1SS6 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



783 



the bees into a pound cage, and then allow 

 about one-fourth to the actual weight of the 

 bees for the honey they may have in their 

 sacks; that is, if your order calls for a pound 

 of bees, make the scales turn to a pound and 

 a quarter. If you propose to cage and ship 

 vicious bees, it may be necessary to smoke 

 them so severely as to cause them to gorge 

 themselves. I would then allow one-half for 

 the honey. Again, in tlie lieiglit of the hon- 

 ey season, smoke or no smoke, gentle l)ees 

 will be tilled with honey. A liberal allow- 

 ance should then be given as before ; at any 

 rate, do not be afrnid to give good measure. 

 An interesting point comes in here : AVe 

 liave, in former seasons, bought swarms in 

 the cluster just as the farmers brought them 

 in. We paid so much a pound for the bees, 

 and therefore knew the exact weight of the 

 bees at the time of clustering. On weighing 

 them the next day, to ascertain the amount 

 of honey the bees carried with them, we 

 found that they lost nearly one-half. Of 

 course, the beeshad gorged themselves with 

 honey just prior to the exodus of the swarm. 

 The shipper must therefore use judgment. 



FROM DIFFERENT FIELDS, 



BEE-KEEPINO IN THE AVEST INDIES. 



T HAVE justrcceivcd your A B C book, and " How 

 (d? the Farm Pa3's." I shovikl like a little advice 

 ^[ from you with regard to bee culture. I may 

 '*' say I'm a beginner, and then, again, I'm not. I 

 have 58 colonies of bees in all sorts of boxes, 

 and two hives with bees. The hives were imported 

 from England. With America so near, it is any 

 thing but a paying concern to send to England for 

 bee-appliances. 



This is a glorious country for bee culture, there 

 being no winter and only two months in the year 

 wlicn bees have to be fed— August and September. 

 One great drawback is, that the Aveather is very se- 

 vere sometimes; consequently the little fellows, not 

 being waterproof, have to stay at home. Among 

 the negroes, bees arc kept largely, and they make a 

 good living by it — soms of them. One man I must 

 tell you of— a blacksmith -worth 2s. (ii/. per day, re- 

 fuses to work, because his bees give him such a 

 good income. He has 1000 boxes; and — would you 

 believe it? — sometimes his swarms go away simply 

 because he won't pay 3 pence for a box to put them 

 in. He is " penny wise and pound foolish." 1 have 

 known his bees to remain three and four days on 

 trees in his yard, and not go away. I have seen the 

 bees working on comb, hanging where they swarm- 

 ed. To return to myself, I have 60 boxes, and I 

 mean to keep them on an improved scale. In Octo- 

 ber I expect those 60 to increase to 100. January, 

 when they start fair play, I exjiect them to be 300 

 before I take any honey; and by .luly, the end of 

 the honey and swarming season, if all goes well I 

 expect quite KKW boxes. I think my best plan 

 would be to start fi fresh apiary, letting this one go 

 on the same way. C. E. Scuuamohe. 



Morant Bay, .lamaic.i, .July :Jf<, IH'^6. 



Friend 8., we are very glad indeed to 

 hear of so good a report from Jamaica, and 

 X am particularly inlereblcd in that colored 



blacksmith who has 1000 colonies, for I sup- 

 pose you mean by the term " boxes," liives 

 of bees. If our colored friend has got up to 

 this number of colonies, it seems to m(^ he 

 ought to have intelligence enough to take 

 hold of the A B C book, and I do not know 

 how to give any better advice than for you 

 both to follow its teachings. It is being re- 

 vised constantly: in fact, we are at work 

 every day in tiie year, to keep it. fully 

 abreast with the times in all late improve- 

 ments. — If I were you I should not be am- 

 bitious to become master of a thousand col- 

 onies. Ten colonies, so managed as to give 

 you lOUU lbs. of honey each season, will l)e 

 better than a large niunber with little or 

 no honey. Your success depends greatly on 

 your market. What does nice comb honey 

 in one-pound sections sell for in your prin- 

 cipal cities? 



WHAT TO DO WHEN BEES SWARM IN THE I'AI.L. 



Brother Roo^:— Inclosed find one dollar for 

 Gleanings. I really feel ashamed to send so 

 small an amount of cash for so lai'ge an amount of 

 instruction. My bees have made but little honey, 

 and have swarmed all the fall. What shall I do 

 with them? I hate to cut out the cells. I had one 

 swarm come out last Saturday, and I let them go 

 off because I did not want them. J. B. Pike. 



Marshfleld, Vt., Sept. .5, 1886. 



Thanks, friend P., for your kind words. 

 Before we can direct what you should do 

 with swarms that come out in the fall, we 

 should have to know whether you want an 

 increase of stocks or honey. In any case, 

 unless you are already overstocked I think it 

 will pay well to feed them. Late swarms, 

 when properly fed up, winter beautifully, 

 for the queen almost always raises a nice lot 

 of brood before winter sets in. 



NOT VERY FLATTERING SUCCESS. 



In the fall of 188;? I bought two hives of bees for 

 f^lO.OO. They wintered well on their stands. In 

 the spring of 1884 one of them swarmed once and 

 the other twice, making me in all five good swarms. 

 The same spring I traded a cow, valued at $10.00, 

 on Ave more young swarms, having then iu all 

 ten swarms; but there followed a dry fall, when 

 they did not do very well. In the spring of 1885 

 six of them were dead, with honey enough in their 

 hives, and the four alive. They dwindled away 

 until they were all gone. That ended my bee- 

 business. In April last I bought a hive again for 

 SS6.50, and from that one I now have five good 

 swarms, which have all been doing finely until 

 Avithin about four weeks, when the dry Aveather 

 came upon us, and Avhich is still reigning, since 

 Avhich time they huve gradually been doing less 

 and less, until now they are having actually nothing 

 to do, almost every thing being dried up. Now, what 

 can I do for my bees? Feed them? 1 f so, how? 



Elkhart, Ipd., Aug. Vi, 1886. M. D. Wenger. 



I would feed ; see Onr Own Apiary, last 

 issue. 



BLACK UKES AVORliING ON RED CLOVER. 



I have black bees tlijit Avork on rod clover ex- 

 tensiA'ely. One colony lias made 7.) lbs. of surplus, 

 and swarmed .June 3Hth. One young swarm that I 

 hived .lune 5th made 50 lbs. by June 2Tth. This 

 was surplus. Others have done as well. How is 



