580 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Dec. 



INGS you say that you reared over 200 queens; now, 

 what did you do with the CT extra queens? were they 



culls, and had their heads pinched off, or no, it 



can't be possible that Doolittle has been guilty of 

 selling dollar queens! How la it, friend D.? 



EDUCATION AND ABILITY. 



Ni)W see here, friend York ;* what business had you 

 to go and guess that I meant j/ou, and then go on 

 and talk like that abnut my education and ability? 

 I think that if you were a little mouse, and lived in 

 my shop, and neighbor W.'s big cat didn't catch you, 

 and you could peep out of some hole and watch me 

 when I am preparing those "notes," and see huw 

 many times the dictionary, grammar, and rhetoric, 

 arc pulled down from the shelf, and how much hard 



thinking I have to do, you well, 1 presume that 



you would wonder why my articles are not better 

 than they are. 



HEADY FOR WINTER. 



I have just tiuishcd putting ten colonies into 

 cbimps; eleven more were prepared, more than a 

 month ago, for wintering out of doors, and seven 

 more are ready for the cellar, whenever the cold 

 weather comes. This is the first time that I have 

 commenced the winter with moie than twelve colo- 

 nies. W. Z. Hutchinson. 



llcigersville, Genesee Co., Mich. 



A BOOIU IN EiNGIiAND. 



EIG^T COLONIES FROM ONE IN ONE SEASON, AND 

 EVER SO MUCH HONEY. 



ffpRIEXD ABBOT in his happy way tells 

 f* of the following '-streak of luclc" in 

 the November number of the British 

 Bee-Journal : — 



English bee-keepers, as a rule, have groat cause 

 for rejoicing; but in Scotland and Ireland the re- 

 sults have not been cheering, though hereand there 

 some good takes have been i-ecorded; notably, one 

 in Ireland of ISO lbs. from a single stock, and a query 

 will doubtless be freely echued. If one, why not 

 many? And although we are nut able to say what 

 other stocks in the same apiary have done — though 

 we shall probably have a report — we would remind 

 our readers that there is generally a best stock in 

 evei-y apiary, and in a large apiary the best is usually 

 "a wonder." We have had such an experience 

 with our own bees this year; and if every stock 

 had served us similarly, we should declare bee- 

 keeping to be not ' nc of, but the most protitable 

 busmess extant. Toward the end of April, a stock 

 of half Syrians was so strong that a second hive of 

 combs was put under it, and this was rapidly tilled, 

 and the population so immense that on May 14 it 

 was divided into three, foundation being given to 

 the swarms, and thus there were, in a fortnight, three 

 splendid stocks. A, B, O. From A we took, during 

 June, two full swarms, and during July, extracted 

 27 lbs. of honey; that stock is now strong and well 

 found for winter. From li, the swarm, we have also 

 had two swarms (one a cast, which we have kept, 

 and which is also safe for winter), lbs. super, and 

 21 lbs. of extracted honey; and B is now in good 

 winter order. From C we had one swarm, and 38 

 lbs. of super honey; 12 2-lb. fceotions, for which we 

 were awarded a prize at South Kensington, but the 

 stock which is very strong in bees needed lU lbs. of 

 syrup to tit it for wintering; it is choke full of bees, 

 and has a large quantity of brood, and, all being 

 well, will be tit for repeating the career of its pa- 

 rent stock in the spring. Here, then, has one stock 

 multiplied into eight, and those we have retained 

 have yielded 44 lbs. of comb honey in sections, and 

 46 lbs. extracted. What the four swarms that were 

 sold have done, we can not report; but as they all 

 went out early they must have done well. The profit 

 on that one stock has been simply enormous — say 

 it was worth three guineas in April, there are now 

 four stocks of equal value; four swarms have been 



•^Sco page IW, October nijmber. 



sold for 6i., and the honey for 5Z. 68., making a nice 

 little sum altogether, and we have four stocks left. 

