Jan. 10, 1907 



Aiii(»rican Hee Journal 



vented it, was no longer in use. It 

 will stay in use as long as I keep bees, 

 I reckon — unless I should change my 

 strain of bees. Not every really good 

 strain of bees likes to store honey so far 

 away from the brood-nest when there 

 is only a little coming in, anyway ; but 

 mine do it all right. 



Watering Animals— Bbes and 

 Grapes. 



Prof. Cook may help us in some 

 things besides bees. In watering large 

 animals it is oft quite a job to carry so 

 much. And we may feel that they are 

 drinking more than is good for them, 

 and just making us needless work, and 

 yet we don't think it's nice to deny 

 them what water they want to drink. 

 Let them have more finte for the water 

 to pass into their blood and the thirst 

 will not persist until they have swal- 

 owed down all their great stomach can 

 hold. Just now I am carrying water 

 to 3 cows daily. They take 9 big buck- 

 ets. Taking Prof. Cook's hint would 

 be to give each cow one bucket, then 

 do some other chores taking 5 minutes 

 or so, then give each cow one more. 

 Given in that way, perhaps 6 buckets 

 would do better than 9, and be all they 

 would take. i 



I note with surprise (but not at all 

 with displeasure) that Prof. Cook 

 wishes to avoid saying that bees can 

 not puncture grapes ; he rather sus- 

 pects that they could if they got at it 

 right. I believe as respectable a wit- 

 ness as John Pocklington, originator 

 of the Pocklington grape, testified that 

 he saw a bee puncture a grape — not 

 only saw it, but watch in hand 

 he timed it. I forget the time he 

 named. Part of the time another bee 

 was mounted on the shoulders of the 

 first one helping to bear down. Well, 

 what was this bee's method of opera- 

 tion ? Suppose you wanted to per- 

 forate a base-ball with j'our thumb- 

 nail. You would press hard and rub 

 back and forth on exactly the same 

 line. With long patience it could be 

 done, I take it. Bees' mandibles are 

 shaped much like thumb-nails. If I 

 got Mr. Pocklington aright, his bee 

 used one mandible and rubbed in just 

 that way. Our safe defense, if we 

 don't want to get cornered, is not that 

 bees are incapable of perforating, but 

 that th :y almost never learn how. 

 See, I'm not " holding my whist " this 

 time, when I can get behind Prof. 

 Cook, out of sight. Shall I tell about 

 the other way bees destroy sound 

 grapes ? I think I've seen a little of 

 that — but have never seen the way just 

 mentioned. It's to cluster on the 

 bunch till they cover it all up out of 

 sight — to get themselves into a boiling 

 frame of mind, like they were balling 

 a queen or trying to force a hole into a 

 hive you had just shut them out of 

 when they had been robbing it. I 

 don't know which counts most, the 

 heat they generate, or the joint power 

 with which they pry the berries 

 around : but the joint result is to start 

 the berries from the stems, after 

 which, of course, the rest is easy. 

 Page 998. 



Dur 



Conducted by Emma M. Wilson, Marengo, 111. 



A Sister In Charge in New Zealand 



Miss Livesay has been placed in 

 charge of the State Apiary of New 

 Zealand, according to an article in 

 Gleanings. She is a lady with Eng- 

 lish training, and " she hopes to popu- 

 larize the industry among the farmers' 

 wives and daughters. The supervisor, 

 Mr. C. Sinton Hutchinson, is one of 

 the best scientific bee-keepers in the 

 country. The Langstroth hive is used, 

 as is the case throughout the country, 

 its general adoption being due to the 

 efforts of Mr. Hopkins many years 

 ago. American bee-literature, too, is 

 read far more than English, which, in- 

 deed, is but rarely seen. 



"The bees at the State Farm are 

 hybrids, and nothing has been done 

 yet to improve the strain ; but next 

 season Mr. Hopkins will import some 

 of the best Italian queens. "There will 

 also be observatory hives and probably 

 a library." 



Not an Irish Sister— North Pole 



I think a good deal of the American 



Bee .Journal. When I sit down to read it I 

 don't know when to stop, — Michael Mc- 

 Adamis, of Illinois. 



