THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



73 



we have used six thicknesses of carpet and 

 yet a board on top, in a cold morning, would 

 be coated with frost or drops of moisture and 

 the carpets be dry. The bees are kept dark 

 and will not stir, unless the weather is warm 

 enough for them to tly abroad ; and if, in any 

 sunshiny weather, you wish to entice them to 

 fly you may open the back ventilator, and also 

 leave off the top cover to let the sun shine in. 

 If there is the least risk of dampness the tops 

 maybe left off in any bright still winter day. 

 The outside doubling coming down below the 

 level of the sides and bottom of the hive, will 

 guard the bees greatly from the effect of pier- 

 cing winds. Any bee-keeper can thus have his 

 bees put up to winter as well (if not better) 

 on their summer stands than in the best winter 

 depositories, and this even in Minnesota. The 

 co'der the climate the more wool should be 

 used. Ad the wool used may be. sold in the 

 spring, only the interest on its cost price being 

 lost ; and if woolen rags are used the cost is 

 hardly anything. 



Such is the plan, which may, at first sight, 

 seem to require a great deal of time, trouble, 

 and expense, in preparing the bees for winter 

 and taking them out in the spring. It should 

 be borne in mind, however, that every good 

 bee-keeper wishes to make a thorough exami- 

 nation of each of his colonies in the fall and 

 spring. With one empty hive to commence 

 on, he can go through his apiary, shifting each 

 stock into a prepared hive at the time of making 

 this examination, and the time and money spent 

 infixing the hives may be safely set off against 

 the usual expenditures where especial deposi- 

 tories are used. The outside boards may not 

 be found necessary in the latitude of central and 

 southern Ohio, &c, yet we think they will be 

 found to pay even further south. 



I have not time nor space to enter into a dis- 

 cussion of the especial disadvantages of burying 

 or housing the bees. They are patent to all 

 who have practiced those plans, in the retarding 

 of vigorous breeding in the spring, risks of wea- 

 ther when removing the bees, &c. 



It is only necessary to add that while my 

 father may hereafter protect some things here 

 described by a patent, yet during the term of his 

 present extended patent on the frames, the 

 right to use any improvements he may hereaf- 

 ter patent, is free to all those who have the 

 right to use his hive. 



James T. Langstroth. 



Oxford, Ohio, Sept. 9th, 1868. 



P. S. The dimensions of outside casing are 

 based on the use of a hive of standard size, viz : 

 22| inches long and 16 inches wide, outside 

 measurements of the main or breeding chamber, 

 and 11 inches from the underside of the bottom- 

 board to the top of the ledge on which the up- 

 per cover rests. If a hive of different shape is 

 used, the dimensions of the outside casing must, 

 of course, be varied to correspond. 



[Fort lie American Bee Journal ] 



Do Italian Bees work freely on Red 

 Clover ? 



Bees conserve community unto their last, for 

 no man ever saw a bee degenerate into a drone. 

 Great spirits degenerate not. — Purchas. 



With some this may still be an unsettled 

 question. On procuring the Italian variety, 

 this was with me an important point upon 

 which, for two years, I was not satisfied ; but I 

 am so now, and will state the facts. 



During the two years referred to, while Ital- 

 ianizing, from various causes my stocks were 

 weak and did not afford a fair test. Besides, 

 the autumns were cold and wet, and there was 

 little sweet in the clover to attract bees. 



But in the summer of 1867, I procured of Mr. 

 J. II. Thomas, of Brooklin, Province of On- 

 tario, a beautiful queen, and in the fall, by the 

 aid of Mr. QuinLy, an imported one from the 

 establishment of Professor Mona, in Italy. Be- 

 coming satisfied that I had then the pure article, 

 I set to work early in the spring of this year to 

 requeen all my stocks and provide fertile queens 

 of that type for all my swarms. I now know 

 that I have the right article, and they answer 

 expectations. 



I have fields of the alsike and red clovers 

 mixed. About the middle of June, when these 

 were coming into blossom, I saw the Italians 

 at work about equally upon the two kinds, 

 where these were about equally mixed. But 

 where the alsike was thickest, it evidently at- 

 tracted them somewhat more, for they would 

 be the thickest upon that part of the field. 

 Probably the alsike clover cannot be exceeded, 

 in its time, as a bee plant. At different times 

 during the summer, I have seen them (the Ital- 

 ians) at work upon the red clover quite freely, 

 and that when there was an abundance of other 

 flowers ; a fact to which I called the attention 

 of men mowing for me in a field in which I had 

 sown large red clover only. I have both the 

 common Western and the large Eastern red clo- 

 ver, and the Italians work on both, pressing the 

 blossoms most earnestly, as if to reach to the 

 very bottom of the nectar cups. 



So much for the first crop. Yesterday I was 

 at work cutting a small strip of Eastern red clo- 

 ver, and found the Italians working continual- 

 ly upon this second crop. Not indeed so plen- 

 ti fully as one might see them upon a field of 

 white buckwheat blossoms ; but possibly nearly 

 all day, at the rate of from one to thirty on a 

 square rod, and not a black bee to be seen upon 

 it, although three strong stocks were located 

 within one-third of a mile of this field. Surely 

 in some parts of Pennsylvania, and in places 

 where the second crop is reserved for the seed, 

 the Italian bees should do exceedingly well, all 

 other things being equal. 



I have also seen mine working briskly on iron 

 weed, upon which I do not see black bees. 



Others may keep to their black bees, but I 

 anticipate fall pay for all expense and trouble 

 needful in Italianizing, and keeping the stock 

 pure. The remaining doubt with me is con- 

 cerning the present power of the Italian race to 

 abide our cold ami long Canadian winters. If 

 there should prove a defect here, thorough accli- 

 matization may remedy i r . 



J. W. Truesdell. 



Warwick, P. Q., Canada, Sept. 9, 1868. 



