11!)() 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Sept. 15 



sapped the nuclei, and they slowly dwindled. 

 Not satisfied with this, the last of April I 

 selected six more strong colonies and six 

 weak ones, and treated them the same, save 

 that I left in some of them a small entrance 

 above the queen-excluder; but later I closed 

 them, owing to a tendency to rob. The re- 

 sults were the same; and out of the 18 weak 

 colonies the queen in one of the first lot, 

 with a handful of faithful workers, succeed- 

 ed in liolding the fort, and are now. May 28, 

 receiving help from below, and are breeding 

 up very nicely. 



So much for the weak colonies; but how 

 about the strong ones? Of coiirse, I don't 

 have three or four queens doing business in 

 so many upper stories as to liave bumper- 

 strong colonies, but I have some practically 

 strong colonies, and I selected the strongest 

 of them: and of those, scnue ai-tualiy liecame 

 weak, and they all are far behind others not 

 thus treated. The reason for this is simple — 

 too much room to keep warm, and a failure 

 of queen No. 2 to render assistance in brood- 

 rearing. 



I have been unable to make this thing 

 work; but it is not the first time that 1 have 

 failed to make a really good idea ^naterial- 

 ize, and have later seen in it a glowing suc- 

 cess. Often unseen causes or a failure to 

 observe essential details stands just in front 

 of success, and I should like to have some of 

 those who have made this work tell us more 

 about it. Henry Stew.vki'. 



Prophetstown, 111. 



[See answer to A. J. Snowden, above. — 

 Ed.] 



moving colonies from place to place 

 in an apiary. 



Mr. Alexander's articles are far ahead of 

 any other thing in the way of bee manage- 

 ment. There is, however, one point that I 

 do not understand well. How does he move 

 his hives fi'om one spot to another in the 

 same yard? I should greatly enjoy it if I 

 could liiid this point explained in Glean- 

 ings, and proliably others would also. 



Marseilles. France. L. Sibille. 



[Mr. Alexander does not move any of his 

 colonies, if I remember correctly, except 

 when taking them out of the cellar and put- 

 ting them in again, or shortly after taking 

 them out of the cellar unites a weak colony 

 with a strong one over perforated zinc. — 

 Ed.] 



moses quinby; what he could do with 

 bees in the way of attract- 

 ing attention. 

 I see in Gleanings ycm speak aliout stunts 

 with bees. I think it was some time in Ije- 

 tween 18()0 and ISO? when Moses Quinliy 

 showed what he could do with bees at a fair 

 in Toledo. He had a tall white hat that ran 

 to a peak, and it had a swarm of bees in it. 

 At the top there was a round hole for l)ees 

 to pass in and out. This hat he wore on his 

 head. He would talk bees, and there would 

 gather around him a big crowd — so much so 



that the police would make him move from 

 one place to another. He would, when the 

 crowd was too big, take hold of the top of 

 his hat and give it a wdiirl, and throw the 

 bees all over the crowd, and it was laughable 

 to see them tumble over each other to get 

 out of the way. Then he would put the hat 

 on, and the bees came right l)ack and crawl- 

 ed into the hole at top. I suppose he had 

 the queen caged in it. There may be some 

 one living who remembers this 'man and 

 his tricks with bees. R. L. McColley. 



Sorrento, Fla. 



[I have heard my father speak of this stunt 

 of Mr. Quinby, of years ago. Soon others 

 took up the same idea. The fact is, more 

 l)ee-demonstration work was done at county 

 fairs in the early 60's than there has lieen of 

 late years. — Ed.] 



THE COLOR OF ALFALFA HONEY; WHY IT 

 VARIES. 



Noting your discussion on the color of al- 

 falfa honey, and why it should vary at times 

 and places, causes me to write my experi- 

 ence. For the past fifteen years I liave been 

 engaged in handling honey, and collecting it 

 from o\er this entire valley, which is about 

 100 miles wide by 300 long. In this valley 

 we pi'oduce from 40 to 80 carloads a year, 

 and it is mostly from alfalfa; but in places, 

 the honey is amber, other places it is a fancy 

 light amber, while at still other points it is. 

 wiiitv'. I am also familiar with the honey 

 from Nevada and Utah, and in places where 

 I am familiar with the conditions of the soil 

 relative to water (not liioLsture) I can judge 

 pretty well the color of your honey — that is. 

 if it is alfalfa. Tlie way I tell is this: If the 

 land is sandy so that the water, when irri- 

 gated, will go down through, antl not allow- 

 ed to hll up the ground, the honey will be 

 white: but if the land is of the nature of 

 some portions of this valley, and the water 

 stands within four to eight feet of the sur- 

 face, so the alfalfa roots go to the water, you 

 can not get white honey; in other words, the 

 freer from water your alfalfa is, tlie whiter 

 will be the lioney it yields. 



Hanford, Cal.' ' F. E. Brown. 



[Mr. Brown undoubtedly gives the causes 

 that make alfalfa honey dark in .some locali- 

 ties and light in others. He has had abun- 

 dant opportunity for observation, and I 

 should conclude that he is probablv right. — 

 Ed.] 



poultry and bees; both found profit- 

 ABLE. 



I see that there is quite a discussion in 

 Gleanings in reference to the comparative 

 profits of poultry and bees. I have the sin- 

 gle-comb Khoile Island Red chickens, a gen- 

 eral-purpose fowl, and last year i-leared $200 

 net from an average of 80 hens. I sold (juite 

 a lot of eggs for hatching, at $1.00 for 18. If 

 I had sold all the eggs at market prices I 

 should have made about $1.75 per hen. 



From five hives of bees, spring count. I re- 

 tailed over $49 worth of. extracted honev. L 



