1886 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



487 



Alley and others in their drone-traps I think 

 will answer the purpose nicely. We will 

 give it a trial at once, and report. 



PLANT - LICE AND HONEY - DEW, 

 AGAIN. 



POME OBSERVATIONS BY MKS. CHADDOCK. 



T WONDER if these lice on our box-elder are the 

 M kind o( lice that make the honcy-dcw. There 

 ^t are millions of them on the under side of the 

 ■^ leaves and along the stems, packed tightly on 

 top of each other. To the naked eye they are 

 a little green bug, varying in size from a grain of 

 nuistai-d to a tongue-grass seed. Under the micro- 

 scope they are a pale-green, waxy-looking affair, 

 with deep-green stripes down each side of the back. 

 Their legs and feelers look as though they were 

 made of white wax, tipped with reddish brown. 

 The eyes are of the same color as the tips of the 

 legs and feelers. They are fat and squabby, and 

 when they walk the body drags. When they get 

 older they have long white wings, and the body is 

 not so large. They have a sort of a skentcr-did ap- 

 pearance. They taste like the leaf that they feed 

 on (I ate a few), and just now 1 found out that the 

 top of the leaf is all glistening with little splotches 

 of a decidedly sweet substance. Under the magni- 

 fier it looks like clear water, not standing in drops, 

 but flattened out or smeared over. I pressed the 

 bugs under the lens with a pen-point, and they 

 gave out a tiny drop, too small for the naked eye to 

 see, and I tried to taste it, but it doesn't make any 

 impression on the tongue, so of course they are the 

 very bugs that make the honey-dew. I had not 

 seen the sweet stuff on the leaves when I began 

 writing. The bees are not working on it at all, as 

 the apple-trees are in bloom. 



MORE HONEY-DEW— L.\TER. 



For a whole week my bees have been roaring 

 about the tops of the Norway spruce, and I have 

 been wondering what they found there, but had no 

 time to climb the trees, and I could see nothing on 

 the lower limbs. But this morning after I had 

 turned the cheese, fixed the Are under the soap- 

 kettle, put more water under the lye-hopper, milked 

 two cows, and fixed the churn, I built a sort of 

 scaffold out of a tub, a bo.x, a board, and another 

 tub, and, standing up there, I found drops of nec- 

 tar (?) in among the new growths. It is as clear as 

 water, and very sweet. Along the stem were some 

 things that looked like brown scales; but under the 

 magnifier they developed into plant-lice. They re- 

 semble the insects found on the box-elder, in every 

 thing but color, these being of a yellowish-brown 

 color, with darker brown stripes down each side 

 of the back; and when I pressed them they dis- 

 charged (I should think) six times as much sweet as 

 the green kind did. So far I am pleased with them. 

 This is a dry time for honey here; and if the plant- 

 lice will be kind enough to fill the gap between 

 fruit - blossoms (apple - blossom) and raspberry- 

 bloom, it seems to me that they will fill a great 

 vacancy. Perhaps if each «ne of these lice is to be 

 the parent of a million more I may get over my joy 

 of them before the season is over; but just now 

 I'm pleased. 



My bees have gone crazy. March hares, loons, 

 and all the other comparatively crazy things arc 

 safe and sound when compared with mj- beeg. TUey 



don't know what they don't want. Always, till this 

 year, I had my bees scattered about under the ma- 

 ple-trees, on the north side of every thing, and in 

 corners here and there. I always keep the queens' 

 wings clipped, and when they swarm I catch the 

 queen, put her under a goblet on a plate, set her in 

 the shade, and let the bees come back at their lei- 

 sure. I used to carry the old hive away and put the 

 new one in its place; now I turn it around, a Ja 

 Heddon, and set the new one where the old one 

 used to be. I always put in a frame of hatching 

 brood, and never had bees desert the hive. Now I 

 have my colonies all in one spot, standing eight 

 feet apart each way. When the first swarm came 

 out I proceeded just as I always had done, but the 

 bees came back and divided themselves around 

 among the four hives that wore nearest. Then an- 

 other swarm came out, and they were going to do 

 the same, but I put fifteen yards of cheese-cloth 

 around one hive, a bolt of muslin around another, 

 a table-cloth on the third, and a wet towel on the 

 fourth. Then I lighted up my Clark's smoker; and 

 wherever they seemed thickest, there 1 was in their 

 midst. I finally persuaded them to go back where 

 they came from; and when I had time to draw my 

 breath and fan myself a little with a rhubarb leaf, 1 

 began to smell smoke, and there the cheese-cloth 

 and the table-cloth were both burning away. I sub- 

 dued the fire, and then another swarm came out, 

 and, without ever alighting, or acting in any way as 

 bees should, they went over to a colony that was 

 already boiling over full, and went in and on the 

 hive. 



The next day was Sunday, and Sunday is always a 

 field day with my bees. The one that went in the 

 empty hive the day before came out and alighted 

 on an early Richmond cherry-tree. I caught the 

 queen, and we carried a hive over there and put 

 the bees and queen in; then carried them off a dis- 

 tance from the rest, and left them, with no brood 

 nor foundation in the hive. Two more swarms 

 came off and came back when they ought to. 



In the afternoon these two swarms came out and 

 alighted on two barberry bushes that stand close to- 

 gether. One of them had just about settled when 

 the other started out. Then when they started to 

 go back, each one went to the wrong hive and went 

 in and stayed all right. Next day they came out 

 and both went in one hive, and all the other new 

 swarms came out, and, after airing themselves for 

 awhile, went back where they came from. Hatch- 

 ing brood doesn't make a particle of difference. 

 The first swarm started 23 queen-cells in the 24 hours 

 tht^t it occupied the hive. None of the others start- 

 ed any. Now as to their being too warm. 1 hived 

 them in Simplicity hives, and 1 set them twisted on 

 the bottom - board so that the air could come in; 

 then I put muslin on top of the frames, then I set 

 an empty hive on top of that, and put on the cover 

 so that the heated air could pass out. The hive that 

 held the two swarms, I piled up four stories high, 

 the two lower ones having frames. I don't mind a 

 little skirmisking; but to have the bees playing 

 " pussy wants a corner," trading hives with each 

 other, coming out every day to take the fresh air, 

 as if they were invalids, and the doctor had ordered 

 it, and hanging on the outside of tiives while bil- 

 lions of clover-blossoms are going unsucked, is too 

 much. Mahala B. Chaddock. 



Vermont, 111., May, 1886. 



Why, Mrs. C, I do not wonder that you 



