1881. 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



51 



I have read Mr. Doolittle's article, 

 " Covering bees with snow,'' in the Bee 

 Journal of Feb. 2d, with much in- 

 terest, on account of experimenting 

 myself with snow this winter. I would 

 like to ask Mr. Doolittle. through the 

 Bee Journal, the question, whether 

 he covered the whole hive all around 

 with snow : whether he left any un- 

 covered space in front, or to the en- 

 trance ; and how long he left them so 

 covered V 



The fore part of last summer was very 

 poor for bees here. I started with 12.5 

 colonies ; some of them were very weak 

 and I had to feed them from June 10th 

 to the 18th, from then to the 29th they 

 made their living, when basswood com- 

 menced to blossom, which was so 

 abundant and tilled with nectar, that 

 they tilled up their hives, besides getting 

 about 3,000 lbs. of surplus honey. 



My bees are nearly all hybrids, with a 

 few exceptions of blacks. Fourteen 

 years ago this winter, I found a colony 

 of blacks or natives, or the so-called 

 wild bees. By chance I chopped down 

 a tree in which they were hiving ; this 

 was my first colony. From them, and 

 some other wild bees that came to my 

 premises in swarming season, I have 

 reared my stock. How they got mixed 

 with Italians I do not know, the nearest 

 Italians kept around here, were about 5 

 miles. 



Theilmanton, Minn., Feb. 5, 1881. 



Later— Feb. 8. : Within the last 4 

 or 5 days, considerable ice gathered in 

 the entrances of my hives. 1 have tried 

 another way to loosen or melt it away, 

 in which I succeeded ; it was done by 

 covering the ice with salt. I have spread 

 it on in the evening, and the next morn- 

 ing the ice was melted or loosened so that 

 it could easily be taken away ; while on 

 a few hives with icy entrance that were 

 not salted (on purpose for trial) the ice 

 froze solid. It was 20° above that night. 

 This does not disturb the bees at all, and 

 is a far better way than the above des- 

 cribed iron. Bees in this vicinity that 

 are out-doors, unprotected, are nearly 

 all dead. 



No trains or mail have gone east from 

 here since the 4th inst., and the country 

 travel is almost entirely stopped on ac- 

 count of snow-drifts. ' Weather has 

 changed, and is almost warm enough 

 to-day for bees to fly. They want it 

 badly. Success to the Bee Journal, I 

 read it with much interest and pleasure. 



s£k£gS?M£m*L 





to come. I think that probably }4 of 

 the bees in this section will be dead by 

 the 1st of April. If is thought that the 

 season of issl will lie a good one for 



1 -keepers— I certainly hope so. The 



Journal is exerting a very good in- 

 fluence on the bee-keepers of this sec- 

 tion as can be seen by the care they give 

 their bees. Success to its efforts. 



Harry G. Burnet. 

 Blairstown, Iowa, Feb. 5, 1881. 



Early Work.— At this date my bees 

 are busy bringing in pollen, and the 

 prospect is very good for a yield of 

 honey the coming season. 



G. B. Wallace. 



San Bernardino, Cal., Jan. 30, 1881. 



Do Woolen Blankets Absorb 1— This 

 year in packing my bees for the winter, 

 i put on thick woolen quilts over the 

 frames and below the chaff cushion. 

 Have had considerable trouble with ice 

 forming on the bottom-board so as to 

 obstruct the entrance (the summer en- 

 trance ^x4 in. is open with no upward 

 ventilation), and I fear the woolen 

 quilts repel the moisture instead of let- 

 ting it pass through to the chaff. Will 

 the Bee Journal tell me is this so, or 

 is the trouble caused by the long con- 

 tinued cold ? They have had no flight 

 since early in November. Am prepar- 

 ing for a big funeral, at which all poor 

 bee-keepers will be sympathetic mourn- 

 ers. Am glad the " new departure " is 

 a success. "Growth" is the world's 

 watch-word. E. M. R. 



Flint, Mich. 



