10(5 



THE AMERICAN BEE-KEEPER 



June 



near the outside of the liive, and the 

 drone-comb is near the top bar of the 

 frame, you will not have to decapitate 

 the drones more than two or three times 

 during the season, for the queen will be 

 slow ill depositing eggs in it; and when 

 honey comes in so the bees begin to pre- 

 pare for winter stores, they will fill it 

 with honey, thus keeping the queen 

 from depositing any more eggs in it that 

 season. 



If, in addition to the above, the top 

 bar to the frame, directly over this spot 

 of drone-comb is painted white or red, 

 you will know just where this comb is, 

 without taxing your memory with the 

 matter; and this will tell you exactly 

 where such frames are, should they be- 

 come displaced at any time through 

 your manipulations, by way of spread- 

 ing of the brood, giving colonies which 

 ar3 short of stores framas of honey, etc. 

 All of these little things, when known 

 and practiced, make up the "mickle'" 

 of successful bee-keeping. 



Borodino, N. Y. 



Mine be a cot beside the bill; 

 A beshive's bum shall soothe uiy ear; 



A willowy brook that turns a milL 

 With many a fall shall linger near. 



— Sam' I Rogers?.. 



EXTRACrS FROM FOREIGN BEE 

 LITERATURE WITH COMMENTS. 



BY 1". GKlilXER. 



IT is stated in Imke^-"s RundscJuiu that 

 a single corolla of red clover con- 

 tains one-eighth milligram nectar. 

 A honey-bee may carry at one load sixty- 

 two milligrams. Before such a load is 

 deposited in the hive we can calculate 

 that the 62 mg. raw nectar have been 

 reduced to about 40 mg. by the bees 

 (extracting the superfluous water. It 

 has been found that a single cell of 

 store-comb holds about four hundred mg. 

 of honey or about one-sixtieth ounce, 

 thus requiring ten full bee-loads to fill 

 it. One million such loads would weigh 

 four kilograms or about 9M pounds. It 

 would not be unreasoiuiblc to suppose 



that a very populou'? colony of bees could 

 send out enough workers in one day to 

 gather a million loads in an e.'ctra good 

 honey-flow. 



The Centnd BUM recommends air- 

 slacked lime for driving away ants, 

 which become very troublesome at times. 

 They like to locate in the space between 

 the inner and outer walls of chafl! hives. 

 The lime will be cheaper than the in- 

 sect powder I have used to drive the 

 ants away. 



An old skep of bees — more than a 

 centenarian. The [Viener Blencnvater, 

 reports that an old bee-keeper in Phanz- 

 wirbach is in possession of a skep of 

 bees 133 years old. It is said the bees 

 have never died out, nor has the comb 

 ever been renewed. 



I cannot trace the age of any of my 

 colonies to more than twenty years. In 

 18S1 I stocked up two peculiarly built 

 hives, one a single story chaff hive the 

 other a double walled hive after Crerman, 

 pattern. These two hives have had bees 

 in them ever since and wintered them 

 without exception exceptionally well 

 each winter. 



Our industrial hen is accused in the i 

 Central, Blatt as an enemy of the honey- 1 

 bee, having been caught eating them. 



I believe this is a mistake. Fowls 

 may learn to catch drones, but nevci- 

 workers, and I have never known but a 

 few to learn the trick. All fowls learn 

 to like drone-brood. When I had plenty 

 of it I used to feed it to them and it may ; 

 be they thus became accustomed to feed- 

 ing on matured drones. It was at this 

 time that I observed young, nearly 

 grown cockerels picking up drones as 

 they alighted on the boards. Sometimes 

 these venturesome hunters "all of a sud- 

 den'' made haste to get under cover { 

 somewhere, but they were seen again at j 

 their old game afterward as long as the j 

 drones lasted. 



From the Lcipzigcr Bienen Zcitniuj . . 



