574 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



i..By«, I Notes from Canada Mt.j.y.oM 



Good advice by friend Holtermann on p. 

 467, June 15, regarding control of swarming 

 at out-apiaries, and I would urge beginners 

 to take his methods if they Avish to be abso- 

 lutely sure as to conditions of the colonies 

 during honey-flow. It is a tremendous 

 amount of work examining every colony 

 every week, as ho advises ; but as he has men 

 to do the work and I rough it alone mostly, 

 needless to explain why we differ a bit on 

 this subject. But I just wonder if he has 

 examined, or rather had his helpers examine 

 evei-y colony each week during the last 

 month. For once at least I venture to say 

 he has not gone lO all this trouble. Person- 

 ally I feel sorry to say that we have not 

 examined a single colony to see if they were 

 thinking of swarming. A non-swarming 

 strain surely — when not a bit of nectar is 



corcdng in. 



* * * 



Just one month ago — June 11 — I wrote 

 that prospects were not very good for clover 

 honey in Ontario this year, and stated that 

 a light crop at best was all we could reason- 

 ably expect. Instead of a light crop, we 

 have in our locality a total failure,' and 

 about all reports I have received up to date 

 from other parts of the Province tell the 

 same story. In the July 1st issue I stated 

 that much old honey was in the brood-nests 

 as well as quite a lot of fresh nectar gath- 

 ered from maples, etc., and I was rather 

 afraid at the time that some of this darker 

 honey would not be turned into bees and 

 that it would go into the supers. Needless 

 worry in this case, as many hives are at this 

 date, July 11th, lighter than they were a 

 month ago. Continued cool weather and 

 drouth explains this unusual condition, and 

 even if we would have had much more 

 clover than we had, I doubt if much honey 

 would have been stored owing to unfavor- 

 able weather conditions. In localities where 

 they have basswood; some honey may yet be 

 gathered from that source, but as basswood 

 is now scarce in most places and an uncer- 

 tain yielder at best, it looks as though On- 

 tario will have practically no white honev 

 this year. There is some buckwheat around 

 us, and naturally we are hoping for at least 

 enough honey from this source later on to 

 fit the bees for winter. 



While it is of no use to bori'ow trouble 

 for next year, it looks at this date as though 

 1915 will be another year of failure in so 

 far as the clover is concerned, as the long- 



continued drouth has given the freshly seed- 

 ed alsike a great setback, and what plants 

 are left are small. Of course this condition 

 may be only local, as many localities may 

 have had showers that did not come our 



way. 



* * * 



The editor's write-up of the district 

 around Haileybury, Ont., page 446, June 

 15, was read with interest by myself, as I 

 have been through the country and noted its 

 lioney-producing possibilities, writing up my 

 impressions in the Canadian Bee Journal 

 some few years ago. I surely believe that 

 there are great possibilities in that counti-y, 

 but it is good to remember that, generally 

 si^eaking, the farther north one goes, the 

 more uncertain are the seasons in so far as 

 late frosts and very cool weather are con- 

 cerned, during the months of April and 

 June. Then again frosts often come quite 

 early in the late summer and fall, as on one 

 occasion when visiting my sister at New 

 Liskeard, a town just a few miles north of 

 Haileybury, all tender vegetation was froz- 

 en on Aug. 15th if I remember correctly. 

 However, taking one year with another I 

 suspect they are as sure of a crop as we are 

 further south. At any rate, the district in 

 question has always had a fascination for 

 me ever since I visited the country. As to 

 wintering, I would not fear it in the least, 

 as a frost-proof dry cellar will winter the 

 bees all right. At Milberta, above Hailey- 

 bury, I knew of one lot that wintered well 

 outdoors, but the bees were covered over 

 with snow quite early in fall and remained 

 so till spring. As the Editor says, the win- 

 ters ai"e very cold and the summer season 

 short, but my sister who lived there for 

 some time (her husband ran a large market 

 garden) found the climate not at all dis- 

 agreeable. When up there one year in Au- 

 gust, I was looking at a few colonies owned 

 by the postmaster in Haileybury, and at 

 that time the bees were building beautiful 

 sections of water-white honey. Outside of 

 the toAvn .there were hundreds of acres of 

 willowherb, so there was no doubt that the 

 honey was coming from that source. But. 

 Mr. Editor, your caption " cold northwest " 

 is a bit misleading, as Haileybury is straight 

 north from Toronto somewhere about 400 

 miles or more, and, if I mistake not, Toronto 

 is some east of Medina. But as the condi- 

 tions will be pretty much the same for 500 

 miles west and many miles east of Hailey- 

 bury, perhaps after all you may not be so 

 far out of the way 



