THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



95 



would build up faster than in their present con- 

 dition. The honey is of a .yood (|iii\lity. and 

 very thiek. TluMiiiestioii with me, is. Whether 

 tlie iioney can he taken from new eombs with- 

 out destroy inji' them. Tlie eombs are very white, 

 and easily broken. I have never used the Ex- 

 traetor : in fact, 1 have never seen bu( one, and 

 tliat a home-made one. 1 desire inlormarion 

 from tiu)se tliat are not interested in the siile of 

 machines. 1 am wintering my bet's on their 

 summer stands, by drivinu; stakes in the trround, 

 one foot from tiie" hives, and paekinii wdii tlax- 

 straw to tlie top of tiie liive, on all sides, except 

 the front, wliicli 1 leave oi)en. I jiive no uj)- 

 ward ventilation. L use the American and 

 Langstroth liives. Last winter I lost fourteen 

 out "of twenty swarms, with a disease entirely 

 new to me. but have seen nothinji of it as yet. 

 this winter, and hope that I never shall again. " 



Tuos. IIuTciiiNs, Wvoming, Pa., writes : 

 — "I am what you w(nild call a careless bee- 

 keeper. I have about ninety hives of bees. 

 Some in the American and some in the (Jn(HMi 

 hives; but most of tlieni are in theQninl)y hive. 

 I am living in Wyonung Valley, Luzerne Co., 

 Pa. We have not luul a good bee season here 

 for the last five years. There are no basswood 

 or linden trees in this locality. Buckwlieat and 

 white clover are the principal honey producers. 

 Honey v.aries here in jirices; the nicest box 

 honey brings from thirty-five to forty cents. 

 The most I ever got from one hive, was forty 

 pounds, fourteen-pound boxes. That was from 

 the Quinby hive. It seems almost incredible to 

 me when I here of such large yields of surplus 

 honey, in other localities, to keep bees. The 

 winter here has been very favorable for bees, 

 not being very severe; but we are now having 

 very cold weather, to what it has been the pa.st 

 few months. Last winter I lost forty stocks of 

 bees, the weather being very severe. ]My opin- 

 ion is, that when bees are strong enough, and 

 left onthesiunmer stands during'the winter tliey 

 do the best; but all late and weak swarms I jiiit 

 in my cellar, it being very dry, turning my hives 

 upside down. I feed them' about every" two or 

 three weeks. I feed them syrup made of two- 

 thirds "A" sugar, afid one-third water, boiled 

 and strained. ' I feed them by pouring it in 

 among the bees. I see by your JoraxAi,. 

 that some feed their bees in November. Is it 

 because they have no honey ? It they have 

 honey, do thev want feeding ? I think it 

 would be small business to rob them of their 

 honey, and have to feed them sugar syrup or 

 any other food. " 



A. E. Rich, Metamora, 111., writes:— "The 

 winter thus far (January 17th) has been very 

 nio(U'rate, and my bees are weathering it very 

 well out of doors.' I have always wintered in 

 the cellar heretofore — or rather tried to do so — 

 but I think that in reasonably mild weather the 

 bees are better off outside. I have most of 

 niin(> in straw hives, and think them superior 

 on many accounts for both winter and sinnmer. 

 Fully nine-tenths of all the bees in this section 

 of country fr<i/.e to death, or died from some 

 other cause, last winter. Some persons made 

 special preparations for winter, others made 

 none, with perhaps no perceptible difference 

 in the result. The most successful man I liave 

 heard of in this region, however, had his bees 

 in rickety box hives, on the west side of his 

 smokehouse, which stands right in the teeth of 

 the northwest winds. The hives stood on a 

 bench nearly three feet from the ground, and, 

 in some cases, the front edge of the hive pro- 

 jected five inches beyond the edge of the bench! 

 lie lost not more tliau one in five or six. An- 



other neighbor, wlio had p;ra<Ied Italians, got 

 through the winter with nine out of twelve, but- 

 before swarming (inn- he lost all but one. In 

 all the other cases, exeei)t my own. the bees- 

 were blacks. I predict — that is, 1 siini)lv gue.ss. 

 —that there will be this ])resent winter far les.s- 

 loss in this region of connlry than for two 

 years past. .My own bees, aiid I ]iresiime i( 

 was the case generally, kejit l>reeding for iiearlv 

 three months later in the summer and fall thaii 

 heretofore, and went into winter (luarters with 

 a goodly number of young, strong and healthy 

 bees, and I hope tlicre will be less freezing- 

 this winter and less kiss next s])ring. I increas- 

 ed my four stocks to twehf, got considerable 

 extracted honey, mainly from heartsease and 

 buckwheat, and it is that kind of lioney tliey 

 are wintering on now— the same that gave them- 

 the dysentery two years ago." 



Skymoitr Ritggi-es, Saratoga, N. Y., writes: 

 — " The bee business in this section, is in a very 

 backward condition, with few exceptions. 

 Many use box hives, without a chance to putoit 

 boxes, unless put on the outside of the Jiives. 

 They leave their bees on the summer stands- 

 through the winter. I have noticed this winter,, 

 some bee-keep<'rs had hives without bottoms, 

 set upon four one-inch blocks, protected from 

 west winds only. I don't see how bees can 

 stand such an airin»-. I could not winter bees: 

 that way, unless the hives were large, filled 

 with comb, and colonies very popidous in the- 

 fall. The fact is, most bee-keepers around 

 here know nothing of modern bee-keeping. I 

 informed one man not long since, that he ought 

 to have Quinby's or Langstroth's book, and the 

 Ameiucax Bee .lorKNAi.. ' Oh,' he says, 

 'they want money for their books, I can get 

 along without them.' The same afterwards, 

 said the drones laid all the eggs. Last fall I 

 set box hives in the cellar; January 2M set the 

 bees out at 12 o'clock, it was warm and still, 58^ 

 in shade, at 2 p. m. it was cloudy, and a furious 

 wind arose. ^lany bees were blown away, as; 

 they were flying (juite briskly. The next day I 

 set the box liives back into the cellar. They 

 have not shown any signs of dysentery, whether- 

 in the cellar or out, up to this date (March 10). 

 Mr. Perrj', the only ])erson here, besides my- 

 self, that uses movable comb hives, had 1,400 

 lbs. honey in glass boxes last year. He has 8f> 

 colonies, winters in cellars, but never saw 

 Quinby's or Langstroth's bookor the Journal. 

 It has been a favorable winter for bees so far."' 



E. S. Fowi.EK. Bartlett, O., whites:—" There 

 are no bees kept in Ibis part of the country 

 (save what few I kee])) in movable frame hives, 

 except as the farmers keep them the old fash- 

 ioned way. We have never had bee cholera or 

 dysentery as an epidemic except the winter of 

 "(i8 and '69. It was not an unusually ';old winter 

 with us, while the winter of "72 and '7:! was the 

 coldest for ten years or more without any dys- 

 entery; hence the cold weather theory don't 

 suit my experience. I have always been able 

 to produce dysentery by leaving a colony 

 queenless for two months, before the time they 

 ([uit breeding in the fall. — Old bees not winter- 

 ing as well for me as young ones, at least I am 

 not able to give another reason for the difler- 

 enee. I have no reason for doubting nor any 

 experience to confirm the opinion that the 

 honey gathered some seasons is not healthy for 

 the bees. Perhajis difFerent caus(^s ojierate in 

 promoting an<l aggra\ating the disease in dif- 

 ferent parts of tiie country— hence the differ- 

 ent opinions. Let us not be in too great a iuirry 

 to see who will have the honor of guessing, 

 right first." 