[Woolen blankets will absorb the 

 moisture very nicely, and where there 

 are 2 or 3 used in one hive, it is not un- 

 common to find the upper ones quite 

 wet, while the lower blanket will be 

 comparatively dry and quite warm. 

 The trouble is undoubtedly caused by 

 the intense cold and long confinement. 

 A correspondent in this number sug- 

 gests that the sprinkling of salt in the 

 entrance will prevent the ice formation. 

 We have made no experiments in this 

 line, and cannot say whether the salt- 

 water or brine will be distasteful to the 

 bees, but presume it will not. Some 

 bee-keepers go so far as to claim that 

 salt is beneficial.— Ed.] 



Doing Well.— As I have observed no 

 report from this part of the country, I 

 thought I would send you a few lines. 

 I commenced the spring of 1880 with 10 

 weak colonies and no honey ; I increased 

 to 14, obtained 150 lbs. of comb honey 

 and 70 lbs. of extracted, and my bees 

 are well supplied with honey for the 

 winter. I use the Langstroth hive. 

 Bees in this locality had no flight for 7 

 weeks, lasting till Jan. 28, which was a 

 warmer day. Then I raised the hives 

 and swept the dead bees out. There 

 were from a small handfull to a pint 

 under each hive, and in one the bees 

 were all dead, leaving about 20 lbs. of 

 honey in the hive. My bees are on the 

 summer stands covered with chaff. Did 

 the colony mentioned starve or freeze, 

 and is the amount of bees I swept from 

 the others liable to injure them much? 

 Albert Long. 



Iola, 111., Feb. 1, 1881. 



[The bees probably starved— that is, 

 a "cold snap" came on while they were 

 removed from their " base of supplies," 

 and they perished. If your colonies are 

 strong, the loss of from a handful to a 

 pint each will do no harm. — Ed.] 



Coldest for Nine Years.— The winter 

 so far has been the severest known for 

 nine years in this part of the State. The 

 cold weather commenced in November, 

 and it shows no signs of letting up as 

 yet, so that bees have been confined to 

 their hives for 3 months, and the pros- 

 pects are that they will be for 2 months 



Bee Pasturage, Ete.— I am glad over- 

 stocking and growing bee-pasture is 

 receiving so much attention by writers 

 in the Bee Journal. When I located 

 my apiary here I think there were not 

 to'exceed 25 colonies within a radius of 

 3 miles of me. At that time there was 

 little trouble to get good results from 

 bees, with little attention and little 

 knowledge of scientific management. 

 But now there are, I presume, no less 

 than 400 colonies within the radius above 

 mentioned, and we find it requires the 

 best of apiary apparatus and the most 

 scientific management, coupled with 

 "eternal vigilance," to get partially sat- 

 isfactory results. I live by a grove of 

 young timber. Scattered through it 

 were nice young bass-wood trees ; on 

 my land I have cut away the other trees 

 from around them, till now I have 400 

 nice trees, from 6 inches to a foot in di- 

 ameter. Just one-half mile from my 

 trees lives a man who keeps about 100 

 colonies. He had more bass-wood on 

 his land than I had ; but he is stripping 

 his place of bass-wood, cutting it into 

 cord- wood. I asked him to preserve his 

 trees for his bees, but he replied: "You 

 and my other neighbors have saved 

 enough to keep my bees." So it goes. 

 I sowed last spring, five acres of meli- 

 lot, but we had a terrible wind which 

 blowed nearly all the loose dirt and seed 

 into the fence corners, so I have not a 

 half a stand, but I shall let it stand and 

 make what it will. I am out of seed or 

 I would sow five acres more next spring. 

 I believe this winter will cause the loss 

 of half the bees in western Iowa. I see 

 friend Martin, in a recent number of 

 the Journal, feels confident of no loss 

 as he says he has his bees packed in 

 straw or chaff. I have tried the chaff 

 theory to my satisfaction, and find some 

 seasons I have lost more of those pack- 

 ed in straw than of those left unprotect- 



ed on their summer stands. I used to 

 be an enthusiast for cellar wintering, 

 but while I lost none in the winter, I 

 suffered tearfully by spring dwindling 

 and spring desertion. I have seen con- 

 siderable of that peppery honey Prof. 

