Vol. XXXIV. 



AUG. U 1906, 



No 15 



Dr. Merriam, Chief of U. S. Bureau of 

 Biological Survey, says skunks hunt mice 

 and insects, and rarely kill poultry. 



Last year 700,000 pounds of Canadian 

 bluegrass seed was brought into this country, 

 says government officials, and 250,000 pounds 

 of yellow- trefoil seed, and all of it used to 

 adulterate other seed. 



Sweet corn will lose, even in a cool 

 place, and with the husks on, almost half of 

 its sugar in 24 hours— the sugar, perhaps, 

 converted into starch. So don't pluck your 

 corn long before meal time. — U. S. Report. 



Julius Steigel has been using metal 

 combs 16 years, and has 1000 in use for ex- 

 tracting- combs. The cells are | inch deep, 

 and so they can not be used for brood, and 

 no excluder is needed. —Deutsche Imker aus 

 Boehmen. [I should like to know what those 

 metal combs cost.— Ed.] 



P. Neumann mentions in Leipz. Bztg. 

 that the Texas Bee-keepers' Association ad- 

 mits only whites, and wants to know wheth- 

 er all the larger bee keepers' associations of 

 this country exclude colored people. I don't 

 know. I never heard of any except the 

 Texas association. 



Wonderful accounts are appearing of 

 great yields of alfalfa over a large acreage 

 near Fayetteville, N. Y. You know, Mr. 

 Editor, that bee-keepers are not scarce in 

 that vicinity. Can you get one of them to 

 tell about alfalfa as a honey-plant there? 

 [Alfalfa honey from York State is unknown. 



I do not know of any place in the East where 

 that plant has ever yielded any honey. I 

 have never seen our bees go near our fields 

 of it. -Ed.] 



A. C. Armstrong doesn't approve of hon- 

 ey and cream on pancakes, page 948. I want 

 cream on pancakes, or milk if I can't have 

 cream, no matter what else is on them— helps 

 their digestibility. Without it they pack 

 into chunks of dough that the juices of the 

 stomach can not easily penetrate. 



Two cases of a person being stung by a 

 queen are reported in Deutsche Imker aus 

 Boehmen. In each case the pain was less 

 severe than the average sting from a work- 

 er. A queen also in rare cases stings a 

 worker. I saw one case, and never but one. 

 A virgin stung a worker, killing it instantly. 



Kidney disease is alarmingly on the in- 

 crease, says the U. S. Chemist. Extra work 

 is put upon the kidneys by coal-tar dyes in 

 butter, and preservatives in canned goods. 

 Large quantities of sugar are injurious in the 

 same way. Safety lies in substituting hon- 

 ey for sugar. [That is a good doctrine to 

 preach; and it is true, every word of it.— 

 Ed.] 



E. W. Alexander says, page 935, "After 

 you once get your colonies strong in bees, 

 keep them so during the whole year." 

 Don't you know, Mr, Alexander, that you 

 are to have your bees strong for the harvest 

 only, and not have a lot of useless consumers 

 when there is nothing for them to do? 

 Well. I don't know how it may be in other 

 localities, but I never can get my bees strong 

 too early in the season, and they never can 

 be too strong to suit me afterward. 



P. Neumann, in Leipziger Bztg., gives a 

 reason for a similarity of the contents of 

 German bee-journals which is to the credit 

 of German bee-keepers. It is the fact that 

 each bee-keeper who is a member of the 

 Central Bee-keepers' Association demands 



