189'^ 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



763 





,"%^ 



CONDUCTED BY 



DR. C. C. M.n.I^E'R, MARENGO, ILL. 



[Questions may be mailed to the Bee Journal, or to Dr. Miller direct.! 



Small Hives for Wintering. 



D. N. Ritchpy's remark on pace 715 made rae look back 

 to see what I had said on page 630. There I found I had 

 said, " BTit you're not proini; to winter those bees in a tJ-fratue 

 hive, are you ?" At first thought I could not imagine what 

 could have induced me to object to their being wintered iu a 

 small hive, for certainly their chances for wiutering would not 

 be bettered by puttinR them into larger hives: but a nioineufs 

 thought showed that the trouble cauie from my lack of famil- 

 iarity with the Euglish language sufficient to make myself 

 clear. What I meant was that a colony that had been kept 

 the season in a hive S inches wide, containing 6 frames, would 

 hardly be strong enough to winter successfully. If Mr. 

 Ritchey means that he puts his colouies on 6 frames for win- 

 tering, then there is nothing unusual in that; but if he has 

 successfully used hives for four years that are only 8 inches 

 wide and contain only 6 frames, then I'm decidedly interested to 

 know more about it, for from a short acquaintance with Mr. 

 Ritchey I think he knows what he's talking about. If you're 

 using hives that never contain more than 6 frames, Mr. 

 Ritchey, please tell us all about it — how strong colonies get, 

 their yield, whether you have to feed in the fall, and whether 

 you prefer them to hives having S or more frames, and if so, 

 why ? C. C. M. 



Buckwheat and Clover in lVIi$§i§si|>pi — Feedings 

 Cane Syrup. 



1. Will buckwheat do well and yield honey in South Mis- 

 sissippi, TO miles from the Gulf of Mexico? How about clov- 

 ers? I think we have the white clover here. Will sweet 

 clover do anything here ? 



2. Would itdo to feed bees on pure ribbon cane syrup that 

 has no chemicals in it? How should it be fed ? I'm suffer- 

 ing from my bees visiting two cane-mills to some e-ttent. 



3. How many acres of buckwheat should I sow for 50 

 colonies of bees to work on ? and what time should it be 



I sown ? Mississippi. 



Answers. — 1. As to the pl:ints that flmrish in any given 

 place, I'd rather have the opinion of an intelligent planter of 

 experience'in that locality than of the most experienced bee- 

 keeper in some other part of the United States. I have an 

 impression that buckwheat does not succeed well in Mississip- 

 pi, but I m^y be entirely mistaken. I think I have seen fav- 

 orable reports of sweet clover in Mississippi. 



2. Such syrup might be safely fed in spring when bees 

 are flying every day; but it should not be fed atany time when 

 it would go into surplus hon°y, nor in fall for winter stores. 

 It may be fed iu any way that liijuid food is given to bees, 

 either in the hive or in the open air. 



8. It is a very difficult thing for any one to give an exact 

 answer as to the amount of honey to be obtained from a given 

 plant on a given area. M. Quiiiby, who in his day did so much 

 for bee-keeping, said an acre of buckwheat would yield 25 

 pounds of honey in a day. If that be correct, 50 colonies of 

 bees might take care of 10 or more acres. 



A Besinner's Experience— Clipping (Queens. 



I have 5 colonies — 4 Italian and 1 black. I began In 

 August with about a teacup of black bees and gave, all told, 

 two frames of brood from my Italians. The first week In Sep- 

 tember the queen and drones hatcht. I now have a very fair 

 colony of bees, but will have to feed them some. The first 

 week in September I hived a runaway swarm of black bees ; 

 there were less than a quart of them. I gave them one frame 

 of brood and some empty combs. They had a black quetn 



and I have not tried to rear an Italian for them. I have them 

 now strong enough to go through the winter by feeding. 



This is my first year with bees, and I have had neither 

 papers nor books on the subject, yet I have reared both queens 

 and drones out of season. 



