770 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Oct. 1. 



cept one, and it barely escaped with a hand- 

 ful of bees left. The weather was very cold 

 for weeks together, and the open space above 

 the frames made it impossible for the bees to 

 maintain warmth enough in the brood-cham- 

 ber to enable them to move out to their stores 

 when all the honey within the cluster was ex- 

 hausted. 



If Mr. McGowan, and other bee-keepers so 

 disposed, will each prepare a few colonies in 

 the following manner I feel sure they will feel 

 highly pleased with results, and I shall be glad 

 to have them report in Gleanings issued 

 June 1st next year : 



Promptly after the first frost that kills veg- 

 etation, and during the warm part of the day, 

 strip the hives to be prepared, in succession, 

 of every thing, down to the top of the brood- 

 frames ; and if, upon examination, the outside 

 frames are found to contain little or no honey, 

 replace them with frames filled with sealed 

 honey. If no frames of sealed honey are at 

 hand, the same result can be accomplished by 

 feeding up to, say, 20 pounds per colony. 



Cover the frames with a quilt of heavy 

 brown muslin just the size of the hive, with- 

 out any thing between the quilt and the frames. 

 Take a strip of % lumber 4 inches wide, and 

 make a belt just the size of the top of the 

 hive, which, when placed in position, will rest 

 on the edges of the quilt all around and hold 

 it in place. Fill this four-inch space above 

 the quilt full of dry sawdust ; put on a cover 

 that will not leak, with a brick or stone on it. 

 Contract the entrance with blocks, to two 

 inches in width, and without any other pro- 

 tection or attention let them remain untouch- 

 ed until apple-bloom next year, when upon 

 examination they will doubtless find their 

 bees in excellent condition ; and if the weath- 

 er is warm and favorable, they can put on one 

 tier of baited sections with good prospects of 

 getting some delicious apple honey. 



To satisfy themselves as to the comfort this 

 method gives the bees, let them go to one of 

 the hives during the winter when the mercury 

 is down to from ten to twenty degrees below 

 zero, take off the cover, and shove the hand 

 down through the sawdust to the muslin quilt 

 just over the cluster, and they will find it dry 

 and surprisingly warm. 



I have had good success with five, six, eight, 

 ten, and thirteen frame hives prepared for 

 winter in this way. 



The sawdust must be kept dry ; and if the 

 bees gnaw through the quilt in the spring, be- 

 fore time for supers, it will be detected by 

 sawdust at the entrance, and it will be neces- 

 sary to replace the muslin with oilcloth, and 

 put the sawdust in place again. The quilts 

 when removed in the spring will be more or 

 less propolized, but sufficiently porous to al- 

 low slight ventilation upward into the saw- 

 dust, which thus removes all moisture and im- 

 pure air out of the brood-chamber, rendering 

 it both comfortable and healthful. 



If in trying this experiment the bees have 

 to be fed up, instead of two frames of sealed 

 honey use 6 pounds of granulated sugar, 3 

 pounds of water, and a pound of golden-drip 

 corn syrup, the latter to prevent granulation 



in case all should not be sealed. Bring the 

 whole to the boiling-point, and feed in any 

 practical way, preferably from the top, to pre- 

 vent robbing. 



Kittanning, Pa., Sept. 20. 



[Your method is the orthodox one for out- 

 door wintering, with the exception that there 

 ought to be double walls around the sides and 

 ends of the hives ; and while single-walled 

 hives might be warm enough for your climate, 

 they would hardly do where we live, or any 

 place where the frost during the winter runs 

 into the ground along in February and March 

 down sometimes two feet, and where there is 

 liable to be protracted cold of three or four 

 weeks hovering around the zero-point.— Ed.] 



CANDIED VS. EXTRACTED HONEY FOR MAR- 

 KET. 



A Reply to Dr. Miller and the Editor; the Im- 

 portance of an Effective Display. 



BV CHALON FOWLS. 



It looks to me, Mr. Editor, very much as 

 though you and Dr. Miller were putting up a 

 " man of straw " for me to knock down. In 

 Stray Straws, page 644, Dr. M. gives quota- 

 tions from Doolittle and Somnambulist in 

 which they tell how their home custodiers pre- 

 fer candied honey, and you proceed gleefully 

 to count them on your side as opposing the 

 plan of bottling liquid honey for the trade. 

 And the Muths too — well, that's cool — and I 

 was just chuckling to think I had captured 

 Dr. Miller's biggest gun, and could now use 

 it to defend my own position. Now, if I un- 

 derstand these gentlemen correctly, they per- 

 suade their home customers and manufactur- 

 ers, or all customers who buy in bulk for their 

 own use, to take candied honey, and this plan 

 I most heartily concur in. But when it comes 

 to putting it up for sale in the groceries in 

 small packages, pounds, half-pounds, and the 

 like, I don't understand that they advocate 

 putting it up candied instead of bottling in 

 liquid form. This plan of putting up honey 

 in the candied form for the grocery trade is 

 no new thing. I have no doubt the plan has 

 been successful with the Dadants, but it does 

 not follow that it would be equally successful 

 with others under different conditions. 



Although the scheme has had good backing 

 from the start by editorial indorsement in the 

 bee-journals, the pails used for the purpose 

 being advertised by supply-dealers the same 

 as glass packages, yet the plan has not come 

 into general use ; and it's my belief that, for 

 the general market, where the producer does 

 not deal directly with his customers, liquid 

 honey will outsell the candied two or three to 

 one almost anywhere, where there is a chance 

 to make a display. In my own experience 

 the proportion was nearer sixteen to one. 



You see along back in the eighties I tried, 

 for comparison, giving the grocers liquid hon- 

 ey in tumblers, and the candied article in the 

 Jones pails with the tin packages all covered 

 with fine lithograph labels. Well, these showy 



