144 



THE AMERICAN APICULTURIST. 



covers of the hives. Some hieroglyph- 

 ics of my own devising indicate to me 

 what the cases contain, be they sec- 

 tions or shallow frames for extracting. 

 Well, when it is desirable to know the 

 condition of the surplus department, 

 all I have to do is to shove the cover of 

 the hive to one side, turn up the 

 corner of the quilt, when a little smoke 

 causes the bees to retreat downward 

 exposing to view the white finished, 

 or unfinished combs, as the case may 

 be. The work is rapidly performed. 



[Through some inexplicable cause, 

 Mr. Demaree, in answer to questions 

 in last number of the Journal, was 

 made to say what he did not intend, and 

 which materially changed the meaning 

 he intended to convey, viz. : in No. 6, 

 5th line, " prevents " should read " per- 

 mits;" in No. 9, 4th line, "passed" 

 should be " pressed " and 5th line " ex- 

 periment" should be "implement." 

 We will endeavor to be more careful 

 in the future. — Ed.] 



ought to be punished with wormy 

 honey. Unless moths are specially plen- 

 tiful, I do not consider sections much 

 in danger, if delayed a little in transit 

 between hive and honey-room. My 

 crop in 1882 was the wormiest I have 

 had, but no more worms developed 

 themselves during the summer of 1883, 

 although quite a lot of the sections 

 were kept over in a room that moths 

 could get into if they wanted to. Bees 

 were getting in continually and a 

 general raid was only prevented by 

 the fact that they always went to the 

 window. 



4. Swarming fever with me is so in- 

 curable, that I do not think it pays to 

 take oft' sections to examine the con- 

 dition of the brood nest. A general 

 overhauling of the colony incites to 

 swarming, I think. If some brood is 

 removedto discourage swarming, per- 

 chance it only does about as much 

 good as the disturbance has done 

 mischief. Better let them swarm if 

 they will ; I think they will do it any- 

 way. 



ANSWERS BY E. E HASTY. 



1. Being an utter and incorrigible 

 heretic on the convention question, 

 perhaps it is hardly worth while to trot 

 out my views. 'Spects I should abol- 

 ish conventions altogether, and in 

 place of them systematize friendly vis- 

 iting of one another's apiaries. 



2. I think Italians do store honey 

 more readily by the side of the brood 

 nest, both early and late; but my 

 Italian fever has run its course, and I 

 no longer keep pure Italians. Well- 

 bred hybrids and blacks are so free to 

 put honey above, whenever there is 

 any to store, that my present practice 

 is to give no side sections whatever, 

 and take all surplus from the top. 

 Storing in the brood-combs below 

 seems not to come much in vogue 

 among my bees until a sort of present- 

 iment of approaching winter comes 

 over them. 



3. My experience with moth-worms 

 in sections is that they almost always 

 originate in a stray cell of pollen. I 

 feel convinced that the moth has lea rued 

 to lay its eggs on the stigmas of 

 flowers, and that the bees gather and 

 bring home moth eggs with the pol- 

 len. ' The apiarist who lets moths 

 breed in thousands on his domains. 



LETTER BOX. 



Sterling, April, 1884. 



Dear Sir: 



Bees have wintered well here: 

 they flew last November about the fif- 

 teenth and did not get another fly until 

 about March 15. They have gathered 

 pollen only one day in April, as the 

 weather has been very cold. We win- 

 tered our bees on the summer stands 

 in chafl" hives on Langstroth frames. 

 I find that bees winter in single-walled 

 hives with division board on sides just 

 as well as when in chafl' hives; also 

 side packing in chafl" hives is not essen- 

 tial and I cannot see any particular 

 ditt'erence between covering the combs 

 with coarse bagging or with cloth that 

 is covered with propolis so that no 

 air can escape through it. The great 

 secret of wintering bees is to get 

 ready for winter before winter comes, 

 and have young bees and plenty of 

 honey and then there is no trouble 

 about wintering. 



W. R. Crockett. 



