AMERICM BEE JOTJRML. 



EDITED AND PUBLISHED BY W. F. CLARKE, CHICAGO, ILL. 



AT TWO DOLLARS PER ANNUM, PAYABLE IN ADVANCE. 



Vol. IX. 



SEI*TEM:BEI1, 1ST3. 



No. S. 



For the American Bee Journal.] 



Novica 



Dear Bee Journal : We are really afraid 

 that for once we shall be unable to get the one 

 barrel from each ten colonies, but yet we have 

 faith that it could have been done had our 

 queens all been as prolific as some of them 

 were. Accordingly we commenced in July to 

 destroy all queens not considered up to the 

 standard, giving the stock queens cells from 

 choice parentage; since then we have been 

 rearing extra queens in the upper stories, inter- 

 posing a heavy sheet of manilla paper between 

 the two, besides the quilt to prevent accidents 

 should the bees gnaw through the latter. 

 With the L. hives we make the upper entrance 

 on the roof of the portico. With the " Simpli- 

 city" — by the way, kind readers, please allow us 

 to stop long enough to thank friend T. S. on 

 page 36 for his setting the matter so that none 

 may get erroneous ideas from the term " dollar 

 hive." He is in the main right, but the hive 

 without frames was often ordered and sold for 

 $1.00, as those having Langstroth hives could 

 simply hang a set of frames, combs, bees, and 

 all in them, and see whether they liked them 

 without farther expense. If they approved 

 them they had a complete pattern to work by ; 

 for $1.00 paid for all there was about the 

 " Simplicity Hive," different from the Lang- 

 stroth," and the same may be said of all other 

 hives used two story. By the way Mr. Editor, 

 we were somewhat annoyed to find that our 

 advertisement in two numbers, read " Hives 

 ready to maW^ for 90c. It seems every one did 

 not know this should have read vail. If 

 "Uncle Sam" will cari-y queens by mail, we 

 won't ask him to carry hives. We, too, wrote 

 to the P. N. G. with all the eloquence we could 

 master to try and set him right about bees by 

 mail, but he only replied by copy of the 

 decision, saying he had seen no reason for re- 

 voking his decision. We will most heartily 

 join with our old friend Alley in any thing that 

 may facilitate giving the people Italian queens 

 at less expense. Several P. M's say they will 

 send them at any rate until ftarther orders, and 



we really hope the proper authorities will see 

 that justice be done this branch of rural 

 industry. There! Now, we'll try and tell, 

 that — to raise queens in the second story of S. 

 hives, we put an extra door step on the upper 

 half, and it is our opinion that during dull 

 times for honey, especially in the fall and with 

 stocks that have not swarmed, a fine queen could 

 be raised every two weeks as well as not. If 

 you think no one will " pick at it," Mr. Editor, 

 you might state that we sell such queens un- 

 warranted for one dollar each, and orders are on 

 hand now for more than we can probably raise. 

 Is not there a chance here for many others to 

 make their heavy colonies yield quite an income 

 after honey has failed, and at the same time " do 

 good" by disseminating Italians cheaply? 



We are pained to see Dadant overhaul Adair 

 so roughly. While we agree with Dadant in 

 the main, in regard to " Progressive Bee 

 Culture," we fear his article would not have 

 been written had not Adair attacked imported 

 queens. It seems the two have been friends, 

 can they not remain so even while criticising. 

 Adair we think has committed some grave 

 blunders; Mrs. Tupper certainly did one or 

 more, and M. Quinby and others have done 

 their share. If one intimates that the extractor 

 kills brood ; and another that frames in part 

 closed or ail around can be handled with the 

 facility of open, suspended ones; or that any 

 particular hive will give box honey with the 

 certainty, and in quantities equal to extracted ; 

 public good, or the good of the masses demand 

 that the matter be corrected, not by assertions, 

 but by facts, and these should be given 

 promptly and fearlessly and never from spite or 

 revenge. 



We once read a letter accusing us of making 

 an attack on a man in " cold blood," /. e. he 

 had never wronged us. Had he done so it 

 would have been revenge, hence excusable. It 

 was his hive we objected to, not the man. 

 Mr. Gallup speaks of a hive three feet high ; we 

 .should not like this at all, nor should we like a 

 frame 11 inches square, or aljout that, as Mr. 

 Gallup's is. 