My bees are in the orchard over 100 feet from the house. 

 Would you advise me to clip the (jueen's wings to prevent the 

 swarms leaving or clustering high next spring, or not ? If so, 

 had I better clip them now, or wait till they begin to fly in the 

 spring? I never saw any one clip a queen's wings, how is it 

 done •} Tkxas, Nov. 7. 



Answer. — You will probably find it an advantage to have 

 your queens dipt. If you are not on hand to see the swarm 

 issue, sometimes a dipt queen will bo lost, but it is better to 

 lose a queen than to lose both bees and queen. 



Better wait till spring. Not so many bees are then In the 

 way of finding the queen, and there Is no advantage in having 

 them dipt sooner. 



A queen has four wings, a large and a small one on each 

 side. It will be sufficient to cut oS two-thirds of the large 

 wing on one side. It is better to cut on oue side only, for a 

 queen can make a better stagger at flying with both sides alike 

 then when only one side is cut. On account of seeing at a 

 glance whether a queen is dipt or not, it is better to cut oft 

 both wings on one side. G. M. Dooliltle uses a small blade of 

 a pocket-knife, very sharp, holding the wing with the left hand 

 over the hive, letting it drop on the frames as the wing is cut 

 with the right hand. It seems easier to me, perhaps becaus3 

 I'm accustomed to it, to use a pair of scissors, and perhaps this 

 is the practice of most dippers. Get the queen between the 

 thumb and finger of the left hand, her head facing toward the 

 the left, and with a pair of lace scissors, or any scissors that 

 are rather small toward the points, cut off one or both wings 



on one side. • 



Having no experience in dipping, you might find it of ad- 

 vantage to get the Monette queen-clipping device, which is 

 spoken of in the highest terms by some who have used it. You 

 can can get it from the office of the American Bee Journal for 

 80 sents, or you cau get it free by sending in a new subscriber. 



Building an Adobe Bcc>IIonse. 



I have 11 colonies of Italian bees, and am a novice and 

 wish to fix for extracting as I think it will be easier for me as 

 I am working out by the month. How shall I go to work ? I 

 could make an adobe house of any size necessary, walls to be 

 12 inches thick, or more, and keep the implements etc., in it. 

 and go at proper intervals to extract. If I do not get them in 

 a house the natives will steal both bees and honey. 



New Mexico. 



Answebs. — If I understand you correctly, you want to 

 ma'^-e a house in which you can fasten your bees. Adobe be- 

 ing cheap and lumber high, I think I should try the adobe. 

 As you say your heavy winds come from the southwest, it 

 might be well to make a building to run from southwest to 

 northeast, with a door at the northeast end. The width of the 

 building depends somewhat on the size of the hives. Make it 

 wide enough to take a row of hives on each side with room for 

 you to pass between the two rows. One row would have its 

 entrances to the northwest, the other to the southeast. The 

 length, of course, would depend on the number of hives you 

 expect it to contain. In front of each hive should be left iu 

 the wall a porthole perhaps i inches wide and 2 inches deep. 

 Then in some way you must dose all between the port-hole 

 and the entrance to the hives so that no bees can get out into 

 the house. Your diagram seems to inquire whether you should 

 build a square or a circular wall, but you will see lh:it for the 

 sake of economy in room the entrances are to be on two oppo- 

 site sides, taking two rows of bees, so your building will rather 

 be long or oval. 



Langstrotti on the Honey-Bee, revised by 

 The Dadanis, is a standard, reliable and thoroughly complete 

 work on bee-culture. It contains 520 pages, and is bound 

 elegantly. Every reader of the American Bee .lournal should 

 have a copy of this book, as It answers hundreds of questions 

 that arise about bees. We mail it forSl.25, or dub it with 

 the Bee Journal for a year— both together for only .S2.00. 



Every Present Subscriber of the Bee Journal 

 should be an agent for it, and got all others possible to sub- 

 scribe for it. See offers on page 783. 



