104 



IRE AMERICAN BEE-KEEPER. 



tiuu , and as soon as I found the queen 

 in the upper hive and laying, to set 

 the upper hive on the stand in place 

 of the lower one, which I moved off 

 to a distance, thinking there might be 

 a queen cell in the lower hive, and 

 that it would be all right. So I put 

 hives on five, one of which was a Sim- 

 plicity tnat I purchased a year ago, 

 and four of them were those of my 

 own make, which, by the way, if they 

 were the same leugth as your Dove- 

 tailed hive I would prefer to any other 

 hive I have, and I have some Dove- 

 tailed hives of your own manufacture. 

 The result was, that in three of the 

 hives they worked into the top hives, 

 and in the other two they did not. 

 The first two hives in which I noticed 

 the queen at work I set on the stands, 

 but set the lower hive at a distance. 

 I lost both the lower colonies. The 

 three, which I divided after having 

 lost the first two, I did not move to a 

 distance, but moved the lower hive suf- 

 ficient to set the upper hive where the 

 lower one was. Both came out all 

 right. Now why lose the first two? 

 Either the moving to a distance, which 

 I think was the reason, or not moving 

 soon enough after the queen had 

 taken possession of the upper store 

 was the cause of the loss. 



Bees did nothing here last year, 

 either in increase or honey. Three- 

 fifths of the bees put into winter 

 quarters last fall are dead this spring. 

 One of my neighbors who had in the 

 fall nine swarms now has two. Two 

 who had five now have two each. An- 

 other who had quite a number now 

 has three left. Another a few miles 

 distant who had sixty swarms now 

 has ten. I passed an apiary the other 

 day, about seven miles from here, 



consisting of some fifty hives. I 

 stopped to examine it and found the 

 owner. Upon inquiry I found that he 

 had in the fall forty-three colonies, 

 and there was not a dozen bees flying 

 about when I was there. The owner 

 stated that he did not know how many 

 he had lost, but thought it was about 

 thirty. 



In reading the articles to the Bee- 

 Keeper, noticing how well bees are 

 doing in some localities, and some 

 other things that are not as bees are 

 are with us, then glancing at the bot- 

 tom and finding that the article is 

 from Missouri, Virginia, Maryland, or 

 some of the states south of us, while 

 we have from our climate something 

 about "Box vs. Frames," and some- 

 thing in regard to foundation, etc., 

 but not enough in regard to what is 

 best to do for the safety of bees in our 

 latitude. From what I read I have 

 come to the conclusion that people do 

 not know one-half as much about bees 

 as they think. 



I noticed a piece from some writer 

 that granulated sugar is not the kind 

 to make syrup for bees. Why not? 

 He says because it will granulate. 

 Root says 20 pounds of sugar to one 

 gallon of water is just right. So fol- 

 lowing his theory to feed this spring, 

 I took my sugaring-off pan and put it 

 on the stove and put in a gallon of 

 boiling water and then put in seven- 

 teen pounds of granulated sugar, and 

 according to Root, stirred it until it 

 came to a boil and took it off. As 

 soon a.- it was cold enough I put it 

 into glass cans and tied pieces of 

 cheese cloth over the top and turned 

 them bottom up on the. frames to feed 

 towards night. The next afternoon 

 I examined them and found that each 



