the supers. 

 Set the hive off the stand and the new one in its place. Put 

 the supers on the swarm. Close the entrance of the parent 

 hive with grass. In a few days take out the empty case 



from underneath and give plenty of super-room. In the 

 parent-hive are queen-cells and danger of after-swarms. In 

 8 or 10 days shift the parent hive so as to throw the flying 

 workers into the swarm. 



Spring management consists in having good queens, plenty 

 of stores, warmth, and let alone. 



Towards the end of the season remove the honey with 

 escapes. Be careful not to take all the honey. Leave the 

 lower surplus case. For winter, unite weak colonies in July 

 as soon as the flow is over. Set one on the other; don't care 

 if old bees are killed. The brood is what counts. Each hive 

 must weigh 50 pounds if double ; if a single case, 40 pounds. 

 Make up shortage by feeding in the fall. In spring let se- 

 verely alone. Much handling in spring causes loss of queens. 

 Note the importance of having the brood-chamber shallow 

 and filled with brood. 



Mr. W. J. Craig then read a paper on 



THE INFLUENCE OF BEE JOURNALS. 



Considering the subject of the influence. of bee-journals 

 broadly, we may rightly apply much of what has been said, 

 and can be said, of the influence of current literature gen- 

 erally. We live in an age of literature, an age when people 

 read a great deal and think a great deal, and whether in the 

 form of newspaper, magazine, book or pamphlet, such reading 

 must necessarily wield a large influence over the individual 

 and community, in the formation of opinion, the moulding 

 of character, and the regulation of action. 



Bee books and journals have taken their distinctive place 

 among the literature of the world. From recent statistics we 

 find that there are over eighty magazines devoted exclusively 

 to bee-keeping. France leads the way with 19, Germany 11, 

 Russia 9, Belgium 9, United States 7, Austria 6, Italy 3; 

 England, Spain, Algiers and Australia 2 each ; Denmark, 

 Switzerland, Sweden, Norway, Holland, Romania, Nederland, 

 Ireland and Canada, one each. 



These magazines must, as a matter of course, have an 

 effect upon the bee-keeping of the many thousands of readers 

 they represent ; all of them advocating better bee-keeping, bet- 

 ter systems of management, better marketing, presenting new 

 theories, reporting new discoveries and inventions, vieing 

 with each other in original matter from the best authorities, 

 and in carefully-selected matter from the most reliable 

 sources, standing up for the right and exposing and de- 

 nouncing the fraudulent and the wrong. 



All this can be truly said of present-day bee-journals; 

 they are, in brief, doing all that they possibly can do for the 

 furtherance and development of the bee-keeping industry. 

 This statement may no doubt be questioned by those who 

 consider the motive of the bee-journal always a selfish one, 

 and that it exists merely for the sake of direct gain to the 

 publisher, or a desirable adjunct to his business. Such view 

 is narrow, and mean, and selfish in itself. None of the 

 journals that we know of are making a fortune; in fact, some 

 of them would have gone out of existence long ago had it 

 not been for the substantial financial support of their pub- 

 lishers. 



Guide-books and hand-books on general management 

 are good and useful as references, or for the beginner in lay- 

 ing a foundation of sound apicultural knowledge, but if the 

 novice is to advance, with advancing thought and advancing 

 methods, he must have access to current bee-literature. The 

 bee-keeper's column of the newspaper or agricultural maga- 

 zine, no matter how well conducted, cannot be satisfactory 

 to the bee-keeper who would make a success of his bee- 

 keeping, and can never take the place of the journal devoted 

 exclusively to apiculture ; in fact, the most dangerous and 

 obstinate heresies that bee-keepers have had to contend with 

 have issued from these sources. 



Local conditions and requirements, apart from loyalty 

 to State or Country, make the support of the local repre- 

 sentative magazine of first importance ; then as many others 

 as the bee-keeper feels he can afford. Unfortunately the 

 great mass of small bee-keepers do not seem to have a proper 

 estimate of the value of apicultural information ; they are in- 

 terested to a very small extent — "only a few hives for their 

 own use," they tell us ; but somehow more or less of their 

 ill-favored product finds it way on the market, to the detri- 

 ment of the excellent article placed there by the intelligent 

 producer. There are probably upwards of 8,000 such bee- 

 keepers in our own Dominion, whose bee-keeping is of the 

 crudest character. 



Our Canadian publication needs the cooperation of this 

 Association much more than it has been favored with. There 



