234 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOUKNAL AND GAZETTE. 



Accordingly I moved the hive down on the 

 lower floor, but then a part of them went up to 

 their old locality and were lost, notwithstan- 

 ding as much as a week or ten days of cold 

 weather had intervened. 



Well, bj^ the middle of December my hive 

 contained very few bees and almost no honey at 

 all. What was to be done ? 



I brought them into the house with a cloth 

 over the front, and got some real honey and fed 

 them well ; but there were so few bees that I 

 was afraid to risk them ; so I tried what I con- 

 sidered a bold experiment. I foimd where I 

 could get some heavy Langstroth hives; brought 

 them home ; took a frame from each of four of 

 them, bees, honey and all — looking them over 

 carefully to avoid getting their queens ; put the 

 four frames and bees into a box; shook them all 

 up so that each individual bee did not know 

 whether he was himself or somebody else. I 

 then shook the bees off from the frame, placed 

 the frame in my Italian hive, and poured the 

 bees on a newspaper in fiout of the hive ; (by 

 the way. I think a newspaper or two much bet- 

 ter than a cloth to swarm bees, as you can by 

 taking hold of the corner, shake the bees up 

 near the hive with very little trouble, as they 

 cannot stick to it at all ; ) carefully looking them 

 over to see that I had no black queens. 



All seemed well. The bees went in as thank- 

 fully as if they had always lived there, and 

 filled the hive up so as to make a nice swarm. 

 But on going to look at them in the evening, 

 I lound a very long bee on the entrance board, 

 dead. With a heavy heart I carried her in, and 

 while mourning ovtr my departed queen, as I 

 supposed, behold she began to move, and then 

 to crawl, and, on being fed, became quite lively. 

 What to do with her now was the question. I 

 finally put her into a cage, set her over one of 

 the holes in the honey board, and left her until 

 mo'UiUg, althougli the bees seemed to pay very 

 little attention, to her, as I thought, for a queen. 

 In the morning she was dead again, and this 

 time would not come to life for warming, honey, 

 or anything of the kind ; and to make ture that 

 she was the queen, I sent her to Mr. Langstroth, 

 and waited nervously for a reply, clinging to 

 the hope that I might be mistaken, and suppo- 

 sing that he probably could tell a queen when 

 he saw one. 



In a few days a reply came, stating that he 

 was happy to inform me that the bee enclosed 

 was nothing but a workek bee, with its body 

 considerably distended with dysentery. 



As may be imagined, this was welcome news, 

 and so far relieved my mind that I concluded 

 to rest in peace and let my bees do the same 

 until spring — which they did, and came out all 

 right, with one whole frame of sealed honey 

 untouched. 



Why did the twenty-five or thirty pounds of 

 syrup fed them do so little good in comparison 

 with the frames of sealed honey given them ? 

 Was it raising the brood in the fall that took so 

 much ? Does honey go so much further than 

 thick sugar syrup ? Or, was it fiom the fact 

 that the honey was sealed in the frames and 

 just as they required it V 



I suspect that all three hai something to do 



with it ; but would be glad of further light on 

 the subject. 



How shall we feed them in the fall to prevent 

 them raising brood if it is not advisable ? 



In my next I will try and give the result of 

 my attempts at queen-raising in the summer of 

 1866. A. J. Root. 



Medina, Ohio. 



An Attack by Bees. 



THE MILITARY ROUTED IN ALGERIA. 



A company of French light infantry f^ent out 

 to make a reconnoissance in Kabylia, halted at 

 noon for rest and refreshment in a village which 

 had been deserted by its inhabitants on their 

 approach. The soldiers were thus able to ex- 

 plore the village in all directions and search the 

 houses entirely unmolested, but found that the 

 fugitive population had carried off all their val- 

 uables except about thirty hives of bees under 

 shelter of a dense cactus hedge. These, being 

 well stored with houej^, were at once appro- 

 priated amid exulting shouts by the soldiery, 

 who immediately kindled a fire and expelled 

 the bees en masse with smoke. After a portion 

 of the liquid sweets had been consumed, the 

 company was reformed and resumed its march, 

 carrying with them the hives on the points of 

 their bayonets But the maltreated bees, thus 

 deprived of their stores, had by this time recov- 

 ered from their alarm and stui)efaction and 

 were on hand by myriads to avenge their 

 wrongs. Gathering in a cloud above the ad- 

 vancing column, they suddenly descended and 

 attacked it furiouslj" in front and rear and on 

 every side. The soldiers unprepared for such 

 an onset, threw down the hives, dropped their 

 arms, and danced around, crying, leaping and 

 beating the air in their vain attempts to strike 

 down their enraged assailants. But all their 

 efforts were unavailing ; even the lume of burn- 

 ing gunpowder was of no avail ; though dozens 

 of cartridge boxes were emptied for a supply, 

 it only rendered confusion worse confounded. 

 While thus disorganized and demoralized, the 

 fugutive Berbers, seizing the advantage, rushed 

 boldly to attack them, and speedily effected 

 tbeir utter discomfiture— the French being 

 driven oft", leaving about one-third of their force 

 dead on the scene. 



Incarnat clover {trifoliwm incarnatum) is an 

 annual, the blossoms of which yield supplies 

 of excellent honey which is eagerly gathered by 

 bees. When sown in spring on stubble land 

 which was plowed in autumn, it conies into 

 blossom about the lastof July or first of August, 

 yielding plenty of pasturage for bees, and pro- 

 ducing on good ground a large crop of hay. 

 Sow about half bushel of seed on an acre. It 

 may be sown with spring barley, but will then 

 come into flower somewhat later. If sown in 

 autumn, it should not be done later than about 

 the beginning of September. It will then blos- 

 som in May, and can be mown for an early 

 crop of hay. It succeeds well on loamy, clayey 

 and sandy soils ; and is best adapted for mild 

 climates. 



