1873.] 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



177 



As before stated I have been successful in winter- 

 ing my stocks, and I have given as briefly as possi- 

 ble, consistent with clearness (and possibly too much 

 so) a description of my winter bee-house, in the 

 hope that some brother bee-keeper may be benefited 

 thereby. The plan given is for the least outlay of 

 means, believing it will best meet the wants of the 

 masses, but may be made as expensive and ornamen- 

 tal as the means and fancy of the owner may desire. 



The winter of 1871 and 1872, will long be remem- 

 bered for the dysentery, which like a pestilence 

 swept so many thousands of colonies from the earth, 

 but it did not come nigh my bee-dwelling, although 

 in December there was added to my stock already 

 there, eight colonies from what afterwards proved 

 to be one of the worst affected districts in Chautau- 

 que county. One of said stocks when brought to 

 my apiary on the 18th of December had not the 

 most agreeable smell, but I had no trouble with them 

 after placing them in comfortable quarters. Two 

 things we regard as requisite in successfully win- 

 tering bees in this latitude (42°): 



1st. A properly constructed wintering house. 



2nd. A judicious management of the same in 

 controling the air currents. To illustrate, when the 

 temperature of the atmosphere rises to near the 

 degree generated by the bees inside their winter 

 quarters, there would be but a moderate circulation 

 of air with both ventilators open, but let the tem- 

 perature change to zero, and a continuous current of 

 air would pass in at the lower and out at the upper 

 ventilator, rapidly carrying off the heat generated 

 by the bees. By closing both ventilators this cur- 

 rent would be arrested and the requisite warmth 

 retained. 



The objection sometimes made that it is too much 

 labor to carry the bees into, and out of a wintering 

 house, is not of much force. I usually take a day 

 to carry in one hundred stocks, but if necessary 

 could put in that number in three hours. 



W. J. Davis. 



Yoimgsville, Pa., Dec. 1872. 



[For the American Bee Journal.] 



Bees in Warren County, 111, 



Me. Editor: — The season in this locality was 

 only moderate ; during the blooming of white 

 clover it yielded honey but for a short time, and 

 but little honey was stored in boxes even by the 

 Italians ; the blacks gathered none. The latter 

 part of August and to the middle of Sept. the 

 Italians averaged twenty-five pounds to the stock — 

 gathered from fall flowers. One man having 22 

 stocks, all black but one, and it a hybrid, ob- 

 tained from the blacks no box honey — from the 

 hybrid 40 lbs. In Jersey county, where I spent 

 the summer rearing queens, the season was a poor 

 one for honey. The drouth has been so severe for 

 the past two years that white clover has almost died 

 out. During the month of June my bees gathered 

 a very dark colored and poor quality of honey, 

 similar to "honey dew." I think it was gathered 

 from sumach, (Rhus Glatrnm). The comb built 

 from it was very white and nice. They also gath- 

 ered just enough honey from spearmint to give 

 almost all the honey gathered that flavor. In 

 August they gathered honey just fast enough to 



keep up breeding rapidly and get up the swarming 

 fever. 



On page 92 Mr. Gartman inquires as to whether 

 in getting queen cells started breeders always 

 change the queen. Novice, on page 122, advises 

 him to "swap frames with a queenless stock." 

 He may be so unfortunate, or fortunate, as to have 

 frames of different sizes ; in this case let the bees 

 "swap" hives. I would inquire if any of your 

 readers ever received any queens from Chevalley, 

 who advertises in this Journal ? I sent him an 

 order last February. Have never received auy 

 queens, and as yet have not got my money back. 

 From the description Mr. Dadant gives of his 

 queens one would judge they were impure. The 

 description fits almost exactly the queen I received 

 through the "Italian Bee Co." of Mr. D's selec- 

 tion. Her progeny were flying on the 23d of 

 November, and, as far as 1 could judge, looked all 

 right. Still I would have preferred one of "just 

 the color we so much admire," instead of a 

 striped one. It used to be thought that in all Italy 

 there were none but pure Italian bees, but it would 

 seem from Mr. Dadant' s letter that the locality in 

 which pure stock is to be found is very limited It 

 would seem that (page 142) our friend Burch is 

 going to force his queens to mate. Now I believe 

 the medical fraternity claim that in cases of rape 

 conception does not follow. So I am faithless in 

 this plan as in all others, and if you were to pay 

 me a visit, Mr. Editor, and see the various traps, 

 cages, &c, that have been described in the differ- 

 ent journals, even the house described by "Ama- 

 teur," and I tell you I never had a single queen 

 fertilized with any of them, you certainly would 

 not wonder at my faithlessness. 



T. G. McGaw. 



Monmouth III., Dec. 3, 1872. 



[For the American Bee Journal.] 



The Season— Borodino, N. Y, 



Dear Bee Journal. — Perhaps you and your nu- 

 merous readers have concluded that we had entirely 

 forgotten to write and let you know what we have 

 been doing in this part of the country. But this is 

 not the case. We have been so busy with the cares 

 of our bees and 130 acres of land, that we could 

 not possibly find time to write. We commenced 

 the winter of 1871 and 1872 with 42 stocks of bees 

 with plenty of good honey, and in as comfortable a 

 place as a well ventilated cellar could make them. 

 All went well until about the 15th of January, when 

 the bees commenced leaving their hives one by one 

 and falling on the cellar bottom to die. As it 

 grew toward spring this loss increased so much 

 that after setting them out we swept up two bushels 

 of dead ones. We wrote to some of the most pi'om- 

 inent bee-keepers and received instructions, but 

 their plans, as well as ours, to stop the mortality 

 were an entire failure. We tried every plan of 

 ventilation, both of hives and cellar, but of no avail. . 

 On April 7th we set out 41 stocks, (one having en- 

 tirely deserted its hive), quite materially weak- 

 ened by the loss of bees. The day was very fine 

 and still, with the mercury at 60°, yet at night we 

 had only about one-half the bees we had in our 

 hives when we set them out. We are sure the 



