1894 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE, 



553 



Well, we hustled the boys on the hives, got the 

 team and wagon, and loaded the bees on, de- 

 spite the fact that great big thunder-clouds just 

 back of us threatened to give us a drenching, 

 and despite the fact that the wagon looked as if 

 it wouldn't hold up to even get out of the yard. 

 We told the two yard-men that they need not 

 go — that we and the teamster would take our 

 chances, unload the bees if we got there, and 

 put them where they belonged — one hive just 

 opposite a basswood-tree. The wagon was so 

 loaded down that we were afraid the wheels 

 would break if we got on ; so we mounted the 

 bicycle. The roads were so muddy from a re- 

 cent rain that we finally put the wheel in a 

 barn, and ran on alongside of the team with its 

 load of bees. It beean to sprinkle. It then be- 

 gan to come down in big drops. It began to 

 rain. Then it poured. We had on light calf- 

 skin shoes, Knickerbocker suit, long stockings, 

 and white sweater. Well, to make a long story 

 short, we arrived at the orchard without mis- 

 hap, unloaded the bees, opened up the en- 

 trances, and put off for home. Of course, we 

 were soaked through, including the poor bees, 

 whose hives had been covered with wire-cloth 

 screens to give them ventilation; and those 

 borrowed stockings were a sorry sight, and the 

 shoes full of feet and water. We did not catch 

 cold, any of us — not even the horses; and the 

 bees — well, they are all right. 



than to bees for business. On the other hand, 

 we have reason to believe that some are en- 

 deavoring to breed for both qualities. 



FOUR AND FIVE BANDED ITALIANS. 



OuK apiarist reports that some of the colo- 

 nies of these bees are very vicious — very much 

 like the Cyprians; and Neighbor H. gives the 

 same account of them. Still, we have in our 

 'own apiary one colony that is gentle and good 

 I workers. Mr. Vernon Burt, of Mallet Creek, 

 I has several stocks of these yellow fellows, and 

 I he reports that they are not only gentle, but 

 1 among the first to go among the supers. 



As to wintering qualities, there are not any 

 of the yellow bees that stand our northern 

 climate quite so well as the ordinary three- 

 banded and leather-colored Italians. Mr. Burt 

 reports that his yellowest bees were the first to 

 die last winter, and he is very successful in 

 i wintering his bees too. 



Our apiarist, Mr. Spafford, says he has notic- 

 ed for the last four or five years that these ex- 

 tra yellow bees are the first to succumb. This 

 may be partly due to the fact that they are 

 bird largely in the South. 



The above is given as an unprejudiced and 

 fair statement of the yellow bees as we have 

 found them in this locality ; but why they 

 I should vary we can not imagine, unless there is 

 a little Cyprian blood in some of them. At 

 first we felt inclined to call a halt on the rear- 

 ing of these bees, fearing that many might be 

 disappointed on encountering thplr temper. 

 We have feared all along that some breeders 

 Avere a little careless in running to color rather 



PROSPECTS FOR THE HONEY-FLOW. 



For the last ten days the prospects have 

 been rather discouraging. Reports seemed to 

 show that there was very little white clover 

 anywhere in the country; and in our own lo- 

 cality scarcely any could be seen in the old 

 pasture lots, where years before it abounded 

 freely. It is still early to speak for outside lo- 

 calities; but in our own. the white clover is 

 just beginning to make its appearance. Bass- 

 wood, too, is just opening up. The conditions 

 for a honey-flow from this source were never 

 better. The trees are literally full of flower- 

 buds; and where the blossoms have opened up, 

 the bees are humming around them as in the 

 old-fashioned way. and already are beginning 

 to drop in at the entrances; and as early as the 

 first break of day there is that roar that sounds 

 sweeter to the bee-keeper than music. Reports 

 everywhere speak well of the prospects from 

 basswood. 



ALSIKE CLOVER. 



Our neighbors who have been so fortunate as 

 to be in the vicinity of alsike are harvesting 

 nice little crops of honey. Neighbor H., about 

 2 miles to the south, says his hives are full of 

 honey. Neighbor Chase, some eight or nine 

 miles to the southwest of us, reports something 

 like 40 acres near his bees. He is "in clover," 

 surely, and we shall expect that he will have 

 a big crop of honey, especially if basswood 

 amounts to much. Neighbor Burt, some four 

 miles to the north of us, also reports a consid- 

 erable amount of alsike in his vicinity. He 

 was instrumental in the first place in having it 

 introduced, and now the farmers put it in of 

 their own accord, as they do elsewhere, because 

 they think it pays outside of any benefit that 

 may accrue to their bee-keeping friends. "We 

 have had no alsike accessible to our bees; and 

 as white clover failed to show up, our colonies 

 have been running short on stores. 



SWEET CLOVER. 



There is more of it in waste places than ever 

 before. The railroad embankments and road- 

 sides are thick with it, and neither we nor any 

 other bee-keeper scattered it. 



THE RECORD BROKEN ON BIG CROPS OF HONEY; 

 1250 LBS. OF HONEY FROM ONE 

 HIVE OF BEES. 



We have heard before of wonderful yields of 

 honey in Australia. The following is an extract 

 which we make from an article that appeared 

 in the Western Post, published at Mudgee, 

 near Sydney, Australia: 



I had five or six colonies that produced over 1000 

 lbs. each of honey tliat season, but I have only two 

 down in my memo, book, whose extracting I put 

 down every week after they had collected about 400 