 Cook speaks about. A grocer in our 

 town bought a lot of nice white comb 

 honey but it was so hot no one could 

 eat enough of it to make him sick un- 

 less he was a tobacco chewer. I never 

 obtained any of it myself, as I am not 

 near any low land. All I have seen 

 comes from localities near swamps. I 

 am asked almost daily by those who 

 have some of it, what it is gathered 

 from and from the best observation 1 

 can make, I think it is gathered from a 

 kind of swamp milk-weed. There is no 

 laurel in this section. The hot honey 

 seems to be stored by the bees only in 

 seasons of great scarcity, as I never 

 knew of any complaint during good sea- 

 sons. I am so pleased with the Weekly 

 Bee Journal. It is certainly a great 

 success, so far as your readers are con- 

 cerned at least, and we hope it will be 

 equally so to you. 



William Morris. 



Anderson, Iowa, Jan. 31, 1881. 



[The hot honey spoken of is probably 

 collected from the prickly ash (Xan- 

 thoxylum Americanum), which grows in 

 great abundance on the lowlands in the 

 heavy timber of nearly all the North- 

 western and Central States. We have 

 also noticed much of it in Missouri, 

 Kentucky and Tennessee. The prickly 

 ash is. a profuse bloomer, and bears 

 many berries of a very sharp, pungent 

 taste. We have seen bees on the flowers, 

 but never to sufficient extent to induce 

 the belief that it produced any amount 

 of honey; it might be, however, in cases 

 of great scarcity of honey, that bees 

 would store enough from it to affect and 

 spoil all the surplus.— Ed.] 



How will they come ouU-It has been 

 so cold here ever since the 10th ol .No- 

 vember that bees could not fly out with- 

 out freezing. About the 20tli of No- 

 vember I moved my bees one-half mile 

 and placed them under a hay-shed fixed 

 on purpose for them, under a high cow- 

 shed. I have Mitchell's hive, I guess it 

 is, it came from McDougal, of Indian- 

 apolis, Ind. When I moved them I 

 closed them up with the division boards 

 as well as I could, and covered the 

 frames with dry cloths, mostly woolen 

 The hives then were full of frost, and 

 shortly afterward I found them damp ; 

 I dried all the coverings, and now they 

 all appear dry and as lively as m sum- 

 mer. I am a beginner with bees. I 

 purchased 6 colonies last spring, and 

 they increased by natural swarming to 

 21 I obtained over 100 lbs. of comb 

 honey from the first new swarms. I 

 am somewhat worried since seeing in 

 the Journal the danger of disturbing 

 them in winter. Some of them do not 

 smell very sweet now koTuTTLE 



Saratoga, Iowa, Jan. 31, 1881. 



valleys is very rich and produces a greal 



number of wild flowers ; white clover is 

 very abundant, and dandelions grow 

 without end. The ereeksare lined with 

 willows, which furnish Hie bestof bee- 

 pasturage in the spring ; besides these, 

 we have the basswood, which is prac- 

 tically boundless in extent, as the hill- 

 sides are covered with young basswoods 

 from 1 to 15 feet high. I have intro- 

 duced alsike clover in my section, that 

 is that place where mv farm is, about 9 

 miles from Arcadia. The only question 

 here now is: Can bees be wintered 

 with surety in this place '< If so, then 

 the amount of honey that can be pro- 

 duced in Western Wisconsin is simply 

 enormous. R. A. Morgan. 



Arcadia, Wis., Jan. 31, 1881. 



Complimentary.— Our bees had a good 

 "fly" on the 30tn of January, being the 

 second flight that they have had since 

 the 1st of November. Such a winter 

 as we are experiencing is a new thing 

 to the oldest inhabitant. The farmers 

 who keep bees, or rather let the bees 

 keep themselves, have lost fearfully, 

 perhaps one-third— equal to the increase 

 of last year— has already perished, and 

 more will go. I could not express to 

 you the real pleasure it gives me to see 

 the American Bee Journal "all 

 fresh" once a week. I confess that I 

 had my doubts at first as to whether a 

 weekly bee paper could keep up as high 

 a standard of bee literature as that to 

 be found in a well edited monthly ; but 

 in this I was agreeably mistaken. The 

 matter found in each weekly issue has 

 been in every respect equal to that found 

 in the monthly, before the change. 