The editor of the Irish Bee Journal 

 says : 



The American Bee .Journal is called in the 

 States the " Old Reliable,'' and is one of those 

 ever-fresh, ever-welcome publications that no 

 bee-man worth a dollar and a half can afiford 

 to do without. Of that attractive Journal, 

 one of the most delightful departments is 

 that of " Our Bee-Keeping Sisters," 



Then, after some kind words about 

 the head of this department, he con- 

 tinues : 



Well, Miss Emma M, Wilson does us the 

 honor of reading the Irish Bee Journal, and 

 treats us very kindly in her department of 

 the American Bee Journal, Our editorial on 

 " Drivel," page 37, caught her attention, and, 

 as with so many of us, the quotations we 

 made amused her immensely. But how does 

 she begin her article? " Woman's Life, a 

 journal presumably published in Ireland," 

 she says ! 



There you are again ! 



We have already so much to answer for in 

 this country, a little more or less makes no 

 difference. The article quoted was so un- 

 blushingly ridiculous that it must have ema- 

 nated from one of the " writers for women's 

 journals " here, and the publication itself 

 must, of course, be Irish ! If the sun, moon 

 and stars, including the Milky Way and the 

 Great Bear, were suddenly to drop into New 

 York Harbor, the cry would immediately go 

 up that an Irishman did it. It strikes us that 

 we have here the secret of many national 

 disasters and failures. Take, for example, 

 the various North Pole exploration expedi- 

 tions, of which America contributes her 

 share, and each of which makes " a record," 

 but with just as little hope of success. Why? 



Because some one is constantly shifting the 

 Pole farther north; and the explorers will 

 have to set a dozen policemen on the chest of 

 every Irishman in the Arctic regions before 

 they can " discover the Pole I" 



But, as a set off, let us assure Miss Wilson 

 that the publication which has given good, 

 healthy laughter to hundreds of us, has its 

 home in London, where the apicultural 

 knowledge of Europe is concentrated, and is 

 no more Irish than are the Falls of Niagara, 

 This, we feel sure, will be welcome informa- 

 tion to the gifted lady who weekly delights 

 us and all other readers of the American Bee 

 Journal, 



With this full explanation care will 

 be taken in the future to keep in mind 

 that a Woman's Life is not necessarily 

 an Irish Woman's Life because men- 

 tioned in the Irish Bee Journal. 



But is there not some mistake on 

 the part of Editor Digges when he 

 speaks of some one shifting the Pole 

 farther north ? Does he not know the 

 Pole is lost, and that frantic efforts 

 are being put forth to find it ? Now 

 how could any one shift it further 

 north without first finding it ? But if 

 it had been found by any of "those 

 Irish ' that he speaks about as " always 

 on the borderland of starvation,' in- 

 stead of shifting its place would they 

 not have cut it up for firewood? In 

 which case is it worth all this bother 

 to try to find the stump ? 



Now, if Editor Digges wants to make 

 sure that the Irish Bee Journal shall 

 not be misquoted, the way is very easy : 

 Just let him stop making its pages so 

 bright that one is constantly tempted 

 to quote from them. 



Yellow Sweet Clover — Are There Sev- 

 eral Kinds ? 



If I were sensitive about being called 

 a " Sweet Clover Crank,' I would cer- 

 tainly "let up " on writing about it, 

 for a little while, at least. 



I had a letter a short time ago from 

 a valued friend of mine. He is a sweet 

 clover expert, by the way, and few 

 have done more to remove the preju- 

 dice against the beautiful " Melilotus 

 alba."' 



He wanted to ask me about some 

 sweet clover he had been growing. He 

 said he bought 25 pounds of seed from 

 a reliable firm (a bee-supply house), 

 and sowed it on March 31. I will quote 

 from his letter : 



" The seed grew well, and on May S began 

 to bloom. Soon there was a sea of yellow 

 bloom everywhere that I had scattered the 

 seed. This clover grew about 12 to li inches 

 high, but — / never saw a single bee on this mass 

 of sweet clon'r bloom. The plants of this 



