174 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Mar. 1. 



prefer syrup. There was a man not far off 

 that had a good many at one time, but got 

 tired of them, and don't care for them any 

 more." 



When land has been cultivated a number of 

 years it is called worn out, and is not cultivat- 

 ed, but allowed to grow up in wild land again. 

 Many of these fields grow up to broom sedge, 

 and my host had one, and ever)' room had 

 two brooms made from it — a long and a short 

 one. I busied myself while waiting by mak- 

 ing some of these brooms, and I think brushes 

 made from it would be excellent to brush off 

 bees from combs, being more soft and pliant 

 than broom-corn. There appear to be two va- 

 rieties of this sedge. 



The second time the mail came it was in a 

 cart, and I resolved to go in it. We arrived 

 at noon at a log house in the woods, where a 

 postoffice was kept. While the mail was 

 changed and horse fed I ate my lunch in the 



blooming plant in my drive through the pine 

 woods. The mail carrier said there were plen- 

 ty of flowers in bloom during the summer. 

 St. Andrews Bay, Fla., Feb. 17. 



BINGHAM'S NEW BEE-CELLAR. 



How to Construct a First-class Winter Repository. 



BY T. F. BINGHAM. 



The view of the roof covering my practically 

 air-tight bee-cellar is well illustrated by the 

 cut. It is 20 ft. wide and 20 ft. long, and, as 

 shown in sectional view, very steep, affording 

 a large room for work above the cellar. But, 

 what is of more value to the bees, the room is 

 dark. It is into this room that the cellar is 

 ventilated, or from it the bees receive the air 

 they use without taking it from the unwarmed 

 air outside. 



BINGHAM'S BEE-CELLAR. 



soft sweet southern sunshine. A young wo- 

 man came from the house ; and as I talked 

 with her I inquired about bees. Yes, they 

 had a few, but they did no good any more ; 

 worms ate many of them up. The past sea- 

 sons had been too dry for any thing to grow. 



We drove twelve miles through the pine 

 woods without passing a house, and sixty miles 

 without meeting or passing a team. I kept 

 watching for objects of interest. There were 

 the same pine woods, varied occasionally by a 

 ti-ti or cypress swamp. Once we saw in the 

 distance a pretty deer— how supple it was ! — a 

 doe. The colored driver said, " If I had my 

 gun I would git dat, sure." Who would want 

 to take the life of such a pretty creature ? 



I never watched bees during winter in Flor- 

 ida when they were not bringing in pollen. 

 It's a mystery where they gather it. There 

 must be pollen-bearing plants under the thick 

 under-brush of the ti-ti' s. I didn't see a 



Your illustrator has, in sectional view, shown 

 the ventilator as passing up through the roof 

 in the middle of the floor. This is correct, all 



'■^^"'"Xm 



but in that the ventilating-tube, which is a 

 three-inch tin conductor reaching from the 

 bottom of the cellar two feet above the floor 



