Oct. 11, 1906 



American 3ee Journal 



can not bite through a smooth surface like 

 the skin of a grape clears them of any guilt 

 in this matter. It is true that bees can pull 

 some things to pieces when they can get hold 

 of them with their mandibles, but it should 

 always be remembered that they can only 

 press orpinch with them, and not bite at all. 

 The mandibles are not sharp, and so can not 



cut anything. 



*■ 



Transferring Combs 



The matter of transferring combs is of 

 much less importance than formerly, yet for 

 those who still have transferring to do, the 

 following plan taken from the Irish Bee Jour- 

 nal may be worth considering: 



Trim straight the bottom edge of the comb 

 to be transferred. Let it rest on the bottom- 

 bar of the frame (having previously fixed to 

 the top-bar a piece of foundation of 6uch a 

 size and shape as to till the remaining space). 

 Fasten horizontally around the outside of the 

 frame one or more pieces of wire— sufficient 

 to prevent the comb from falling sidewise If 

 necessary put another wire around the frame 



perpendicularly. Without any further atten- 

 tion the foundation will be drawn out, the 

 piece of comb fixed, and the result will be a 

 frame filled with comb. When the bees have 

 completed the work of fixing, cut the envel- 

 oping wires. This will be found a handier 

 and neater way of transferring a comb than 

 the old method of tying it with tapes and a 

 false bottom-bar. — W. Munro. 



"Tested Queen" Defined 



What is a tested Italian queen? The or- 

 thodox answer is that it is a queen whose 

 worker progeny shows 3 yellow bands. When 

 Italians were first introduced into this coun- 

 try, that answer fully met the case, and it 

 was safe to say that 6uch a queen was of pure 

 Italian blood and purely mated. Is such the 

 case now? We have developed bees that 

 show 5 yellow bands. Suppose a queen of 5- 

 banded origin meets a drone with such an 

 amount of black blood that the resulting 

 worker progeny shows 3 yellow bands. The 

 old answer will not hold good. What, then, 

 is a tested queen? 



Miscellaneous 

 flews - If ems 



Mr. James A. Green, of Colorado, it 

 seems was unintentionally misrepresented in 

 a recent issue of this Journal. He corrects 

 us as follows: 



Friend York:— On page 814, you quote 

 me as saying that " I will harvest a full crop 

 of honey." Did I really write that? If so, it 

 was a " slip of the pen." One of my apiaries, 

 it is true, produced what might be called a 

 full crop, but 2 others produced only a fair 

 crop, and the other 3 apiaries had only a poor 

 yield, so that I will not have over half a crop. 

 I meant to say that I would harvest a fair 

 crop. To claim more is an error that I would 

 like to have corrected, as it is far from the 

 truth. 



Neither am I inspector of apiaries at pres- 

 ent, as I resigned the office of bee-inspector 

 last spring. I had too much work of my own 

 to attend properly to the inspectorship, so 

 'gave it up. Mr. n. S. Groves, of Fruita, is 

 my successor. James A. Green. 



Mr. Green is right. A typographical error 

 made him 6ay "full crop" instead of "fair 

 crop," as he had written it. 



We supposed, of course, that Mr. Green was 

 still a bee-inspector, not having heard of his 

 resignation. 



The Apiary of E. G. Carr, of New 



Egypt, N. J., appears on the front page of 

 this issue. Mr.- Carr wrote as follows on 

 Aug. 31 : 



■ I am sending a photograph of my apiary of 

 25 colonies, increased from 19 in the spring. 

 • The crop is nearly a failure here this year— 

 about 150 pounds of extracted and 50 pounds 

 of comb honey. Very little clover survived 

 last winter, and what there wa6 left evidently 

 had no nectar in it, as the bees did not notice 

 it. There was a good How from locust, and 

 some from poplar. 

 My little girl of 5. 1 .; years is shown holding 



a frame of bees. She has practically no fear 

 of them; and, if she is stung, she goes into 

 the house to get something to put on the part 

 stung, and then is right back with me among 

 the hives. 



Like all other bee-keepers, I am hoping for 

 a good honey crop next season. 



I anxiously look forward to the weekly 

 arrival of the " old reliable " American Bee 

 Journal. E. G. Carr. 



The Apiary of D. J. Blocher, of Pearl 

 City, 111., is shown on the first page. When 

 sending the photograph on Aug. 9, Mr. B. 

 wrote as follows : 



The picture I send is one of the home yard 

 of golden Italians. It is about 6 miles south- 

 east of the Black Hawk Monument, where 

 Black Hawk, the Indian chief, took his stand 

 before leaving the State. 