G. W. Demaree. 



Christiansburg, Ky., Feb. 3, 1881. 



[We are fast reaching the fruition of 

 our ambition— i. e., to make the Jour- 

 nal so attractive that the prejudices 

 of the few against change in form, and 

 the doubts of many about keeping up its 

 high standard, will be absorbed in its 

 increasing interest.— Ed.] 



To Prevent Robbing.— My bees have 

 not had a fly for 3 months, the weather 

 has been so cold and steady ; we have a 

 thaw to-day, and I hope they will soon 

 get a chance to fly. I think my bees 

 are all alive. It seems there still are 

 bee-men who do not know how to stop 

 robbing, so I will give my remedy. Use 

 a wet rag folded up and laid at the 

 entrance, regulate according to the ex- 

 tent of the case on hand, and you will 

 never fail to stop it. I have practiced 

 this plan for 2 seasons, and never failed 

 in a single instance. Bee-keepers feel 

 somewhat gloomy in this locality on ac- 

 count of the hard winter. 



H. S. Hackman. 



Peru, 111., Feb. 8, 1881. 



Good Prospect for Basswood.— Hear- 

 ing that the' bee-keepers of Wisconsin 

 think that most of the basswood in 

 their State is dead, on account of the 

 extreme cold weather we have had dur- 

 ing the past 3 months, I would say that 

 I have examined the basswood in this 

 vicinity very closely, and find it all 

 alive ; buds are swelling now, and look 

 as healthy as ever. The bees, as a gen- 

 eral thing, are doing very poorly, and 1 

 believe that one-half of the bees that 

 were put into winter-quarters last fall 

 are dead, those alone surviving that 

 were well packed on summer stands it 

 froze up here about Nov. 11th and there 

 has not been a day since that the ther- 

 mometer indicated over 30 above zero 

 at noon, and twice it has been 40° below 

 zero in the morning. The ice is now 30 

 inches thick here on the Trempealeau 

 river ; but, notwithstanding the extreme 

 weather, the bees that were well packed 

 on summer stands are in very fine con- 

 dition. I will now attempt to describe 

 the location here. In the first place, we 

 being near the Mississippi river, the 

 country is very uneven ; the soil in the 



Hard on Bees.— This is the most se- 

 vere winter on bees that I have had in 

 my 24 years' of experience. My bees 

 gathered very little honey during the 

 fall season, except that which was 

 gathered from fruit and a cider press 

 which was only a few hundred yards 

 from my apiary. The unnatural food 

 and cessation of breeding early in the 

 season, is the cause of heavy loss dur- 

 ing the severe weather from Dec. 29th 

 to the present time (the weather still 

 being very cold). I tound one of my 

 best colonies queenless ; in looking over 

 a colony apparently dead, I found that 

 the queen with a few dozen workers, 

 with proper care would revive. I took 

 both hives into the house and deter- 

 mined to save the one if possible. 

 After getting them thoroughly warmed, 

 I introduced the queen in the queenless 

 colony, on the evening of Feb. 2, with 

 the theromometer 6° below zero. Would 

 it not be a good plan for all the bee- 

 keepers to report next spring just how 

 many colonies they had last fall, and 

 how many they have left when the 

 honey season opens ? Is there a stronger 

 argument necessary for the bee-keepers 

 to teach them that healthy food and 

 proper care in putting them up for win- 

 ter is a positive necessity V Surely, my 

 fellow bee-keepers, we must learn some- 

 thing from the severe lesson we are get- 

 tine if we expect to succeed better 

 hereafter. w , J- f Bupp. 



Glen Rock, Pa., Feb. 2, 1881. 



