718 



Gleanings in Bee Culture 



this period in Belgium's different provinces. 

 Among these industries is apiculture. 



As a brief indication of Belgium's effort 

 to advance bee-keeping, a few extracts may 

 be made. 



In the province of Antwerp, it is reported 

 that 147 courses, comprising 601 sessions, 

 with an average of 40 in attendance, were 

 given during the past ten years. In the 

 province of Flanders, having eleven socie- 

 ties of apiculture, 252 courses in bee-keep- 

 ing, comprising 1008 sessions, with an at- 

 tendance of 22,176, have been held since 

 1890. The province of East Flanders, giving 

 courses in horticulture and market garden- 

 ing, floriculture, aviculture, and farriery, 

 besides instruction in other agricultural pur- 

 suits, has offered occasional courses in api- 

 culture. The province of Hainault, Liege, 

 and Hamur have apparently given less at- 

 tention to the interests of bee-keepers, which 

 may be attributed, possibly, to the differ- 

 ences in agricultural interests in these local- 

 ities. The province of Liraburg, however, 

 it is reported, has held for adults 110 courses 

 in bee-keeping, comprising 509 sessions. 



Since the tables in the report show re- 

 markable increase in farm valuation and in 

 the average production per acre in the vari- 

 ous crops, and since these are attributed to 

 the methods of extending agriculture, it is 

 also fair to presume that bee-keeping has 

 benefited in proportion. 



BEE-KEEPING IN CUBA. 



Climatic Conditions and their Effect on Apiculture. 



BY D. W. MILLAR. 



Both my partner, Mr. Curnow, who for 14 

 years has studied and experimented with 

 bees in the tropics, and myself find many 

 rules and regulations for liandling bees dis- 

 cussed in Gleanings, which would be of 

 no value here, more than would many of 

 our methods be in the North. However, of 

 late there has been much discussion on 

 swarming, foul brood, increasing, etc., where 

 we believe our methods would apply; and 

 while they may be old and worn out they 

 are the best we know about here, and we 

 have read nothing similar. On account of 

 tlie difference between bee-keeping in the 

 North and in the tropics, about all we know 

 we have had to figure out for ourselves. So 

 far as I know there is nothing published on 

 tropical bee-keeping. This is why many 

 Northern bee-men, and the best, have had 

 difficulties in this country. Possibly what 

 I have to say may start something that will 

 help us. 



All our new blood, which we believe in 

 introducing regularly, is pure Italian, al- 

 though we prefer the dark leather-colored 

 bee, which comes from a pure queen mating 

 with a hybrid drone. They have the three 

 distinct bands, but can not be pure, al- 

 though they pass as such. However, we 



make no special effort to breed for them, as 

 we keep our apiaries as nearly pure as is 

 possible, where there are so many black bees 

 in the country. We make our hives, after 

 the pattern of the ordinary American single- 

 walled hive, out of native cedar, and all 

 other wood parts the same. For rabbets we 

 use a piece of No. 24 galvanized iron, y% 

 wide by 14, fitted into a slot sawed to slope 

 a trifle inward, in the dapping of the hive- 

 head, the slot being just deejD enough to al- 

 low the proper height above for the frame 

 to rest on. This, we find, saves time and 

 nails, and gives a smaller surface for the 

 frame to stick to. The ten-frame-size hive 

 is our preference; but in the honey-super, 

 only eight are used. These will, if properly 

 spaced, be filled with as much honey as ten; 

 and as we go in for extracted honey almost 

 exclusively, there is less work in extracting. 



MOVING SHORT DISTANCES AT NIGHT. 



Many long methods for moving colonies 

 from one location to another have been giv- 

 en, but we find here the simplest and best 

 way is to move the hive at night, and to 

 place a bottom-board or some noticeable ob- 

 ject in front of the entrance for the next 

 day. The bees' attention will be called to 

 the change in this way, and the new loca- 

 tion marked. This we got from Anna B. 

 Comstock in " How to Keep Bees." 



REMOVING BROOD TO CONTROL SWARMING. 



We avoid swarming, if increasing, by re- 

 naoving surplus brood with adhering bees 

 to a new hive, giving them a new queen. 

 If we do not care to increase, we place a 

 super of foundation on the bottom below 

 the honey-board; place the queen in this, 

 and the bees will come down and get busy. 

 We then destroy queen-cells if there are 

 any above. After the brood above has 

 hatched and cells are cleaned, honey will be 

 stored, and they will have had enough to 

 do without swarming until they forget 

 about it. - 



FOUL BROOD NEED NOT BE EPIDEMIC. 



Foul brood is contagious but not epidemic 

 here, and we consider ourselves negligent if 

 it gets beyond one colony. When we notice 

 symptoms of any kind we place a small 

 sack of moth-balls between the frames. If 

 it is of the European variety, we then re- 

 move the diseased brood to the honey-super, 

 where the unaffected portion will hatch, 

 and the other will be cleaned out by the 

 bees. We do not consider this contagious. 

 If American foul brood, we get a new hive 

 and place it entrance to entrance with one 

 diseased. We place in the new hive a full 

 healthy frame of hatching brood, shaking 

 off all old bees and the queen, filling the 

 rest of the super with foundation. An es- 

 cape is placed on the entrance of the old 

 hive, and left for 30 days, then what re- 

 mains is burned in the old hive. A sack of 

 moth-balls is placed in each hive. 



RAPID INCREASE. 



Recently we noticed that some one want- 

 ed to know how best to increase his bees 