 Many other stocks did exceedingly well, but this, the 

 only lot we worked for comb huney, made us wish 

 there had not been such a demand for swarms, as 

 evidently, this year, honey-getting would have been 

 the more profitable game. 



Did I not tell you a great honey yield was 

 liable to " happen " to almost any of you? 

 Here follows some advice for the fall 

 mouths. See if it tits you:— 



Apropos to this, we may mention that a noted bee- 

 keeper and caterer, fonmrly of Crawley, in Sussex, 

 has discontinued hive-making for sale, and has gone 

 in for honey only, at Kottingdean, in tlie same 

 county, whence he has kindly lurwarded a descrip- 

 tion of his driiught-pre\ enter, mentioned on another 

 page. We owe an apology tor wandering into our 

 own apiary, and penitently return to •■our mut- 

 tons," to advise that as bees are now quiet, every 

 thing possible should be done to prevent future 

 disagreeables. Hive-roofs should be thoroughly in- 

 vestigated and made rain-proof, and vermiu care- 

 fully exterminated (it is astonishing how many thou- 

 sands of insects may be prevented oy destroying 

 their nests now), a routing-out of crevices with a 

 small bunch of birch-broom will be of great service. 

 Old combs should be boiled up (or melted down) to 

 prevent harbor for wax-moth, and the possible 

 spread of disease; old skeps should be burned for 

 tne same reason; old frame-hives that are too good 

 to burn should be thoroughly cleansed; old ideas 

 should be sifted, and old debts paid, particularly 

 those outstanding for the Bee Joariml; and tht^ to a 

 goodly number we can say there will be something 

 off your minds as well as off ours. 



LECHLER'S 600 I^BS. TO TUE: HIVE!. 



ALSO SOME KIND WORDS FROM FRIEND WILKIN IN 

 REGARD TO EXTRAVAGANT REPORTS. 



^DfUjDITOR OF GLEANINGS:-In yours of Oct. 20. 

 Iqji you ask me to answer to the particulars of 

 — the inclosed card which you sent me, which 



reads as follows:— 



<i. W. Lfthler, of California, sa.vs on patfe 19:( of Gleanings, 

 that he trot H tons of honey, and an increase to 80 from a start 

 of :)0 colonies in the sprinir. I should liRe to .see that statement 

 sworn to before a justice of the i)eace. Six hundred lbs to each 

 colony! 1 wonder how many thousand pounds his best colony 

 gave! * « » I have taken 6:i00 lbs. from 35 colonies in th"o 

 sprinir, and one-halt their increase; the rest of the increase I 

 worked for queens, etc. More honey yet to come. I did think I 

 liad done pretty "ell. AV. S. H.VRT. 



New Sniyrna.'Fla., Oct. 9, 1881. 



My neighbor Sobey said to me, in reference to 

 Lechler's report, "Ah! Root ought not to publish 

 such stuff as that until he investigates it." That is 

 what I thought of the big Texas story of the bee- 

 cave you published lately; how the waters of the 

 stream passing by were sweetened so far below 

 from the drippings of the cave, and also the meat of 

 the bears killed in that region tasted sweet from 

 the same cause, except you had published it in a 

 way oyihj to bring out the question whether there 

 was any extraordinarj' yield of honey in those parts 

 to give rise to such monstrous tales. 



About ten years ago, at the National Bee-Keepers' 

 Convention at Cleveland, O., at which friend Root 

 and myself were p'-esent, Hosmer, of Minnesota, 

 made this proposition to the members of the con- 

 vention: "If any one of you will buy one hundred 

 of my 110 hives of bees at $10. each, you can have 

 them, to be paid for only on the condition that, from 

 my remaining 10 colonies, reduced to only nuclei in 

 the spring, I do, the coming season, take 10,000 lbs. 

 of honey." The members half believed he would do 

 it, so plausible was his story; yet none of us took 

 his offer. Graveuhorst, a noted bee-keeper in Ger- 

 many, seeing the report of Hosmer, wrote me, 

 "How is it in America? does it rain down honey? if 



