THE AMERICAN APICULTURIST. 



These difficulties are very easily 

 overcome by using movable frame 

 hives and employing improved 

 methods. But facts prove more 

 than theories, so I will report what 

 has occurred here. Last January 

 a neighbor bought six swarms, and 

 by good management has increased 

 them to twenty-five good swarms, 

 which he valued at $175. I do not 

 know the amount of his honey- 

 yield. 



We started the first of February 

 with eight colonies, which were 

 light, as they had been kept in 

 boxes. From these we now have 

 twenty-five good strong swarms. 

 We have taken 300 pounds of hon- 

 ey and could have secured as much 

 more had we received our extractor 

 a month sooner. Extracted honey 

 sells for fifteen cents, and comb 

 honey, in small boxes, for twenty- 

 five cents per pound. I think I 

 have demonstrated -tliat bees can 

 be kept elsewhere than on the 

 coast . — Florida Disijatch . 



Honor to whom Honor is due, 

 BY Ch. Dadant. — In the Bulletin, 

 No. 37, Mr. Fournier reproached 

 me for having hinted that the 

 French Debeauvoys hive was not 

 practicable. He wonders that, a 

 Frenchman, I attempt to lessen, to 

 deny even, the worth of the first 

 French apiculturist. 



I have not only insinuated, I 

 have stated, that the Debeauvoys 

 hive has not been able to sustain 

 the proof of numerous tests which 

 have been ap[)lied to it. One is 

 allured if he boasts of it by merely 

 looking at it, as it is abandoned 

 after trial. "Mr. Debeauvoys has 

 secured 2500 followers. Ah ! well, 

 2475 of these followershave proved 

 turncoats." (Hamet, Apiculteur, 

 1868-69.) 



How is it with the twenty-five fol- 

 lowers ? I challenge Mr. Fournier to 

 mention a single one. As for Lang- 

 stroth, who has received neither 



medal nor recommendation of sa- 

 vants, his hive has not only made 

 its way into the United States, but 

 into Europe. It is this hive, whose 

 principal merit is that it opens at 

 the top, which has made the fortune 

 of the apiculturist of the United 

 States, and which has placed them, 

 in apiculture, at the head of all the 

 nations of the world. 



I am a Frenchman, it is true, 

 and I am proud of it ; but this title, 

 with which I am honored, does not 

 impose upon me the right to praise 

 that which is evil, or to depreciate 

 that which I know to be good. 



If I have spoken of Debeauvoys, 

 it is my opponent that has caused 

 and still compels me to announce 

 that Langstroth has copied Debeau- 

 voys, and to cite him as the first 

 French apiculturist and his Guide 

 as an excellent work. I should 

 like to permit the worthy Debeau- 

 voys to sleep in peace with his hive 

 and his book ; Mr. Fournier has 

 not permitted it. 



The Debeauvoys hive, such as 

 he has described in the first edi- 

 tion of his Guide, such as I saw 

 at the Exposition in 1849, was 

 not like that which was deposit- 

 ed at the Conservatory of Arts and 

 Trades that Mr. Fournier described. 

 The first Iiive had the form of a 

 house, having a roof with a single 

 slope, and it is known that Debeau- 

 voys preserved this form for a long 

 time ; for, in the opinion of the 

 editor, in the sixth edition of the 

 Guide, published fourteen years 

 after the first, in 1863, we read on 

 p. 3, " this hive which has no 

 longer a sloping roof, is made of 

 wood !...." 



The frames of the first Debeau- 

 voys hive had the oblique form of 

 the hive and were about 17^- inches 

 high at the back, 13|- inches on the 

 front, with a breadth of about 13 

 inches. They rested by their lower 

 extremities on the platform, and 

 fitted exactly in the hive, without 



