60 



TUB AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



[Sept., 



[For the American Bee Journal. J 



Mortality of Bees in Illinois. 



There has been great destruction among bees 

 in this country. Hundreds of beekeepers have 

 lost from one-half to all they had during last 

 winter and spring. Full seven- eighths of the 

 number that went into winter quarters have 

 perished and have generally left plenty of honey. 

 1 am quite satisfied that this wholesale destruc- 

 tion was mostly from bad management, or 

 rather from no management at all. 



I will give my experience in preparing for the 

 winter. I gave a brief account of our honey 

 season of 1871, in A. B. J., vol. 7, p. 135. It 

 was in the forepart of September that I found 

 the crisis was coming, for the honey drouth of 

 July and August was so severe, that the bees 

 were consuming more honey than they were 

 gathering, and that the queens had nearly ceased 

 laying. Early in September, I found they were 

 gathering honey very fast from Smart weed 

 (Polygonum Hydropiper L.\ and were filling 

 the brood cells, leaving but small spaces for 

 queens to lay their eggs in. I concluded at once 

 that if permitted to go on thus, I would soon run 

 out of bees. Having previously obtained a 

 Hru-chka from the National Bee Hive Company, 

 of St. Charles, Illinois, I commenced extracting 

 the honey out of the chamber, and supplying 

 the upper chamber with empty combs, and 1 

 use the two-story Longstroth hive. This soon 

 gave the queens room for laying, of which they 

 soon availed themselves, keeping the stocks up 

 to full standard. By this means they were fully 

 prepared for winter both in bees and honey. 

 When the time came to fix them up for winter- 

 ing, I prepared them as I stated in my former 

 letter, and they came through all right, in the 

 spring without the loss of a swarm. Since I 

 have adopted wintering them on their summer 

 stand with proper protection, they have not 

 been troubled with dysentery. 



This season has been very dry, and the honey 

 producing plants have yielded but little nectar. 

 If the fall pasturage does not prove abundant, 

 like last year, we will have to feed our bees for 

 next winter. 



T would like to have correspondents give the 

 name of their county, as well as their State and 

 post oflice. I would be glad if every beekeeper 

 passing this way would give me a call. My fare, 

 though humble, is always free to such. If they 

 cannot learn something maybe I can. Send on 

 the Bee Journal. We are never too weary to 

 read it. 



H. W. Wixom. 



Mendo'a, La Salle Co., 111., July 20, 1872. 



[For the American Bee Journal.] 



Imprudence of Beeking. 



In the July number of the Bee Journal, is 

 an article with the above caption (which by the 

 way, should have been headed Impudence of bee- 

 keepers), which contains some right and some 

 wrong. As a general rule only successes are 



reported, and every year many poor victims 

 dazzled by the idea of clearing $40 or $50 per 

 swarm, go into the business only to be disgusted 

 with it. The harm done is not to the beekeepers 

 but to the victims. Let both be fairly reported, let 

 them have some idea of the amount of sweating 

 they will have to do in handling bees in hot days, 

 of the number of stings to be endured even from 

 "amiable" Italians; of the number of disap- 

 pointments and vexations when the bees will do 

 just the reverse of what is desired or expected, 

 and then let them know that if they fight 

 through all this, read good books and papers, 

 and learn the trade, there is honey for them. I 

 have no interest in keeping bees, only pleasure 

 and honey. I have neither bees, hives, nor 

 queens to sell, but so long as millions of dollars 

 worth of honey goes to waste ever year, for want 

 of bees to gather it, we should be large hearted 

 enough to desire the greatest good to the greatest 

 number. 



But is it true that we shall suffer by having 

 new comers in the field? Is there less money to 

 be made in honey now than when less were 

 gathering it? Compare the price of honey in the 

 comb in different sections with the price ten or 

 twenty years ago. Years ago the same cry was 

 raised about fruit, "the market will be over- 

 stocked and it will bring nothing." To-day I 

 cannot buy any fruit for less than three or four 

 times the price I could when a boy, in the same 

 place. I want enough intelligent beekeepers to 

 come into the field, so that a regular market may 

 be established not subject to great fluctuations ; 

 so that a staple article, found on the table of the 

 poor as well as the rich, not oidy when company 

 comes, but as a regular article of diet. 



C. C. Miller. 



Marengo, III. 



[For the American Bee Journal.] 



Bee Notes from Morrison, 111. 



Mr. Edit r : — In the May number of your 

 Journal, "B" heads an article "Dronings," 

 and takes out a patent on the caption, but gives 

 his readers no specifications or limits ; now I 

 wish to find a little fault, or rather make a sug- 

 gestion to the Editor of the Journal — that to 

 beekeepers a most valuable requisite would be a 

 department of " hints." * * * * 



The spring has been cold and backward — 

 business anions the bees has made but slow 

 progress with what few we have left — a great 

 disaster having befallen beekeepers in this region 

 and left many yards empty of their joyous 

 workers — where last season stood many hives 

 of industry, can now be seen standing or lying 

 around the monuments of departed sweetness ; 

 many apiaries are gone entirely. 



Of 35 good stocks last fall, I came out this 

 spring with two, one in a box and one in a 

 frame hive. One of my neighbors lost 50, all he 

 had. A man near me that does not believe in 

 the science of bee-culture, and does nothing but 

 let his bees alone, only lost one out of nine, all in 

 old box hives, and black bees, and standing out 



