1881 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTUliE. 



425 



And now for my own report:— 



Til the spring of 1883, when my father's bees began 

 t) fly (he had bought a couple of colonies the au- 

 tumn previous), I became entranced with the little 

 fellows, and then and there became a bee-man. I 

 hardly knew a bee from a black fly. I knew nothing 

 of yourself and Gleanings, or any thing olse in the 

 bee line; but, bees I would have. I bought a colony 

 of blacks for ft). 00; had two swarms; bought anoth- 

 er first swarm, and made about 93 lbs. of honey 

 from all. I took another colony from my brother to 

 work on shares; wintered the five safely, and start- 

 ed out In April, 1881, to "make a business" of it. 

 Bees wore scarce, and very hard to get, and only 

 blacks at that. I bought 9 mo-e stocks, mostly in 

 box and straw hives, sonic very weak, and some 

 queenless. I transferred the whole "business" in- 

 to new hives; bought a lot of foundation, and equal- 

 ized them as well as possible, for clover bloom. 1 

 have bought, besides, IT first swarms (all blacks), 

 and now for results: I have extracted 1300 lbs. of 

 flrst-olass clover and basswood honey, and have to- 

 day 53 colonies,— 18 Italian, 11 Cj'prian, 8 Holy-Land; 

 the remainder will be "as the others" before the 

 season closes. 



Clover and basswood bloom was splendid; but 

 since the latter closed, we have had little or no 

 honey, partly on account of the hot, dry weather. 

 My apiarv has been so mixed all through the season 

 that it's hard to give any flgures as to results per 

 colony; but I And, by a premature closing of my 

 books, that they will show a net gain of HOC percent 

 on net investment iu the spring. 



Next season the business will probably be in the 

 hands of my brother (who is at present in your own 

 apiary), while I "go to prepare" myself for a posi- 

 tion in the social and apicultural world, which I 

 shall leave to yourself to picture. 



Now, friend Koot, I can hear you say, " V cry good, 

 friend C; but, go carefully; go slowly at first till 

 you get experience." 1 promise you I will be care- 

 ful, for I guess 1 know what care it has taken to put 

 that little apiary in its present shape; yes, to build 

 it up from nothing in six months: but to go slowly, 

 never! I have a great many faithful advisers on 

 this point, and I would say to all such who may read 

 the?G lines, that with all duo respect for your good 

 wishes and greater experience, " Please, before you 

 say further, come right here and step into my 

 shoes." I have lived a quiet country life on my 

 father's farm for twenty years; but that life is at an 

 end now, and time is precious; time is monej', edu- 

 cation, influence, every thing, and time is short. 



I keep bees, flrstl)', for the money that is in them; 

 secondly and mostly, from a profound love of the 

 great, the grand, and beautiful in nature and sci- 

 ence. 1 have said nothing on the thousand and one 

 ditfcrent points pertaining to the scientific culture 

 of the honey-bee, but I fear this little report is i-.l- 

 ready too long; and, wishing you every success in 

 your noble calling, I close for the present. 



A. E. Calveut. 



Keaboro, Ont., Can., Aug. It), 1881. 



JMay God bless you, my younj; friend, in 

 your enthusiasm ; but still 1 can not but 

 think it best for you to scrape up a stock of 

 energy for the coming winter, so that, even 

 if you should lose every bee, you will keep 

 right on at work, all the same. I3y advising 

 to go slowly, I do not mean that you should 

 waste any time, by any means, but that you 



should be slow about investing beyond your 

 means, or getting into debt. Go just as fast 

 as you can, by all means, if you have every 

 thing all paid up, and your colonies are gooll 

 and strong for winter. I do not believ-e it 

 will spoil your brotlier if I say a word about 

 liim, to encourage oilier young men to go 

 and do likewise. He is in'tlie apiary, busily 

 at work from daylight until dark, every day 

 in the week, and therefore has no time to 

 '' go up town," or lounge about anywhere. 

 Of course, he neither drinks, smokes, swears, 

 nor uses tobacco, and on the Sabbath he 

 helps in the mission school at Abbeyville. 

 Ilis voice is also heard in our young people's 

 prayer-meeting. It may be that, on account 

 of his quiet ways and "devotion to lus bees 

 that many in our town do not know of him ; 

 but nobody knows anything bad of him. If 

 I am right, the world will know of all such 

 young men in God's own time. 



I presume the 140<J per cent was made by 

 commencing with a small capital, and not 

 counting your time, friend C. 



A NEW TOOIi FOR BEE-KEEPERS. 



SEND by this mail a sample press for perforat- 

 ing separators, subject to your alterations. I 

 can furnish them to you by the quantity for 

 75c per press, and I think every bee-keeper would 

 have one if ho knew the value of it. I made my sep- 

 arators out of old tomato-cans, and perforated all of 

 them; it will last a lifetime, if used rightly. I have 

 already furnished the bee-keepers around here with 

 one of my presses, and they all want me to have it 

 patented; but I tell them you would not handle it if 

 I did. Now, friend Koot, 1 want a good big order. I 

 know they will sell; and as well I would like to have 

 an order for more saw-mandrels. Wm. DeWortu. 

 Bordentown, N. J., Aug. l'^, 1881. 



The machine is at hand, and we give you 

 an engraving of it below: 



.MA( HINE FOU PERFORATING SEPARATORS. 



It is a splendid piece of work, and if friend 

 D. will make such tools at the prices he 

 mentions, he will build u]) one of the largest 

 industries of our land. The machine culs a 

 circle of about -l-iG, but it would easily per- 

 forate a hole as large as V inch, iu tin. It 



