308 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



May 15 



A. I. root's "simplicity" hen's nest, brooder coop, and colony-house; also a 



GLIMPSE OF HIS DUCKLINGS AND THEIR MOTHER. SEE POULTRY DEPARTMENT. 



BEE-KEEPING IN FLORIDA. 



Some of the Difficulties. 



BY E, G. BALDWIN. 



Continued from last issue. 



Of course, robbing and moth-millers are 

 two nuisances that annoy even the best of 

 bee-men, north as well as south. The dif- 

 ference is this: Here our summers are about 

 twice as long as in the North, and we there- 

 fore have twice as much chance to suffer 

 from these two difficulties. The danger 

 from robbing, and moth alike, is largely 

 remediable by careful handling of honey 

 and combs. Only the careless bee-keeper 

 need suffer very extensively; but a little 

 negligence will tell far more quickly and 

 more disastrously here than north. It is 

 impossible to keep empty combs out of the 

 hives for two weeks, in warm weather, in 

 Florida, without adeciuate protection. Such 

 protection is best found in tight tiers of 

 hives with an empty hive-body on top, all 

 joints wrapped with felt or paper, and the 

 top super holding a pint of exposed bisul- 

 phide of carbon — ihe hives, of course, to be 

 filled with empty combs, and a hive-cover 

 over all. The bisulphide must be repeated 

 every two weeks for the first month; then, 

 if kept tightly closed, once a month will 

 suffice. But woe betide the apiarist who 



forgets his removed combs for a month or 

 two immediately after taking off. I have 

 never seen anywhere else such tremendous 

 onslaughts on combs and even frames as 

 are here made by the moth when combs are 

 left exposed. A careless bee-man near me 

 a year ago extracted ten hive-bodies of full- 

 depth frames, and, when done, set the whole 

 lot inside the honey-shed, and — forgot them! 

 When I went to the lot, in the following 

 spring, the sight of the interiors was appall- 

 ing. Not only was every comb eaten to a 

 frazzle; not only every frame bored and 

 punctured to a depth of an inch in many 

 instances by the gnawing larvte in their ef- 

 forts to locate in a safe place with their co- 

 coon-spinning, but the inside surface of ev- 

 ery hive-body was layered half an inch deep 

 with cocoons — a literal layer of them, tough 

 and heavy as leather, so that the sheets of 

 them could be peeled off, with effort, like a 

 piece of rawhide. This is no exaggeration. 

 I had seen the work of moth-millers, but 

 this was beyond any thing I had even 

 dreamed was possible from those soft, shy 

 little millers that flit away from your hand 

 in such a timorous, retiring way! Truly 

 they love darkness because their deeds are 

 evil. So difficult is it to keep empty combs 

 off the hi\ es that I have tried to keep them 

 on the colonies as long as possible and re- 

 mo\e them only when cold weather in ear- 

 ly winter comes on, I am now trying the 



