420 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



June 



FIVE PECKS OF DEAD BEES. 



I am S years old, ^nd I wire fiatnes. I 

 helLPeo Pa WUh the bees last sulHIWer, and 

 got a good many slings. I /laVe one hire of 

 be-'s. They ArE in ThE CrLlaR with PA's. 

 Oi y at»out ./jve pecka oF 96 ColoniES so 

 /'»i HavE Died. W^sAw *^^e stfam rise in 

 CloXJds fROm laKe QiUArio tliiy Morning 

 w en It was vpry coX^^- 



Wnitby. 0/tt., Cajiada. 



SpEncer OrvlS. 

 Mac. 3, 1884. 



JOHNS EXPERIENCE IN QUEEN-REARING, ETC. 



Last summei- 1 helped pa make several nuclei, 

 and in one the young- queen got lost, I suppose, dur- 

 ing- her wedding-flight, and we gave them another 

 queen-cell, and the young queen hatched, and she 

 was a nice one ; but after 5 or 6 days we saw her 

 crawling- about at the entrance, and a few bees with 

 her; and in examining- the nucleus inside, the bees 

 were all gone except 30 or 40. AVhat had become of 

 the others is a mystery to me. There was some 

 honey left, but no brood; could they have deserted 

 the honey and queen, and gone off without a queen? 

 We introduced the queen in another nucleus which 

 had no queen; she did well, and by fall they made a 

 strong colony. We had from a hive a second swarm 

 with a virgin queen, and Ave hived them three times; 

 they did not want to stay, and the last time we hived 

 them we gave them a frame Avith brood, and then 

 they stayed. 



We had a large swarm which, being at work four 

 days, all at once swarmed out again; they had sev- 

 eral pounds of honey, and plenty of eggs, as we 

 gave them on^ frame of comb. We hived them 

 again in another hive, and gave them the same 

 comb and eggs which they had deserted, and placed 

 them in a shady place; they went to woi-k and filled 

 the hive, and filled 8 1-lb. sections full of honey, and 

 would have made 24 lbs. more if the weather had not 

 set in so dry. 



The colony of bees which my pa gave me last year 

 did well. I obtained from them 60 lbs. of comb 

 honey and 24 lbs. of extracted, and 2 swarms, so I 

 have 3 very good colonies to commence operations 

 with this year. So you see that I shall be a bee- 

 keeper, as I stated in my last letter in March 

 Juvenile of 188:3. John V. Nebel. 



High Hill, Mo., Feb. 29, 1884. 



I think, friend John, the reason why your 

 bees swarmed out was because tliey had no 

 unsealed brood. This is a very important 

 matter, and our practice is to put in some 

 unsealed brood, if the hive contains none, at 

 about the time the queen shall take her 

 flight. Unless you do, the bees will often 

 go out with her, and then scatter about and 

 get lost, just as yours did. I should say, 

 John, that you are a pretty fair bee-keeper 

 already. 



THE SWARM THAT WAS PUT INTO A NAIL-KEG. 



Pa has 22 colonies, and my sister has two. Pa 

 went away one da.v, and left my sister and me at 

 home to watch the bees, and he told my sister all 

 that swarmed she might have. She got one swarm, 

 and put them in a nail-keg, and tried to make them 

 go in at the top. They filled the keg full of honey 

 the first year, and swarmed once. My pa lost three 



colonies this winter. We didn't get much honey 

 last year; bees did not do well here. They made 

 most of their honey from the Spanish needle. Our 

 bees are the blacks. Pa uses the Simplicity hive. 

 None of my bi-others use tobacco. 



McCune, Kansas, 1884, Lida Thompson, age 9. 



It does not seem to me that a nail-keg 

 would be a very nice place for bees, friend 

 Lida ; but I suppose they considered it their 

 duty to go and 1111 up with honey whatever 

 kind of a tixing you gave them. I presume 

 your sister will have a good nice hive for 

 them when they swarm, will she not V 



now TO MAKE COCOANUT PIE. 



For a pie, put a cup of grated cocoanut to soak 

 over night, if it is desiccated; if fresh, you need not 

 soak. Place in a coffee-cup, and fill it with milk. 

 When ready to bake, take two teaspoonfuls of 

 flour; mix it with a cup of milk or water; place on 

 the stove in a tin pail; place in a kettle of boiling 

 water; stir until ; it . thickens; add a teaspoonful 

 of butter while warm; when'cool, add a little salt, 

 the yelks of two eggs, sugar to taste ; add the cocoa- 

 nut, beating all together; fill the crust, and bake. 

 AVhen done, beat the white of two eggs with three 

 tablespoonfuls of powdered sugar, spread on the 

 top; return to the oven, and brown lightly. 



Sarah Rhoades, age 14. 



Falls City, Richardson Co., Neb. 



HOW TO make ICE-CKEAM CAKE. 



Whites of 8 eggs, 1 cup'of sweet milk, 1 cup of 

 butter, 2 cups of sugar, 2 cups of flour, 1 cup of coi-n 

 starch; 2 teaspoonfuls of baking[powder mixed with 

 the flour, cream, butter, and sugar ; • add the milk, 

 then the flour and corn starch; add the whites beat- 

 en very white. Bake in cakes about an inch thick. 



ICING FOR BETWEEN CAKES. 



White of 4 eggs, beaten very light; four cups of 

 sugar, one-half pint of boiling water over the sugar, 

 and boil until clear, and It will candy in cold water. 

 Pour the boiling syrup over the beaten eggs, and 

 beat hard until the mixture is cold and to a stifl: 

 crea*m. Add, before it is quite cold, one teaspoon- 

 ful of pulverized citric acid, 2 teasponfuls of ex- 

 tract vanilla; when cold, spread between the cakes 

 as thick as the cakes are. 



Parnel Davisson, age 13. 



Falls City, Neb., Feb. 2.5 1884. 



Very good, girls ; but for a bee-journal we 

 ought to have recipes for making cakes 

 and pies with honey. By the way, can't we 

 have a honey pie V It seems to me that 

 some of our smart girls might work it out. 

 If it can't be done any other way, have it 

 something like a strawberry shortcake. It 

 might not be a pie, but perhaps it would be 

 just as good by some other name— honey 

 shortcake for in stance. 



THE BEE-BRUSHES. 



Pa has 16 hives of bees, all in good condition. He 

 received some goods of you. He was ijleased with 

 all but the brushes. They were counter-brushes 

 instead of bee-brushes. I help papa at the bees; I 

 like to be about bees. I own one good swarm, and 

 my brother Jones owns one. 



Barton Horst, age 14. 



Goodville, Penn., March 5, 1884. 



At one time we could not get the bee- 

 brushes, and so we put in some brushes we 

 keep on the ten-cent counter, which answer 



