572 



GLEANINGS IN UEE CULTUllE. 



July 



or cimrso food, and fed on grain alone, soon de- 

 vour pieces of wood, sliavings, etc. In the Ameri- 

 can people, the use of concentrated food tells its 

 tale \\\ the horrors of dyspepsia. Why should we 

 not find this same lawe-xtending- to insect-life— the 

 siirao wise power created both? The office of pollen, 

 fi-om wliatever source it comes, then, is to provide 

 this substance, which is insoluble. If you attempt 

 to dissolve bee-bread in boiling: water it will be 

 found that a large portion remains intact. My f>b- 

 servation convinces me that the mature bees use 

 pollen for food ab well as for the immature fed lar- 

 va-, or some substance as a substitute. 

 BaUersfleld, June 4, 1888. W. A. Webster. 



Friend W., you are a scientist, and I have 

 no doubt but that you are right. You do 

 fiot mention grahani bread, but I presume 

 it comes in on a line with tlie facts you have 

 given us. [ Iviiow that horses and cattle 

 must liave hay or straw, or some substitute, 

 and very likely it is. to a certain extent, the 

 same with bees. 



THE SMOKER WITH THE NEW VAT.VE. 



The use of a loose valve in the Clark smoker is a 

 great improvement, as the air enters the bellows so 

 easily that there is comparatively no draft through 

 I he lube. On page 331 you say: "If the bellows be 

 worked, fire-box downward, the valve drops, and 

 does not immediately respond to the compression 

 of the bellows." This can be easily remedied. To 

 work the smoker with the fire-box downward is the 

 most convenient way to use it; and to have the 

 valve respond promptly when thus used, simply 

 place the valve on the board next to the flre-box, 

 and tho weight of the valve will promptly close 

 when the bellows ceases to expand. The heat from 

 the flre-box docs not hurt the valve, as the current 

 of cold air continually cools it. E. Kretchmer. 



Coburg, Montgomery Co., Iowa, Apr. ;J6, 18.88. 



Willi us it is much more convenient to 

 use the Clark with the fire-box upward ; and 

 hence for us the valve is better where it is. 

 Perhaps it is habit. 



CbOVER NOT KILLED OUT. 



During the past winter a number of prominent 

 liee-keepers have expressed the opinion that the 

 dry seasons had killed out the greater jiart of the 

 white clover, and that the honey crop was likely to 

 be short this season. Experience in this locality 

 proves that white clover is not killed by drouth. 

 Last autuiun, before the rains came, our pastures 

 were as bare of vegetation as if grass had never 

 grown there. In these same fields there are now 

 more solid acres of white clover in bloom than I 

 ever saw before. We have had abundance of 

 spring rains, which, I suppose, accounts for it. 

 Bees are doing well, with good prosjiects ahead. 



Browntown, Wis., .lune 19, 1888. H. Lathrop. 



HONEY-DRW THIS YEAR. 



Since looking o\-er your ABC book we have been 

 having a gieat amount of honey-dew in the moun- 

 tains of this latitude. 1 went into the woods to get 

 a swarm of Itees earlj- in the morning, and found 

 every thing covered that evening. I took a piece 

 of oil cloth and spread it over some low bushes and 

 brush, where there were no trees or brush over it 

 — nothing but the clear skj-. The next morning, 

 before sunrise, I went to it and found it glazed 

 over with a sweet sticky substance. I brought it 



home and washed it off, and it made the water 

 quite sweet; so if your bark-louse exuded this 

 sweetness it did it on the wing. Bees are doing 

 remarkably well in this section. 



W. L. Shideleh. 

 Esculapia Springs, Lewis Co., Ky., June 24, 1888. 



carpenter bees— copulation, as seen by an 

 eye-witness. 



The carpenter bees have been one of my earliest 

 sports; and while 1 have never yet been able to see 

 a qucen-liee meet the drone, I did have the opportu- 

 nity to observe the a^t between two carpenter bees, 

 about the middle of last April, as I was working in 

 my turnip-patch (you see, friend Root, I have a 

 vegetable crop lor recreation, work, and profit too, 

 as veil as youiself). I heard the hum of bumble- 

 bees on the wing, and, looking up and around, it 

 was some time before I could locate them, though 

 very soon two of them came tumbling down over 

 and over to the ground. Thinking it was two of 

 them fighting, as they often do, I started on with 

 my work; but soon hearing them again, and look- 

 ing, I saw them rising up from the ground in the 

 air. I then, for the first time, noticed that they 

 were in the act of copulation, and then I began to' 

 observe them more closely. I observed that they 

 were male and female, the latter being more light- 

 colored, and some larger. Tlie twain rose in the 

 airi-omCiiO or 40 feet, and down they came again, 

 pretty soon, to within a lew feet of me. That they 

 were attached as we often see the common house- 

 flies, was plain to be seen. About the time 1 had 

 made this observation they arose in the air, and 

 time after time descended to near the ground; but 

 not quite reaching it any more, they made off, cir- 

 clirg uj) and down till ItW or 13.5 feet away, then 

 they rose to a height of 75 or 100 feet, and flew pret- 

 ty nearly level, as far as I could see them, some 300 

 feet away, and they were still attached. 



The carpenter bee here in the South bores holes 

 about '/i inch in diameter, in the spring of the year, 

 into our hard pine-wood plate and rafters, under 

 sheds and houses, and rear their young in them. 

 Their holes are bored in about one inch deep, and 

 then several inches at right angles, in the hardest 

 of our woods. Abbott L. Swinson. 



Goldsboro, N. C, May 30, 1888. 



the shrinkaoe in sections— a good sugges- 

 tion. 

 1 have just been reading your article on page 454, 

 in regard to the exact width of sections to fill the 

 case, Jio more and no less, and that you had been 

 severely censured by some one for having sections 

 run ^, in. scant to the foot. Now, it seems to me 

 th'at any one who knows any thing of the nature of 

 basswood would not make any such complaint, as 

 it is very susceptible to dampness, and even a damp 

 atmosphere affects it quite perceptibly. I always 

 order my sections a little larger or wider than I 

 want then), as I can easily make them narrower; 

 but if too narrow I can not make them wider, and I 

 prefer to plane the edges, as they will unavoidably 

 be a little uneven, and I have a board made level 

 with a cleat nailed on one end and side to hold the 

 sections on edge, and 1 then take as many sections 

 as I can plane well, from 35 to .50, and set them all 

 together on edge against the aforesaid cleats, to 

 hold them true; then with my plane (which every 

 bee-keeper should have and know how to use) I 



