74 



AMERICAN BEE lOURNAL. 



Jan. 30 ■.902 



hive. He would endorse what Mr. Selwyn had said about the 

 difference in the thicl<ness of houev in certain seasons. The 

 thin honey was not wliat the customers wish to purchase. Bee- 

 keepers did not adulterate honey with water, but there was 

 unripe honey put upon the marlcet which destroys tlie mar- 

 ket for good, thick, well-ripened honey. 



Mr. Darling found that the longer the honey was left with 

 the bees the riper and thicker it became. 



Mr. Frith said thi- was a long-standing question, and of 

 much importance. Many assertions were made, but they 

 wanted evidence such as this. He was surprised that they 

 had to admit that nectar did undergo some change in the hive. 



Mr. Holtermann thought we should not let this statement 

 pass; many have for years admitted that it does undergo 

 some change. 



Mr. Fixter asked if any one had trouble while picking 

 fruit, or had they found bees working on sound fruit. 



Mr. Evans — .Vs a matter of fact, in seasons of scarcity the 

 bees sometimes work on raspberry, but it is near the close of a 

 season when berries are stunted and small : the bees do not 

 sting the pickers unless they pinch them. 



Pres. Newton — I think if raspberries are neglected and 

 overripe they are attacked ; not when ready for shipping. 



Mr. JIcEvoy — I can endorse the president's statement. 



Mr. Ever — I am convinced that bees will injure the rasp- 

 berry even when not overripe. 



Pres. Newton — I do not agree with Mr. Byer. 



^Ir. Chalmers — I agree with Mr. Byer. 



Jlr. Holtermann — I agree with Mr. Byer. but it is not 

 often, and the bees help to fertilize the blossom, therefore doing 

 more good than harm. 



ELECTION OF OFFICERS — PLACE OF MEETING. 



President — J. D. Evans : 1st Vice-President — James Arm- 

 strong : 2nd Vice-President — W. A. Chrysler ; Secretary — 

 Wm. Couse, Streetsville, Out.; Teasurer — Martin Enigh. 

 Directors — J. D. Evans. Jas. Armstrong, W. A. Chrysler, 

 W. J. Brown, J. K. Darling, C. W. Post, A. Pickett, J. W. 

 Sparling. M. B. Holmes, John Newton, F. A. Gemmill, Samuel 

 Wood, and Prof. Harrison : Auditors : William Nolan and 

 H. Sibbald ; Inspector of Apiaries: William McEvoy : Assis- 

 tant, F. A. Gemmill ; Representative to Toronto Exhibition, 

 A. Pickett : Western, J. F. Miller ; Ottawa Exhibition, J. K. 

 Darling: next place of meeting, Barrie, Out.; Revising Com- 

 mittee, Messrs. Heise and Evans. 



(Continned next weeli.) 



I Questions and Answers. ^ 



CONDUCTED BY 



£>K. O. O. MII^LER, afareng-o. 111. 



(The Qucatious may be mailed to the Bee Journal office, or to Dr. Miller 



direct, when he will answer them here. Please do not ask the 



Doctor to send answers bv mail. — Editor. 1 



Historical— Dead Bees and Wintering. 



1. Wliere and by whom was the first copy of the American 

 Bee Journal printed ? What date is the oldest number V 



y. Is one quart of dead bees too much to indicate bad 

 wintering, at the present date (Jan. 7). from 18 colonies? 



Penn. 

 Answers. — There lies before me a volume, whose title page 

 reads as follows: 



The American Bee Journal. 



Edited by .Samuel Wagner. 



Volume 1 — 1861. 



Published by 



A. M. Spangler, Book and General .lob Printer, 



No. 25 North Sixth St., Philadelphia. 



