926 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Dec. 1. 



■mentioned can be easily remedied, I can get 

 along in the future as well as in the past; and 

 if you can see an easy remedy I feel sure you 

 will apply it. C. C. Mii.lek. 



Marengo. 111., Nov. 11. 



[Why, doctor, yon have been studying on the 

 same problem we have, and we were just " get- 

 ting a good ready " to tell what we had done or 

 were about to do, in the line you suggest. Well, 

 perhaps we had better tell some of it now. In the 

 first place, our Dovetailed hives per package of 

 five hives require only a few ounces of crating, 

 and this crating is for the sides and ends. The 

 rest of the stuff is all boxed inside of itself; that 

 is, inside of the bottom -boards, in such a way 

 as not to mar or injure any portion of the hive. 

 Since rubber stamps have become so cheap we 

 are stenciling the contents of nearly every box 

 we put up. in plain letters. The object of this 

 is twofold: To avoid mistakes on the part of 

 our packers in selecting the packages; and, 

 second, to inform our customers, when goods 

 are received, what the package is and what its 

 contents are. Again, we have been reducing 

 the size of many of our boxes. Our new goods 

 are nearly all put up in small packages. You 

 say you would like to have a box or crate that 

 would be useful for something after it has sub- 

 served its purpose of protecting the goods dur- 

 ing shipment. Well, we are about to do some- 

 thing in this line. Our 12 and 24 lb. shipping- 

 cases are to be put up in crates with convenient 

 handles holding 100 and .50 cases in a crate re- 

 spectively, in the flat. After these are received 

 by the consignee, the crate is made of such size 

 and shape that it will hold either nine 24-lb. 

 cases put up, or eighteen 12-lb. cases filled with 

 honey. These crates are so made as to conform 

 to the rulings of the Western Classification 

 Committee: therefore bee-keepers who receive 

 our shipping-cases will need to preserve the 

 crates in which they come. 



Some six or eight years ago, when the writer 

 was at Oberlin, studying, he used to order goods 

 from the Home of the Honey-bees, for local bee- 

 keepers. When the goods were received he was 

 greatly chagrined and surprised on one or two 

 occasions to observe that some of the small 

 packages had to be literally " dug open." as you 

 say. One of the employes had evidently driven 

 nails because he did not have any thing else to 

 do, and they were long wire nails at that. Half 

 the nails and half the size would have answered 

 just as well for ten times the distance the pack- 

 ages had to travel. It did not take E. R. long 

 to sit down and write home a genuine old-fash- 

 ioned " growl." Even now, when he is peram- 

 bulating through the packing-rooms, and finds 

 some new hand putting a suiplus of nails into a 

 box, he hears from him, because he knows what 

 it means to pull those same nails out again. 

 We have learned that it is much better, where 

 goods are very heavy and bulky, to bind the 

 boxes with band iron, and use fi-wer nails, than 

 to use a great lot of wire nails without the 

 binding. 



Some customers in the South have requested 

 to have all their goods packed in one large box. 

 These cases are very rare indeed where a lower 

 rate of freight is obtained thereby. But even 

 if a lower rate were obtained, many bee-keepers 

 would prefer to pay more and have smaller 

 packages. 



This will doubtless be read by all supp-ly- 

 dealers. and we have no doubt that they have 

 been making impiovements in the line indicat- 

 ed. When bee-keepers and supply-dealers can 

 get right down and consult each other's con- 

 venience, it will be dollars and cents in the 

 pockets of all parties concei'ucd.] 



Ud/es' Conversazione. 



INTRODUCING QUEENS IN THE FALL. 



UUTDOOK FEEDINC; VS. FEEDING IN THE HIVE 

 FOR WINTER. 



I have often seen it advised in the bee- 

 journals to purchase queens in the fall, as they 

 can be bought cheaper then, and we have more 

 time to see to improving our bees; but it is so 

 much more uncertain about their being intro- 

 duced safely that I would not advise purchas- 

 ing high-priced queens in the fall unless there 

 is an almost sure prospect of a honey-flow. If 

 the queen is killed it takes time to send for 

 another; or if they are left to raise one for 

 themselves, the colony is apt to run down, and 

 it is quite a risk to run— that of the young 

 queen becoming fertile — because, if there is no 

 honey-flow, there are but few drones. Tinker- 

 ing with bees to keep them built up in time of 

 a honey-dearth, and no queen, is more than 

 likely to prove an injury to them, even in the 

 hands of veteran bee-keepers. I did not, in 

 past years, think so: but I have come to the 

 conclusion that, in times when there is no 

 honey coming in, the fewer bees that can be 

 handled, if they have a queen and plenty of 

 honey, the better it is for that colony. In fact, 

 about all a colony of bees needs is a good queen, 

 a continuous honey-flow, and plenty of room to 

 store honey: but it does not seem a detriment 

 to them to be handled frequently, provided the 

 queen is not injured; but in time of a honey- 

 dearth, if they have even a fair queen, I would 

 let them alone and give them an occasional 

 feed out of doors, of sugar syrup in a shallow 

 wooden feedei', with wooden floats, made by 

 nailing strips of boards together, with bee- 

 spaces between, set up edgewise. Ours is 

 about 4 inches deep, 6 feet long, and 1 foot wide. 

 It ought not to be too heavy for a woman to 

 handle, as, very likely, she will have much of 

 the occasional feeding to do: neither should it 

 be small, because it takes more time to feed in 

 small feeders and keep them clean. The little 

 boards that the floats are made of should not be 

 of too thin lumber, because they will give out 

 too soon: nor of too heavy lumber, because 

 they should float readily on top of the syrup, 

 and sink when the syrup is taken out. For 100 

 colonies there should be at least three such 

 feeders, to give sufficient room for all, that 

 they may take it up quickly and not alight 

 upon each other. It makes the colonies in 

 much better heart, this occasional feeding 

 when no nectar is secreted in the flowers. 



We found that 100 colonies would take up 12 

 quarts, which would be about half a teacupful 

 to the hive, in about 1.5 minutes after they had 

 been fed several times. It was surprising to 

 see how quickly the news would spread over 

 the apiary that the syrup was coming. We 

 feed at all times of the day, just when most 

 convenient, but when warm so the bees could 

 fly readily. If the neighbors' bees got any it 

 did them good. So much time is saved in thus 

 feeding outdoors, that it more than pays our 

 loss of a little syrup. If bees are two miles 

 away they get but little of the syrup, as it is 

 taken up so quickly, and the feeder is aban- 

 doned very soon after the feed is taken up. As 

 oui' bees are mostly Italians, and the neighbors' 

 are nearly all blacks, we can tell when their 

 bees come. 



You say in your footnotes to my article in 

 Gleanings of Oct. 15. that one objection to 

 feeding sweetened water is, that it sours so 

 soon. I would not feed it so weak that the bees 



