THE AMERICAN APICULTURIST. 



169 



them that I am aware of. I can say, 

 however, that they give much better 

 satisfaction than ItaUans ] 



A HONEY PLANT. 

 Mrs. Harrison says a good word for 

 sweet clover (melHlot) which in Illinois 

 is classed among the noxious weeds to 

 be exterminated, which she thinks a 

 great mistake. It has no burrs or stick- 

 ers, and dies root and branch the sec- 

 ond year after blooming. It takes 

 kindly to waste places and to poor grav- 

 elly soils, and serves a good purpose for 

 the railroads, in preventing their cuts 

 and embankments from washing. D- 

 A. Jones, of Canada, a noted beekeeper 

 of that country, had control at one time 

 of nine miles of railroad, and furnished 

 the workmen who kept it in repair with 

 seed of the yellow variety, Mellilotus 

 officinalis^ requiring them to carry it in 

 their pockets all the time, and sow it 

 whenever they disturbed the soil. The 

 Dadants had a friend who was a bee- 

 keeper at Keokuk, Iowa, who com- 

 plained that his bees did not make as 

 much honey as theirs did at Hamilton, 

 across the river. The Dadants recom. 

 mended that he sow the seed of sweet 

 clover in all waste places, which he did, 

 and in a few years reported that his lo- 

 cality had unproved in honey produc- 

 tion. It bridges over the interim between 

 the blooming of white clover and Au- 

 tumn flowers, and is rapidly gaining in 

 favor among beekeepers. Judging from 

 its rank growth in this locality, there 

 will not be a cessation in the honey flow 

 until frost, for it will furnish a supply un- 

 til fall bloom. — Exchange. 



Send fifty cents for one of our im- 

 proved drone-and-queen traps. 



INTEODUCIXG QUEEXS. 



A GOOD deal of patience, deliberation 

 and skill are necessary to handle bees 

 successfully. To well qualify one who 

 in other respects is fitted for the apiary, 

 he must study the nature and habits of 

 the bees thoroughly. A writer says : 

 As quite a number have asked the best 

 method of introducing queens, I will 

 here say that I hardly know which way 

 is best, but, as I have been quite suc- 

 cessful in the last five years, not losing 

 a single queen that I now remember of, 

 I will give my plans. The first is the 

 "candy plan ;" but I do not like the di- 

 rections that go out with the candy plan. 

 I first know that my hive is queenless, 

 then I lay the cage on the frames, wire 

 downward, remove the tin from the 

 candy edge of cage, and let them se- 

 verely alone for one week, and I always 

 find the queen out and laying. A great 

 number of queens lost by introducing, 

 I am satisfied, is because the hive is 

 opened too early. Put in the queen, 

 and do not, under any circumstances, 

 touch it for a week, is my advice. 



Another good way is to keep the 

 queen caged over hatching brood, and 

 have no wire cloth on the cage ; but 

 as this is more trouble, we have not used 

 it any this year. 1 would never make 

 the colony queenless before putting in 

 the new queen, as there is more danger 

 in your leaving some little, dumpy cell in 

 the hive that will hatch before the queen 

 is released, than there is in putting in the 

 queen at the same operation the old one 

 is removed. Then there is no danger 

 of a queen hatching for ten days, and 

 by that time the introduced queen will 

 be out. But, usually, the new queen is 

 out and laying before the bees have time 