Ii was a monthly publication, the first number appearing 

 January, 1861. There are 284 pages in the volume, about 

 24 pages each month. The printed surface on each page was 

 a little more than a half that on the page of the present num- 

 ber — to be exact, four-sevenths. Comparing the volumi' for 

 1861 with that for 190 I (40 years later) the printed surface 

 of the latter is a shade more than five times as much as the 

 former If the subscription price had been continued at the 

 same rate in proportion to the printed surface, it would now 

 iae $5. UO a year instead of SI. 00. Samuel Wagner, living at 



York, Pa., the editor of the first volume, was a fine German 

 scholar, and the first volume was and is especially valuable 

 because of what is drawn from German success, and because 

 of its containing the Dzierzon theory, with which every bee- 

 keeper should be familiar if he would be up in his calling. No 

 single volume of any bee-paper has been so valuable to me as 

 Volume 1. of the American Bee Journal,aud to this day I refer 

 to it frequently. 



2. No : I .-hould say that is not at all a large quantity of 

 dead bees up to Jan. 7. 



Transfering and Swarming. 



I have a colony of bees in a box-hive and X am going to 

 transfer into a Danzenbaker hive in the spring. Will a swarm 

 issue from them ? and will it store any surplus honey during 

 the season ? Rhode Isi-^nd. 



Answer. — If you make no blunder in transferring, the 

 colony ought to do about the same at swarming and storing 

 honey as if it had not been transferred. Some, however, pre- 

 fer to leave the colony undisturbed until it swarms, hiving the 

 swarm in the new hive, then transferring about three weeks 

 after swarming. 



*~*-^ 



Danzenbaker vs. Langstrotti Hive. 



If the Danzenbaker hive is preferable to the Langstroth 

 hive for the production of comb honey, are the closed-end 

 frames an advantage ? Wouldn't the bees stick propolis all 

 over them so they could not be manipulated ? Ohio. 



Answer. — I think closed-end frames ought to be better for 

 wintering outdoors than open-end frames. But I found them so 

 difficult to handle that I gave them up. Where propolis is not 

 so plenty they would not be so bad. but if I had to use Danzen- 

 baker hives I should prefer to live where there was no bee- 

 glue. 



•*-*-^ 



Moving Bees a Long Distance. 



i want to move 90 colonies of bees as far west as Omaha, 

 Neb., by railroad. I will describe their condition and a plan 

 that I have in mind for preparing them for the journey, and if, 

 in your judgment, it is not complete, add what you think 

 would make it so. 



I expect to ship April 15 or 20. The bees are all in 8 

 and 10 frame St. Joe hives, on metal spacers, so the frames 

 can not get misplaced sidewise. My plan is to put an extra 

 strip on the bottom-board, making the space below the frames 

 about ?+ inch, and close the entrance tight, and give them 

 the same space above, with a strip across the top-bars at 

 each end so they cannot shake, covering each with screen-wire, 

 then with the lid or hive-cover off tier them up in the car. The 

 frames are to run with the car, placing two strips of inch 

 lumber between each tier, then fasten them securely so they 

 cannot move. The distance is o82 miles. If they were not 

 shut up over 4S hours would they get through without water ? 



Illinois. 



Answfr. — It seems to me your plan hardly leaves any- 

 thing to desire, so I have no suggestion to make. In April it 

 hardly seems they ought to suffer for water if confined not 

 more than 48 hours : still, it will not be a difficult thing to give 

 each colony a small sponge or a rag filled with water. 



Why Not Help a Little — both your neighbor bee-keep- 

 ers and the old American Bee Journal — by sending to us the 

 names and addresses of such as you may know do not now 

 get this journal ? We will je glad to send them sample 

 copies, so that they may become acquainted with the paper, 

 and subscribe for it, thus putting themselves in the line of 

 success with bees. Perhaps you can get them to subscribe, 

 send in their dollars, and secure for your trouble some of 

 the premiums we are constantly offering as rewards for 

 such effort. 



•' The Hum of the Bees in the Apple-Tree Bloom " is 

 the name of the finest bee-keeper's song — words by Hon. 

 Eugene Secor and music by Dr. C. C. Miller. This is 

 thought by some to be the best bee-song yet written by Mr. 

 Secor and Dr. Miller. It is, indeed, a " hummer." We can 

 furnish a single copy of it postpaid, for 10 cents, or 3 copies 

 for 25 cents. Or, we will mail a half-dozen copies of it for 

 sending us one new yearly subscription to the American 

 Bee Journal at $1.00. 