We run from TO to about 100 colonies in 

 this yard, in addition to many 2 and 3 frame 

 nuclei of standard Langstroth size. Only a 

 part of the yard is seen. 



The finest breeder I ever owned is in this 

 yard. She is now in her 4th summer, and 

 doing a6 good laying as ever. She is of my 

 own rearing. 



I have had some bees since boyhood, but on 

 account of working on the farm, and after- 

 ward going to school, I have given them less 

 attention than I do now. The way I care for 

 this yard is clearly seen. It is moved every 

 week, and salt is put around the hives to kill 

 the grass next to them. Between the first 

 and second rows of hives is seen the watering 

 trough, which is kept going the whole sum- 

 mer. Salt is added every little while. The 

 entire yard is in the open. All dummies are 

 kept on the sunny side of the hive. I have 2 

 other yards which I run in conjunction with 

 this one for queens and honey. Last spring 

 we planted a wind-break west of the yard, 

 and contemplated planting more, also a few 

 trees in the yard for some shade. 



We are slow to take hold of new inventions, 



but are firm believers in the standard Lang- 

 stroth frame and hive, that can be tiered up 

 or torn down. With this kind of hive we can 

 fit any hive with supers, either for extracted 

 or comb honey. After trying a good many 

 hive6, we have come to the above conclusion. 

 Requeening in the fall is also one of our 

 ideals for a successful apiary. We are pre- 

 paring for still more extended operations and 

 improvements. Our strawberry field is just 

 in front of the bee-yard. The dwelling-house 

 is at the southeast corner of the yard, but we 

 had to get on the cave back of the house for 

 the view we wanted, so the residence is 

 omitted from the picture. 



D. J. Blocher. 



A Bee-Disease Inspectors' Meeting 



will be held in San Antonio, Tex., Nov. 12, 

 being the Monday following the last day of 

 the meeting of the National Bee-Keepers' 

 Association on Nov. 8, 9, and 10. Dr. E. F. 

 Phillips, ActiDg in Charge of Apiculture in 

 the Bureau of Entomology, Department of 

 Agriculture, Washington, D. C. , sent us the 

 letter published below, dated Sept. 7. At 

 that time it was expected to hold the meeting 

 of the BeeDisea6e Inspectors in San Antonio 

 on Nov. 7, but on account of the Home- 

 Seekers' Excursion tickets not being 6old be- 

 fore Nov. 6, it would have been impossible 

 for many to reach San Antonio in time for 

 any meeting on the 7th, 60 the date of this 

 meeting has been changed to Nov. 12. In 

 view of this, we have changed the following 

 letter to read " Nov. 12" where it was writ- 

 ten " Nov. 7," and have made a few other 

 slight changes to correspond with the 

 changed date ■ 



Dear Mr. York:— I herewith enclose a 

 circular letter which was sent out some time 

 ago, which will explain itself. 



After hearing from a number of Inspectors 

 who agree to be present, it has been decided 

 that this meeting will be held in San Antonio, 

 Tex., on Nov. 12, 1906. A number of persons 

 prominent in bee-disease work will be pres- 

 ent, and a good meeting will result. 



To this meeting all persons interested in 

 work on bee-disease are invited. The atten- 

 tion of persons interested in having bee-dis- 

 ease laws passed is particularly called to this 

 gathering, and such persons are urged to at- 

 tend. It i6, of course, to be understood that 

 discussion of subjects foreign to bee-disease 

 will not be allowed, nor will any one be per- 

 mitted to occupy the time of the meeting in 

 riding a " hobby." This meeting is not part 

 of the National Bee-Keepers' Association 

 meeting, nor is it in any way connected with 

 it. The proceedings will probably be pub- 

 lished, so that the discussions will be avail- 

 able for those not present. 



E. F. Phillips, 

 Acting in Charge of Apiculture. 



Accompanying the foregoing letter was the 

 following, signed by two inspectors of api- 

 aries, and also Dr. Phillips; and, as in the 

 above letter, we have changed " Nov. 7" to 

 read "Nov. 12:" 



To the Bee-Disease Inspectors: — 



Asyou are well aware, the brood-diseases of 

 bees are a serious thing to American bee- 

 keepers. While the inspectors are fighting 

 the progress of disease to the best of their 

 ability, yet lack of laws, inadequate laws, and 

 an absence of uniformity of method and of 

 co-operation make the work difficult. 



For these reasons it has appeared advisable 

 to call a meeting of inspectors for the pur- 

 pose of remedying this condition of affairs in 

 so far as is possible, by consultation and co- 

 operation of persons familiar with this work. 

 If the inspectors now at work on these 

 problems can meet together, there are several 



