188(5 



gleanikctS in i^EE CULTUiiE. 



T91 



but I clealied them, and th<rc has not one shown 

 itself for two years now. 1 pulled some with roots 

 two feet long-. Ed. tt. HAcnvi-EV, 1:5-39. 



Weston, O., .Tnly 19, 1.S86. 



[Friend B., T am pleased to tell yon that I have 

 also g-ot ahead of the Canada tliistles on our little 

 patch; at least, they are getting- to be scarcer and 

 scarcer, and now tliej- have almost ceased to sprout. 

 .My plan is to dig- the ground over with my fingers 

 about once in three days. From this repeated dig- 

 glng, it has now become so fine that it is .just fun 

 to hunt it over for the smallest sprout. I hardly 

 think it will manifest itself at all another season. 

 On a large scale, I would use an Acme harrow] 



CAS WE PKF.SEKVK. THE .<IlOM.V OF NEW FIONEY? 



Is there any method by which the aroma of fresh- 

 ly extracted hone.v can be secured to the honey 

 during- the year? Will fruit-Jars scaled do ity 



St. Paul, Minn. Wm. WAKEKiEF.n. 



[Ves, my friend, sealing- it up as soon as it is 

 gathered will do it, providing- the honey is not so 

 thin that it soon sours; liut, by the way. I think T 

 would rather have it after tin.' a;-oma had some of 

 it departed— basswood honey, for instance; or, if 

 you please, licuiey from seed onions.] 



NOT A S.MEI.L OF BASSWOOD. 



There was not basswood honey enough this year 

 to give me a smell of it. Last year it seemed to be as 

 abundant as white clover. Bees have gathered more 

 than usual from buckwheat, and will get some from 

 goldenrod; but we do not count much on this for 

 surplus. .7. L. Hubbard. 



Walpole, N. II., Aug. 2!}, 188ti. 



naOUGHT AND BITG-.TUICE. 



Inclosed find one dollar, to i)ay for Gi-eaninos 

 another year. I did not make this dollar from the 

 bees. Drought and bug-juice are responsible for it. 

 T increased by natural and artificial swarming from 

 four to twelve. All are very strong- Init three. I 

 have taken but about 50 lbs. of comb honey. 



Blooraingburg, O., Aug. U, 1886. David Long. 



PURE IT.\T.IANS AHEAD OF HYBRID.'? AND 

 Bl.ACKS. 



My report for this year is, with the ma.ioritj', 

 very short. Spring count, 2.1; one weak; increased 

 naturally to 38. I have taken about 30O lbs., mostly 

 extracted. It has been a very poor year for honey, 

 and a large number have lost all or nearly all their 

 bees. I had to double back to 33 stands, which I 

 hope to winter without feeding. My pure Italians 

 beat both hybrids and blacks, they having gather- 

 ed all the surplus I had. C. E. .Tenkins, 20—33. 



Brj an, Te.xas, Aug. 23, 1886. 



THE INTENSIVE SYSTEM. 



Nine years ago I started in the bee-business; 

 those nine years have been years of pleasantness, 

 and I think I have succeeded nicely. I have ,50 

 strong colonies and 60 nuclei, and that is as many 

 as I care to keep, as I run them on the "Intensive 

 System;" that is, the greatest possible gains with 

 the facilities afforded. The phrase, "Intensive Sys- 

 tem," I learned from Rev. Sam .lones, but I be- 

 lieve it is orignal with me when applied to bee- 

 keeping. Walter S. Pouder. 



Groesbeck, Ham. Co., O., Sept. 13, 1836. 



moth, and how to get rid of the.m. 

 The best moth-trap that T have ever heard of is 

 this: Take the refuse, after rendering combs, and 

 keep in a box or bee-hive in the apiar.v, and the 

 millers will congregate on the chunks of refuse and 

 deposit their eggs; and by looking over the refuse 

 every morning the bee-keeper can destroy lots of 



millers. Of course, the best protection to combs is 

 a strong- colony of bees: but nuclei have to be 

 protected, and I find it pflj's to destroy all the 

 millers I can. ,7. B. Kapp. 



Owensville, O., Sept. 1, 1886. 



[The Italians are the best moth-traps we know 

 of. In our apiary, e.\clusively Italians, we ha\e 

 never been troubled with luoth.] 



a CORRECTION. 



I notice just one typographical error in my arti- 

 cle of the 15th of Aug. The word "boiled," 2d 

 line, 2d column, page 644, should be " bolted." 



London, England, Sept. 6, 1886. S. Corneii,. 



Qm 0WN ^pi^i^Y. 



DO.MESTICATING BUMBl.E-BEES. 



X^ AST week, as I was passing through the apiary 

 t!^ my attention was arreste<l by the apiarist 

 '1^^ calling to me something in thiswise: " Er- 

 ■*" nesti Ernest! hello there!" 



" Well," said I, " what'll you haveV" 



So saying I peered this way and that through the 

 long j'ows of grapevines shading- the hives. Finall.\-, 

 through the leaty avenues I espied a hat whose 

 owner, as he neared me, called out, ".lust come 

 here a minute." T followed, morall.v certain that 

 he had found a hive badly infected, or that a col- 

 ony -was doing some unaccountable thing- which he 

 could not explain. We halted in front of a Sim- 

 plicity bottom-board, from which the hive-body had 

 been removed. Nothing very peculiar about that 

 bottom-board, thought I, while with the smokei', in 

 the meantime, the apiarist gave a few puffs under 

 it. This done he slowly lifted one edge of the board. 



^' Apis Anirrif ana (.'), and successfully domesticat- 

 ed too," said I, as the apiarist pulled the straw over 

 and handed me a few- cells of honey. 



Perhaps from an enumeration of some of the 

 characteristic qualities of these bees, some of our 

 hay-making juvenile friends may recognize the 

 species. They are a large bee, as large as acorns, 

 and in color not unlike Carniolans— distant cousins, 

 may be, though I will not say positively. Their 

 numbers vary from one to three dozen. Strangest 

 of all, their surplus honey is stored below, and their 

 brood is above. They are very peaceable when han- 

 dled with smoke, as we had no trouble with them; 

 but when handled with paddles in youthful hands, 

 small boys are loth to call them any thing else than 

 terrors— at least, that was formerly my verdict 

 against them. Their honey is delicious— at least, so 

 says the editor of Gleanings. I have often heard 

 my schoolboy friends pronounce bumble-bee honey 

 superior to any thing else. These bumble-bees can 

 be handled with smoke as readily as the Italians. 

 In fact, we take pleasure in showing them to vis- 

 itors and others. They neither have stung nor have 

 offered to sting; in fact, I think if the juveniles 

 manage it rightly they can handle them like kittens. 



I mention these facts to show what may be done 

 with these clum.sy lovers of sweets, and perhaps 

 our juvenile friends and others may be interested 

 enough in their peculiar habits to give them a trial 

 —not that they will yield any large returns in honey, 

 forthecompai-ati\c amount of honey stored by them 

 is very small. Our bumble-bees havestored, I should 

 think, a little over a pound of honey, all told. As 

 the bees themselves die off on the approach of win- 



