S98 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CtrLTUltE. 



AitG. 



chamber is contracted down to about 000 or VOO 

 square inches of I'ranie space, according- as a g-lven 

 number of frames malse it. 1 usually use but six 

 Gallup frames in time of contraction, which give 

 690 square inches of frame space. Sometimes I use 

 but four, and often only five, this being govern- 

 ed by the size of the colony, contracting all to suit 

 their numbers, so that the most honey may be ob- 

 tained while the harvest lasts. In taking away the 

 extra brood, if a few bees are taken with it and the 

 hive closed tight for a few days, a new colony can 

 be formed with it, or such can be used in forming 

 nuclei. Now, there is one thing that I do along this 

 line of contraction that no one else practices, that I 

 know of, still they may do so and I not know it. As 

 soon as the harvest of white honey is over, I take 

 off the surplus arrangement, take out the dum- 

 mies, and fill out the hives with combs the same as 

 it was when I was raising bees for the harvest. This 

 I do for two reasons: 1. Honey has proven to be 

 equally good for my bees to winter on, with sugar 

 syrup, and on the whole I prefer it to the syrup; so 

 if any honey is stored after this, it is in the combs 

 where I want it for wintering purposes. 3. The en- 

 larging of the brood-nest at this time gives me 

 plenty of young bees for winter, and this is really 

 necessary where the contraction has been closer 

 than six frames. Six frames will give plenty of 

 bees for winter, if the bees have not crowded the 

 queen with honey; but, as a general rule, there is 

 nearly honey enough to winter the colony on where 

 that nun)bcr of frames has been used, with the 

 Italian bees. In this case the empty frames are 

 placed in the center of the hive, while if the frames 

 are filled with brood they are placed on the outside. 

 If brood is lacking, and it is getting late in the sea- 

 son, I frequently take the brood from the nuclei I 

 made with it, when formerly taken away from the 

 colony, and give it liack to them, using the nuclei 

 up in rearing queens, so that, when I get through 

 queen-rearing in the fall, the bees of the nucleus 

 have nearly all died of old age. In this way I get 

 my bees in good shape for winter, having very little 

 uniting or feeding to do. G. M. Doolittle. 



Borodino. N. Y., July 14, 1888. 



Friend I)., you have given us some excel- 

 lent reasons for wearing a veil. I, too, am 

 nervous, like yourself; but the bee-veil 

 w^ould make me more nervous, I believe, 

 than the bees or stings, vmless I could have 

 one that would not obstruct my breath in the 

 least, nor make me uncomfortably v^^arm. I 

 do not believe we know exactly what it is 

 you call bobinet. Will you please mail us a 

 little bit for a sample? Perhaps we will 

 have an engraving made, to show the size of 

 the threads and the size of the mesh. It is a 

 very important matter to have the very best 

 fabric tlie world can produce— that is, at a 

 moderate price, for the construction of bee- 

 veils. — I have always been a little skeptical 

 in regard to any kind of contraction that 

 recommended taking away brood or bees. 

 When the honey-harvest is nearly over, it 

 might answer to take away some of the un- 

 hatched brood ; but who can tell with any 

 degree of certainty when the honey-harvest 

 will close? As a rule, it closes with us from 

 the middle to the latter part of July ; but 

 once in four or five years we liave quite a 

 flow from red clover ; and taking away brood 



or bees at such a time would be a pretty sad 

 blunder. 



REPORT PROM MISSISSIPPI. 



OUR OLD FItlEND O. M. BI-ANTON TALKS A LITTLE 

 DOLEFUL. 



J^l RO. ROOT:— Your postal card to me, request- 

 Oi ing statistics in regard to bee-keepers and 

 f% the honey crop would be a most difficult one, 

 ■^^ as I should have to travel over the entire 

 State and canvass every county, as we have 

 no bee-keepers' conventions in the South that 1 

 know of, except Kentucky. Before honey becam'j 

 so low in price, the Southern bee-keepers had quite a 

 furore for embarking largely in the production of 

 honey; but last year, and the year before, so discour- 

 aged them that the greater number abandoned the 

 business. In this county, where there were 30 bee- 

 keepers in the business on quite a large scale, there 

 are none now, with the exception of myself and Ellen 

 Foster, an old colored woman, a pupil of mine, who 

 has 150 colonies. 



There are many occupations in this rich country 

 that are more profitable. There are but few small 

 farmers, but the greater portion are large planters 

 who devote their time almost exclusively to the 

 cultivation of cotton. Diversified farming is car- 

 ried on to a great extent in the hill country; but in 

 this Immense alluvial region, cotton is emphatically 

 "King." My business is so extended that I can not 

 give my apiaries half the attention they require, 

 and the help is so indifferent that I labor under 

 great disadvantages. I am now employing both 

 colored and white labor, and succeed about as well 

 with one as the other. 



The spring was too cool and wet for much of a 

 honey-flow, and not until May did we extract any 

 surplus. June was very wet— raining every day, 

 and some days in torrents, destroying the nectar, 

 and damaging the cotton planter with an excess of 

 weeds and grass. So far I have not taken off any 

 comb honey; but for the last week the bees have 

 been gathering honey rapidly, and I am now going 

 over ray apiaries for extracted honey the second 

 time. The yield so far has been only .5000 lbs. from 

 350 colonies, spring count. These have increased to 

 450. The bees are capping over in the greater por- 

 tion of my hives, and I contemplate a good yield for 

 the next six weeks. 



I have .iust returned from my mountain home at 

 Monteagle, Grundy Co., Tenn., where I found my 

 bees had stored a great quantity of honey from 

 honey-dew— the veritable "louse-juice" described 

 by Mi-s. Chaddock. Friend Wells had a great quan- 

 tity, and I think he will have a difficult time dispos- 

 ing of it. 



After the honeydew flow was over, the bees 

 brought in some beautiful basswood honey; and 

 when I left they were working diligently on sour- 

 wood, which grows in the greatest abundance on 

 the mountain plateaus. 



I regret that I can not give you an accurate report 

 of the bee-keepers and their honey-yield in this 

 State. I should at least rate it very low from the 

 abandonment of the business by so many. 



Greenville, Miss., July 9, 1888. O. M. Blanton. 



P. S.— Jufj/ W. I am now again at Monteagle, and 

 found my bees had made poor progress, owing to 

 the frequent showers. At Greenville, on the 10th 



