1872.] 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



15 



[For the American Bee Journal.] 



Novice. 



Dbar Bke Journal : — Apple trees have blos- 

 somed and gone, and for two or tree days gave 

 us considerable honey. Locust trees have also 

 been loaded with blossoms, and although the 

 weather has been very favorable, no honey, or 

 none of any account, was collected ; of course the 

 bees worked on them, and many hearing their 

 joyous hum and seeing the great numbers at 

 work, said, accordingly, they were doing finely, 

 but a careful scrutiny of the interior of the hives 

 showed, as it often does, that the bees were 

 doing all they could, but each day's labor hardly 

 produced enough to feed the countless thousands 

 of "little ones." 



Abundant rains brought white clover in abun- 

 dance, but even that failed to give the accustomed 

 results until yesterday and to-day, June 12th 

 and 13th. 



We had really began to think that we were at 

 last to have a sample of Gall up' s poor season 

 two years ago (by the way, will some one tell 

 me what Mr. Hosmer did that season, as he 

 seems from his offers to defy alike bad seasons 

 and good j, but at the rate honey is coming now, 

 we fear we shall have no such opportunity for 

 experiments. 



To go back to the locust trees, we remember 

 only one good season for them, 1870, when we 

 got about 1000 pounds locust honey, and since 

 then we have had two of which locust trees 

 would hardly bear classing with honey-yielding 

 plants. 



It has been many times suggested that we 

 plant a locust forest instead of basswood, but 

 basswood we have proved and tested, and we 

 think it never fails entirely, and on the whole 

 produces more honey than all other sources to- 

 gether. 



Our young forest is now under the influence 

 of cultivation and bone dust, just shaking their 

 bright leaves in the breeze as if they would say, 

 " whaifun it is for us to grow ! " 



Our queen or queen worker mentioned last 

 month laid about (j inches square of brood, con- 

 siderable of which was drone, and then tapered 

 oft' and slid away somewhere, leaving her small 

 family to do the best they could, and so saved 

 us the trouble of pinching her out of the world, 

 to make room for some one who would preside 

 with a greater capacity for leplenishing the 

 empty cells provided for her. 



There certainly would have been no difficulty 

 in deciding, as Mr. Laugstroth says in his excel- 

 lent article, page 207, that such a queen as she 

 appeared when first hatched would probably be 

 quite inferior. 



In fact, our yield of honey has been furnished 

 a greater part of it from comparatively few hives, 

 and a few also furnish but very little ; and we 

 think the greatest reason is the difference in the 

 capacity of the queens ; but the fact stands out 

 very plain and prominent, that our wry best are 

 just as often raised in small stocks or with but 

 few combs or bees, and our artificial queens are 

 "certainly the best. One reason may be that they 



are always reared from our choicest queens, and 

 natural queens are raised as they happen. 



We keep our queens generously until their 

 third year, and some until the fourth, when very 

 prolific. 



We are very sorry to see such hard words pass 

 between Mr. Price and Mr. Dad ant, and feel 

 sure that both gentlemen are much better men 

 than they would persuade us. In the heat of 

 argument, both are speaking stronger than they 

 mean. Voluntary mistakes, we think, will apply 

 to Mr. Price as well as Mr. Dadant. See p. 78, 

 vol. 6, also. 



Mr. Price has been referred to before, and must 

 have known that Novice makes an apparent con- 

 tradiction, and to be honest, why does he not 

 mention that such is the case? The last state- 

 ment was made carelessly while we were writing 

 with another topic in view. Nearly all of our 

 Grimm queens were used to replace queens 

 whose progeny were too near black, some quite 

 young and prolific, so much so that we have 

 since regretted replacing them. 



And Mr. Dadant, if you would allow us to ad- 

 vise, we should ask him to send Mr. Price a 

 queen to be paid for only when and at what price 

 he will think fair and just. Mr. Price will do 

 what is rijdit and just, we know hn will. There 

 is quarrelling enough outside ; please let us have 

 no more in "'our family," be it ever so large. 



Mr. Gallup comes down honestly and says he 

 thinks the same result might be obtained with 

 regular Laugstroth frames, and promises direc- 

 tions for using his principle with the Langstroth 

 frame. We really believe his "hitting us" has 

 something the same effect as the parent who 

 punishes only to "make the child better." If 

 we don't "get better," we certainly get some 

 new ideas, and they don't hurt at all. Many 

 thanks, Mr. Gallup ! 



The best colony in all our apiary, we believe, 

 is in a two-story hive, frames one foot square 

 (not the Gallup hive), and they are really pretty 

 to handle, just the thing for ladies to handle, 

 but for some other reasons we prefer the shallow 

 frame. 



The queen of the colony just mentioned is 

 two years old, and was raised from four combs 

 of brood only, no bees at all. The combs were 

 put in an empty hive over night, and next day, 

 very warm weather, so many young bees had 

 hatched out, that we let them go, and they alone 

 raised a queen, and that queen, now just about 

 two years old, we pronounce the must proljie in 

 our apiary. "How is that for high," or rather 

 for Price? We have raised queens the same way 

 before, but it didn't always work. We dislike 

 the bother of cutting out queen cells. Can't 

 some other " Yankee " assist us in devjNing 

 some arrangement for keeping queens in then- 

 cells twelve or twenty-four hours after they are 

 hatched, so that we may save them ail. Our 

 device of late years answers, if sufficient care Is 

 used, but they are too cumberous aoo clumsy. 



After they are hatched, we do this way : Take 

 a comb or two of brood from any hive, and the 

 younj,' queen and a few young bees from her 

 own hive, and all introducing is done. When 

 she lays, give them three or four more frames 



