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-Tubhshedy theA'I^ooY Co. 

 $i2iip[R\tAR. '\® "Medina- Ohio- 



Vol XXXII. 



APR. 15, 1904. 



No. 8 



The question is asked whether queens 

 can not be mated in greenhouses. I think 

 it has been tried, but not successfully. 



Transferring is so little practiced in 

 this country that we're hardlj up to date 

 in it In England more of it is done, and 

 nowadays they transfer 21 days after 

 swarming. 



In cutting candied honey with a wire, 

 I supposed a sawing motion was used, first 

 one hand and then the other; but page 331 

 reads as if a sqaare pull with both hands 

 at a time were used. How is it? [A slow 

 square steady pull, without any seesawing. 

 —Ed. J 



G. M. DoOLiTTLE tells some things that 

 don't look very reasonable, in that article 

 on p. 3)33. Any schoolboy can reason out 

 that bees would do about the opposite of 

 what he says. But, reasonable or unrea- 

 sonable, bees in this locality do just as he 

 says. Of the many good ai tides Doolittle 

 has written, that's one of the best. 



Thkre's another man using cleats, 

 Doolittle, p. 327, and they run full width of 

 hive, so a rope can be used in carrying. 

 My hives are generally carried by one man 

 without any rope, and in that case the full 

 cleat is away ahead of the little one. If 

 you want comfort in carrying hives, order 

 them with full cleats. 



E. E. Starkey, p. 338, thinks the venti- 

 lated cover better than one with dead-air 

 space. He's right — for Florida, and per- 

 haps for Tennessee. In colder localities 

 the dead air is better, because warmer in 

 times of year when it is very important to 

 preserve all the heat possible; and at the 

 same time the dead-air space is very much 

 cooler under a hot sun than a single board. 



" No severe losses are reported in Illi- 

 nois and Iowa, ' p. 329. The losses are 

 probably there, but not reported. [That is 

 true. But we can get some idea of where 

 losses are heaviest by the way reports come 

 in. As I pointed out in our last issue, it is 

 the lake regions that have suffered the 

 most. Illinois has a very small strip of 

 lake border and Iowa none. — Ed.] 



Editor Bassler says in Deutsche Itnker 

 that he has had in an issuing swarm the 

 old queen ac::ompanied by her royal daugh- 

 ters, and he wants to know what to call 

 such a swarm. Is it a prime swarm when 

 it has a virgin queen, or a second swarm 

 with the old queen? That suggests another 

 question: When the old queen- is lost, and a 

 swarm with a virgin issues eight days lat- 

 er, is that a prime or an after swarm? 



Uncle Fritz wants to know what is 

 meant in a Straw, page 115, where E. D. 

 Townsend says if a few more colonies are 

 added the result will be the same as stimu- 

 lating and spreading brood. Suppose a 

 man has 90 colonies, and by stimulating 

 and spreading he can increase his crop one- 

 ninth; if he had one-ninth more colonies — 

 100 in all — he would get the same amount 

 of honey without any stimulating or spread- 

 ing. See? 



Here's something from Schweiz. Bztg. 

 that's new — at least to me: Honey is sealed 

 with convex cappings; after about two 

 weeks the cappings sink down to a level 

 surface, and later still they sink down 

 slightly hollowing; and not till then is the 

 ripening ccmpleted. [This is rather inter- 

 esting if true, and I believe it is. I have 

 noticed that newly capped honey has a lit- 

 tle different appearance from that which 

 has stood for some time. I suggest that we 

 make this a matter of observation this 

 summer. — Ed] 



H. J. FoRST moved several colonies of 

 bees a short distance in summer. He fas- 

 tened them in the hive, handled them rough- 

 ly in moving, allowing full light on the 

 bees through glass laid on top (wouldn't 

 wire cloth do as well?), opened them after 

 two hours of confinement in their "light 



