214 



THE AMERICAN APICULTURIST. 



fornia means better prices all around, 

 now that foreigners are finding out 

 what a good thing American honey 

 is — to take. " Reports from all quar- 

 ters of southern California agree that 

 while the bees are in good coiidition, 

 they have not stored much if any 

 surplus honey, and in some localities 

 they have actually reduced their 

 stores very materially. The cool 

 nights and windy days of the past 

 month have not been favorable to 

 the development of honey-producing 

 flowers or the secretion of nectar. 

 Both sorts of the sages are in bloom, 

 but they afford little honey as yet, and 

 what is stored is not in any respect 

 equal to the honey obtained in the 

 same sections last year at this date. 

 The low price of honey quoted in 

 all the markets is not encouraging, 

 but the values of other commodities 

 are about on a par with honey. 

 Sugar competes somewhat with 

 honey, and the price of that article 

 points still downward in the princi- 

 pal marts of the world, and it is not 

 reasonable to suppose that honey 

 will advance in price very materially, 

 until sugar regains its lost ground to 

 some considerable extent, not only 

 in the United States, but in Europ- 

 ean countries where a very large 

 quantity of our last year's crop of 

 honey found customers, who paid 

 better prices for our product than 

 could be obtained at home, or on the 

 east of the mountains." — A. B.J. 



Women as beekeepers, by Re- 

 becca Harding Davis. — The advan- 

 tages of both beekeeping and poultry 

 raising as an employment for women 

 are great for these reasons : 



I. They can be followed at home. 

 Whether on a farm or in town, or 

 even in a city, if you can have the 

 ground necessary to set the hives, it 

 is all the land you need. No matter 

 if you do not own the land, or, if 

 your lot is small, a place can easily 

 be made on the roof of a house, shed 

 or barn. 



2. It is not necessary in the case 

 of bees to raise anything for their sup- 

 port. There is not a home in the 

 country where this need be done for 

 a few hives. 



3. Any woman or girl can not only 

 make honey boxes, but the hives 

 themselves, as these can now be 

 bought all ready to nail together, so 

 that putting them up and painting 

 them require no strength. 



4. The capital necessary to com- 

 mence with is small. 



The little time required for their 

 care can be secured without interfer- 

 ing with other occupations. A 

 mother can care for her children 

 while she attends to her bees. (My 

 own successful work with bees was 

 done with an infant in my arms, or in 

 a baby carriage, and the other chil- 

 dren barely able to play alone, but all 

 the time within reach of my voice.) 

 A teacher can care for her bees out 

 of school hours, and after she has a 

 start, make more from them than from 

 her other work. We have in mind 

 teachers who have also found health 

 in the out-door air and exercise which 

 their bees gave them. 



5 . There is a fascination about the 

 business which relieves all its tedium. 

 A woman will think of her bees, study 

 about them, and become so interest- 

 ed as to be almost paid for her work 

 by the love of it. 



QVESrWA'S AND AN8WEBS.' 



ANSWKKS 15Y G. W. DEMARHK. 



1. When T did my first Italianizing 

 I knew nothing- of the modern science 

 of queen-rearing. I removed the 

 queen from a strong colony, and seven 

 days afterward destroyed all the queen 

 ceils, and again on the tenth day from 

 the day I removed the queen, I looked 

 all the combs over and destroyed every- 

 thing in the sh.ipe of queen cells — mak- 

 ing sure that no unsealed larv8e were 



'These answers to questions in last month's 

 issue came too late for insertion in that num- 

 ber. 



