94 



(JLEAXIXGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Peb. 



Creator, in his wisdom, arranged it so the most natu- 

 ral way to procure a living is to till the soil, and our 

 Florida soil is quite poor. Although a few seem to 

 get some profit out of gardening, yet 1 think it 

 would be a vexation of spirit to the average farmer, 

 iinless on hammock land. Sweet potatoes do well; 

 the squash family grows well; cabbage does fair to 

 well. Evei-ybody does not farm, even in a farming 

 country; and, bear in mind, it is as easy, if not CAS- 

 ier, to get a living here, aside from tilling the soil, 

 as in an J- country. If you have a little loose money 

 —or, rather, considerable— buy town lots, build 

 dwellings, and rent them. Every house in Orlando 

 is rented at a big rent as soon as built. I presume 

 it is unnecessary to sa.^-, if a person has no capital, 

 and is unable to work, he should not come to Flori- 

 da, for the "bread fruit" does not flourish here. 

 The cost of living is some highei' than in Ohio, but 

 not so much higher as one might think. I think all 

 the canned goods sell as cheap here as in Ohio. Ex- 

 perience has taught me this: If you are an invalid, 

 and are coming here, bring your woolens and flan- 

 nels with you. And now let rae say, in conclusion, 

 that T have tried to give the plain naked facts; that 

 I have taken more pains, I believe, to show the 

 ".s^l(|f" of the frame woik than the veneering with 

 which it is covered; that I have had a cramped feel- 

 ing, for fear I should occupy too much space in 

 GLEANINGS, but 1 must utter this: That keeping 

 bees and growing oranges in i-onncction, to me is 

 most fascinating; and he who kneels to the living 

 God may deny himself of many Of the eoinforts and 

 luxuries of life, and still be happy following tliese 

 two pursuits in this gloriotis climate of Florida. 

 Orlando, Fla. I-. W.(Juav. 



FROM 56 TO 125, AND 8500 POUNDS OF 

 HONEY. 



!)+ liBS. OV HONKV FIUJM ONK SWAKM I .\ n.NK WKKK. 



T HAVE had considerable experience in bee cul- 

 |l[ tu re for the last fifteen years or over. I had 

 W bees in the Langstroth hi\e in the summer of 

 '*' 186!t. I then resided at Pendleton, in the 

 county of Prescott, Ont., an excellent locality 

 for bees. That year 1 collected 1000 lbs. of hOney 

 from four two-story hives. This was before T ever 

 saw a bee-journal, or heard of such a thing. I have 

 had some ups and downs since I coinmencod; still, 

 I have been able to hold mv own well, up to the 

 present time. I give your publications the credit 

 of the greater portion of my success. I have shared 

 at times somewhat in Hlasted Hopes, but generally 

 caused somewhat by my own neglect. 



The season of 1885 I commenced with .")G hives, 10 

 of which were very poor. 1 increased, to 1~'.'(,. and 

 collected oyer 8000 lbs. of extracted honey. T have 

 used and wintered bees on frames of nearly all 

 kinds between the L. an<l the .lones two story and 

 single-story, and the size I like best is a frame 

 I0',2>^, 14 inside measure, 8 frames with two-story, 

 gotten up similar to the Simplicity hive. This is a 

 cold climate, and I have been induced to believe 

 that a deeper frame than the L. is a more suitable 

 one for our cold long winters. 1 do not pretend to 

 give a 16 years' experience in bee-keeping in this 

 letter. 



There is one more fact which I wish to add to the 

 report of last season. During the second week of 

 .July T ol)tained from one first swarm, put in empty 

 combs, 94 lbs. of beautiful thick honev. The swarm 



was hived on Saturday at noon, and the following Sat- 

 urday noon T removed all the combs from the hive. 

 The queen had deposited eggs in two combs only. 

 This was the third time I extracted during the week. 

 Said first swarm came from a bo.x hive which re- 

 mained clustered for a long time, as box hives oft- 

 en do, until the box was almost covered with bees. 



don't extract too close— a suggestion. 



The bees were well rested during their stay In the 

 old hive. This gives me the idea that bees can 

 make up for lost time. I don't believe that it pays 

 to work bees right up to the end of the honey sea- 

 son. If hives are closed in giving- them only the 

 number of combs required to winter on quite early 

 in the honey season— that is, after the swarming 

 fever is over— the bee-keeper suffers no loss. For 

 instance, about the middle of July last, after I ob- 

 tained 8.500 lbs. of honey from ray 13,5 hives, I felt 

 sure I should have no more swarms, so 1 took all 

 comlis from each hive, except those intended for 

 the bees to winter on. I then prepared them for 

 winter by closing them up with division-boards, top 

 frames off, covers on tight, and sawdust behind 

 division-boai'd. At this date each hive had a good 

 queen. The (luestion is, Have 1 lost? did my bees 

 gather honey-dew? [ don't think bees will under 

 such treatment. Hut if I had extracted up to the 

 last of August, all that I could take from them, 

 and left them almost in a state of starvation for a 

 month or so before feeding up for winter, I should 

 expect nothing surer than that mj' bees would be- 

 come demoralizcfl. 



1 have never practiced feeding very much, except 

 when a scarcity of honey comes in mid-summer, or 

 immediately aftei' frost kills the flowers in the fall, 

 which is generally before the middle of September. 

 Then I feed all stock that require winter stores, un- 

 til they have sufticient. 1 feed as fast as they will 

 take it up, and then stop. *l don't believe that feed- 

 ing to stimulate breeding after the flowers cease to 

 yield honey and pollen, pays. Bees will not always 

 breed at this season; and if they do, I think bees 

 raised under such circumstances are much inferior 

 to those raised under the natural impulses. Queens 

 bred late in the fall are worthless; worker-bees 

 raised late in the fall are equally worthless — at 

 least, from my experience I think so. 



James Moffatt. 



Maxville, Out., Can., Dec. 3.5, 1885. 



PERFORATED ZINC FOR THE PREVEN- 

 TION OF ABSCONDING SWARMS. 



A GOOD liEl'OliT FOR THE AI.T.EV OHONE ANP 

 yUKEN TRAP. 



J' WANT to tell you of a little experience that 1 

 i havehad with Alley's combined drone and queen 

 [ trap, and see if you will not agree with me 

 ■ that, in point of convenience and labor saving 

 it should be ranked along with the honey and 

 wax extractors and smokers. On the 14th day of 

 March, 1884, my son and only child came home from 

 college, sick. His disease was typho-malarial fever, 

 which lasted him 72 days, during which time my 

 bees increased from 20 to 48 colonies by natural 

 swarming. Had it not been for two of the above- 

 named traps that I had, it would have been im- 

 possible for me to have secured half the swarms, 

 and at the same time nursed and taken care of my 

 sick chilli. A? it was, when a swarm would begin 



