13S 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Fei$. 1."». 



she naturally longed for a trip on it. By the 

 way, slip camp aci'oss the Atlantic from " Mer- 

 rie England" when she was eight years old. 





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---^--J^^-^lo^ PER YEARj 



In the multitude of counselors there is safety.— Pr. 11 : 14. 



The Vermont bee- keepers, in the State con- 

 vention, report a good honey-yield for the last 

 season. They were quite enthusiastic over it. 



The report of the N. A. B. K. A. is now pub- 

 lished in pamphlet form. As usual, it is neatly 

 and well bound. A noticeable feature about 

 the report is the portrait engravings of the of- 

 ficers for 1891 and '92. It can be obtained of 

 Thos. G. Newman & Son, Chicago, for 250. 



TiiEiJE seems to be a great deal of disagree- 

 ment as to the rule that should be laid down 

 for grading honey. But light is surely break- 

 ing in; and even should we be obliged to adopt 

 a schedule that might be regarded as quite im- 

 perfect, it would manifestly be better than 

 nothing. 



In spite uf the cold snap we have been having 

 throughout tlie country, reports aie daily com- 

 ing in to the effect that bees are wintering well. 

 We feared that there might he some heavy 

 losses in some quarters. Of course, the winter 

 is not yet over; but the fact that bees are doing 

 unusually well at the present time is encourag- 

 ing. 



The foul-brood inspector for the province of 

 Ontario. Canada. Mr. McEvoy. is doing some 

 effective work. At the present rate, owing 

 to tlie excellence of their law. and the effective- 

 ness and promptness of their inspector, foul 

 brood in the province will, at this rate, soon be a 

 thing of the past. We hope the State of Ne- 

 braska, where the disease is said to be bad. will 

 copy the example of the Canadians. 



Reports are now in. and show that, of the 

 queens sent to Australia and adjacent islands 

 by mail, only about ten per cent failed to get 

 through alive. A part of this loss, as one or 

 two reports show, was due to an unusual douse 

 of sea-water. G. M. Doolittle has likewise had 

 remarkable success. By the way. he was the 

 first one to send a queen successfully to Austra- 

 lia, and that was away back in 1SS4. We will 

 shortly publish from him a couple of interesting 

 articles on the subject. 



C. P. D.\DANT says that sections open on 

 three sides are the coming style. They can be 

 so arranged that the tops are entirely closed— 

 that is. the closed sides being on top. This may 

 be some advantage to those bee-keepers who 

 prefer to have their colonies fill only one tier of 

 sections at a time. There is another class who 

 like open -side sections, and this three-way 

 style will accommodate them: and then, once 

 more, these sections can be used like the ordi- 

 nary, with only tops and bottoms open. 



We have received a number of letters from 

 prominent bee-keep<'rs all over the; land, con- 

 gratulating us on the candor and fairness of 

 our reply to th(? report of the Ontario Bee- 

 keepers' Association. This we naturally accept 



as an indorsement of every point we made on 

 the part of the bee-keepers as a whole through- 

 out the United States. Brother Newman, of 

 the American. Bee Jfiurnal. not only indorses 

 our reply, but published it in full in his own 

 journal, and then added some telling points 

 that fully justify his action in the matter of 

 incorporation. 



We have just been favored with a visit from 

 Mr. Frank McNay. of Mansion, Juneau Co., 

 Wis. He is a bee-keeperwho manages success- 

 fully some .500 colonies. He has not occupied a 

 very conspicuous position in the bee-journals 

 of late, but he is one of the prominent and suc- 

 cessful bee-keepers of his State. He runs al- 

 most entirely for extracted honey. In talking 

 with him in regard to exti'actors. beseemed to 

 favor the idea of lh(^ new Cowan reversible. 

 We have promised to send him one. and no 

 doubt ne will report later in regard to its work- 

 ings. 



At almost every convention there is more or 

 less discussion in regard to indoor and outdoor 

 wintering. One party will have entire success 

 with one. and another will have failure with 

 the other; and oftentimes some feeling is stirred 

 up needlessly in the discussion. After having 

 examined the matter very closely we have 

 com(^ to the conclusion that k)cality determines 

 in a very great measure whether bees should 

 be wintered outdoors or indoors. At the late 

 convention at Grand Rapids it was interesting 

 to observe what a ditference there was in local- 

 ities only a few miles apart, as to the coldness 

 of the winter. Where the winters were very 

 severe, cellar wintering seems to prevail. In 

 fact, it was the only method that gave success. 

 Where the winters were moderate the outdoor 

 plan gave altogether the best results. In cer- 

 tain parts of York State, cellar wintering is the 

 only plan that gives satisfactory results. In 

 other parts the outdoor plan is preferred. We 

 shall have to conclude, then, in view of these 

 facts, that, in localities where the winter is so 

 cold that the temperature is. for a good part of 

 the time, down to or below zero, the indoor plan 

 is the preferable one. But where bees have an 

 opportunity for occasional flights, the outdoo 

 plan will probably give the best results. 



BAKHAIUTV TO KEES. 



One of the editorial writers in the New York 

 Tribune seems to be greatly exercised over the 

 fact that we have, on one or two occasions, 

 pulled out 10.000 stings from as many liees. the 

 stings being used to supply a large pharmacy 

 concern who pi"epare a certain powerful and val- 

 uable medicine. Mr. W. T. Doty, in the Orange 

 County Farmer, in commenting on this, says: 

 •• It remains for modern barbarism to devise the 

 refinement of cruelty and nonsense in the use of 

 apis mellifica." Neither of the above writers is 

 attacking as any more than the whole medical 

 fraternity of homeopathy. As to the utility of 

 the medicine, that has nothing to do with us. 

 They are both trying to stir up much ado about 

 nothing, to get the people to hold up their hands 

 in holy horror at such "cruelty" and "non- 

 sense."' As well, with equal consistency, they 

 might decry the butchering of beef, dehorning 

 of cattle, the gelding of male animals, bobbing 

 of lambs' tails, or the cropping of bulldogs' ears. 

 Gentlemen of the quill, there is a broad field 

 here; you seem to entirely overlook the fact that 

 the bee does not possess the same intricate and 

 delicate nervous system, and therefore is by no 

 means as susceptible to pain. If you had raised 

 your voice against the dehorning of cattle, there 

 might be some consistency about it. The ex- 



