48(5 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



June 1. 



view of the bee-escape — nay, go a little further 

 and construct thereon a modern house-apiary, 

 equipped with modern bee-escapes. If the es- 

 cape will woi'k outdoors on ordinary hives it 

 has got to work in the house-apiary. 



THE HAVEKLAND STKAWBEKKY— ANOTHEK BIG 

 I'OIXT IN ITS FAVOR. 



I SUPPOSE that most of you know about the 

 frosts that have cut off the fruit prospects, or 

 greatly delayed them, all over the Northern 

 States. Our potatoes that were stalled in the 

 greenhouse have bt^en cut down three times. 

 They are now making a very fair show, and 

 are ready to be cut down the fourth time, or — 

 give us a good ci'op after ail. Well, the Sharp- 

 less sti'awberry, perhaps, suffered most — tiiat 

 is, its early bloom did: the Jessie next, and so 

 on down through a list of perhaps 30 varieties. 

 Now, which oni\ do you suppose, stood the 

 frost better than any other? Why, our new 

 favorite, tlie Haverland; and just now, great 

 green bei'ries are lying almost in heaps around 

 the plants, just as they did last year. Of course, 

 there is some green fruit on the other varieties 

 also: but the Haverlands are ever so much the 

 largest, and tlie most of them. The lirst berries 

 of the season are going to be Haverlands. with- 

 out doubt. Michel's Early, standing right by 

 the Haverlands. sent out blossoms again and 

 again, some time before the Haverland com- 

 menced to bloom. Hut now while the Haver- 

 lands are well loaded with good-sized green 

 berries, Michel's Early has only a few very 

 small ones. I did not notice this particularly 

 until one of our compositors remarked that his 

 Haverlands stood the frost better than any 

 other. One reason may be, that the fruit-blos- 

 soms lie right on the ground, and were often 

 covered by the foliage of the plant. It is also 

 possible that, during another season, they 

 might fail to show this marked difference. 



STUNG TO DEATH. 



The following is an item that is going the 

 rounds of the press: 



STUNG TO DEATH. 



San Antonio, Tex.\s, May 20.— A Uvalde, Texas, 

 dispatch says: Yesterday Geo. Minus, a stockman, 

 met with a sing-ulai' and fatal accident. He was 

 driving past an apiarj- farm wliere tliey were ex- 

 tracting lioney. Tlie angry bees covered tlie two 

 liorses to the deptli of an inch, and hid Ins face and 

 hands like a liclmet. The two liorses died witliiii an 

 liour, and Mr. Minus is dying. Tliou.sands of bees 

 in their anger stung eacli other to deatli. 



□ This may be, and probably is, considerably 

 exaggerated; for instance, t(oo horses covered 

 with bees to the depth of an i7ich. But even if 

 true, the rarity of reports of people or animals 

 dying from bee-stings shows that such casual- 

 ties are not nearly so frequent as injuries and 

 deaths resulting from keeping horses. Right 

 here we can not forbear suggesting that the 

 bee-escape would have averted all this trouble. 

 Mr. G. H. Ashby. of Albion, N. Y., said that his 

 bees frequently annoyed passers-by when ex- 

 tracting, until he used the bee-escape, and now 

 tliat trouble is done away with. The parties in 

 Texas who did the extracting were doubtless 

 careless, and allowed the bees to get to robbing: 

 and the fact that the bees stung everybody and 

 every thing, points very strongly that way. . 

 Bee-escapes would have prevented robbing. 

 The empty supers could have been carried to 

 the extracting-house, or place secure from the 

 bees, the honey extracted, and combs returned 

 in the supers to the hives where they belonged. 

 There is a lesson here that comes to us: Such 

 accidents as these help to give color to the 

 notion that prevails in certain localities, that 



bees are a nuisance and not fit to be kept within 

 corporate limits. Bees do not begin to make 

 the trouble that cows, chickens, and other stock 

 do inside of corporations, and yet the latter 

 are tolerated, and nothing is said against them. 

 Who ever heard of a town council that wanted 

 to oust chickens or cows from corporate limits 

 because they got into into some old dyspeptic's 

 garden '? 



THE UNITED STATES HONEY- PRODUCERS' 

 EXCHANGE. 



A KEPORT UP TO MAY 10. 1891. 



The reports up to date indicate that with the 

 exception of New England, bees have wintered 

 rather better than last year, when they winter- 

 ed unusually well. The chief cause of the 

 great mortality in New England seems to have 

 been starvation. Some have lost their entire 

 apiaries of 50 to 100 colonies or more, while 

 those who provided them with sufficient stores 

 have wintered with a small loss. Bees are gen- 

 erally reported to be in good condition: but in 

 many cases, at the time of making out these re- 

 ports, they wei'e short of stores ; but as this 

 was only a few days before fruit-bloom, they 

 are probably now well supplied, as the weather 

 has been more favorable than usual during 

 that pei'iod. The prospect for a good crop of 

 honey has not been better for several years, un- 

 less it should be spoiled by dry weather. 



The following are the questions that were 

 sent out to the respondents, and correspond to 

 the numbers by States and numbei's just follow- 

 ing. 



1. What is the number of colonies reported in 

 your locality so far as you know? 



2. What per cent were lost in winter and 

 spring? 



3. How does the number remaining compare 

 with last year, and what is their condition? 



Pine Plains, N. Y. G. H. Knickerbocker. 



Qu. 1. Qu. 2. Question 3. 



201 15 per ct. less; cond'n better. 

 About the same. 

 10 per ct. more; cond'n good. 

 About the same. 

 Ditto; cond'n much better. 

 Ditto; good. 

 Ditto; good. 

 15 per ct. less; good. 

 Ditto; extra good 

 20 perct. more; extra good. 

 Same number; cond'n better. 

 Same number; cond'n better.. 

 25 per ct. more; " 

 10 per ct. more; " '• 



Fully halt less; gen'y weak. 

 Fully 40 p. c. less; not good. 

 Ditto; much better. 

 Ditto; rather better. 

 S perct. more; " 

 15 per less; rather weak. 

 10 per ct. more ; same. 

 About the same; good. 

 About the same; good. 

 40 per ct. less; cond'n fair. 

 20 per ct. more: never bet'r. 

 10 perct. less; r.-vthcr " 

 15 per ct. move ; some " 

 Moi'e; in better condition. 

 About same; fair to good. 

 About same; very strong. 

 .\boutsaine; extra good. 

 10 per ct. more; good cond'n. 

 5 per cent more; cond'n better. 

 20 per ct. less; gen'y good. 

 About same; fair to good. 

 Few more; cond'n good. 

 50 per ct. more •' " 

 10 per less; cond'n fair. 



[At the Y'ork State Bee-keepers' convention, 

 held in Albany last February, arrangements 

 were made whereby the Statistical Department 

 of Gleanings and the United States Honey- 

 producers" Exchange (also a scheme for dissem- 

 inating statistics) were to be consolidated, and 

 to be under the management of the former offi- 

 cers of tl^^ Exchange. The officers of the as- 



