118 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



April 13, 



Great Loss of Bees.— Never before in 

 the recollection of bee-keepers have 

 bees become so nearly extinct as now 

 in our vicinity. Last fall no less than 

 300 colonies of the useful pets decorated 

 the yards of our neighbors. At this 

 date about 292 colonies are no more. 

 Very little attention was given to the 

 little fellows. Out of 30 extra colonies 

 I have but one colony remaining to 

 mourn the loss of their industrious 

 neighbors. E. J. Hinshaw. 



Lynn, Ind., April 1,1881. 



. Bees Confined 134 Bays.— I am win- 

 tering 170 colonies of bees. The greater 

 part of them are in the cellar and are 

 doing well. They have not seen day- 

 light for 13-1 days, and are not likely to 

 for several days to come, as it has been 

 snowing steadily for the last 60 hours. 

 Sleighing is pretty fair here and the 

 snow is at least 20 inches deep where not 

 drifted, and the drifts are from 2 to 6 

 feet high. What is the correct pro- 

 nunciation of the name D/.ierzon ? 



S. F. Newman. 

 Norwalk, O., March 31, 1881. 



[It is pronounced thus : " Tseerson.'" 

 —Ed.] 



Colonies Strong.— I put 50 colonies of 

 bees in the cellar ; 4 of which were made 

 late of nuclei ; I lost 2 of them ; the 

 balance consumed about 5 lbs. per colo- 

 ny while in the cellar. They are now 

 stronger than ever before at this time 

 of the year. Mollie O. Large. 



Millersville, March 29, 1881. 



Shall I Transfer or Brive Them ?— I 



bought at a sale a few days ago 2 colo- 

 nies of black bees, one in an old gum 

 and the other in an old box hive. The 

 combs look very black and old. Which 

 is the better plan, to transfer, or drive 

 into a new hive filled with foundation, 

 and Italianize in either case V Please 

 answer in next issue of Bee Journal. 

 W. R. Young. 

 Myersville, Md., March 29, 1881. 



[Transfer, by all means. You will 

 need the brood in the old combs (which 

 would be lost in the case of driving) as 

 fast as hatched to nurse the Italian 

 brood, it being the especial province of 

 the younger bees to do the nursing and 

 other drudge work in the hive. It is an 

 easy matter, as the season advances, to 

 work the old combs out, by putting in a 

 sheet of foundation every few days in 

 the centre of the brood nest, crowding 

 the old combs to the outside, and lifting 

 out as fast as emptied of brood.— Ed.] 



Heavy Loss in Bees.— Bees are nearly 

 all dead in this locality ; one who had 

 24 colonies last fall has 3 left ; another 

 with 10, has 2 ; another with 30, has 5 or 

 6 ; while others having 1 to 10, are all 

 dead. I have 2 out of 20, but cannot do 

 -without the Weekly Bee Journal. 

 " Long may it live." 



M. F. Eastman. 



Queensville, Ind., April 2, 1881. 



Bees in (Jood Condition.— I am well 

 pleased with the Weekly Bee Journal. 

 My bees have come through the winter 

 in good condition. I had them packed 

 in chaff on the. summer stands. Bees 

 left unprotected are, 1 think, about half 

 dead in this locality. I lost all my bees 

 2 years ago, by wintering without pro- 

 tection. After losing all I boughtmore 

 and wintered in the cellar with success. 

 I like packing in chaff the best ; they 

 come through in better condition. Suc- 

 cess to the American Bee Journal. 



Boswell, Ind. J. H. McDaniel. 



Bees Confined (J Months. — March 

 bade us "adieu" with a regular 

 " howler " from the northwest, and 10 

 below zero. Snow in the timber is 

 about 2 feet deep ; bees have been con- 

 fined since the middle of Oct.; ice in 

 the lake is 3 feet thick. The way 

 things now look bees will be confined to 

 their hives 6 months. What do they 

 think of that " down south " complain- 

 ing of long confinement ; while their 

 bees are at work on the clover and fruit 

 blossoms, up here they are as still as 



death ? This winter has been a terror, 

 and if the Palestine bees are proof 

 against death from cold, I want them. 

 I do not wish to complain, for my bees, 

 70 colonies, are all right, and bright as 

 you wish to see. The hives are clean 

 and they show no signs of disease. I 

 winter indoors, in a house made of logs 

 arched over and covered with earth ; it 

 lias a door in one end and ventilators ; 

 it is the best thing I have tried. When 

 I get them out for good I will report 

 their condition, etc. M. S. Snow. 

 Osakis, Minn., April 1, 1881. 



Sawdust for Wintering.— Thus far I 

 have lost nearly \i of my bees. The 

 greater part were packed in chaff and 

 cut straw, in November ; the remain- 

 der were put in a sawdust cellar and 

 taken out on warm days this month 

 and packed. For a winter like this a 

 cellar for winter and packing for spring 

 is, in my opinion, the best ; but deliver 

 me from bees in a sawdust cellar in a 

 warm winter. Joel Gultck. 



St. Charles, Mich., March 30, 1881. 



Wants the Plan.— I should be glad if 

 Mr. Robinson, of Pewamo, Mich., 

 would give his plan in detail for win- 

 t ring queens on one comb. I think it 

 of great importance. I am much 

 pleased with the Weekly Bee Journal, 

 and wish it success. 



Geo. Reynolds. 



St. Neots, England, March 15, 1881. 



[Will Mr. Robinson please comply 

 with this request V— Ed.] 



Bees Bead. — Most of the bees around 

 here are dead. I have lost 4 colonies 

 out of 14, and I expect to lose 1 or 2 

 more, for it is quite cold yet. I think 

 the Bee Journal the best exponent 

 of scientific bee-culture in America. 

 L. II. Westphal. 



Brighton, Mich., March 31, 1881. 



A Strange Occurrence.— I have a cu- 

 rious circumstance to relate, and would 

 like to know if it is of common occur- 

 rence. Last spring I had a qneenless 

 colony, but with a queen cell nearly 

 ready to cap over. One noon I found an 

 adjoining colony about to swarm, and 

 cutting out the queen cell, took it in the 

 house, broke it open, and found a fully- 

 matured queen, smart and lively. I 

 conceived the idea of giving it to the 

 qneenless colony, and for that purpose 

 took a small mug, put the queen into it 

 with a few drops of honey, put two 

 thicknesses of common mosquito cloth 

 over the mug, a stick through the han- 

 dle, and hung it in the qneenless hive. 

 Returning at 4 o'clock, 1 opened the 

 hive and found the bees had liberated 

 the queen, had manufactured abouttwo 

 square inches of comb on the stick that 

 the mug hung on, and in nearly every 

 cell was from 1 to 3 eggs, and the queen 

 not out of her cell to exceed 5 hours. Is 

 this not a peculiar instance ? 



J. II. Cook. 



Parsons, Kans., April 1, 1881. 



[It is too peculiar to be possible. The 

 bees may have swarmed from the hive 

 alongside and taken possession of the 

 one in which you confined the queen, or 

 they may have had a queen when you 

 put her in, or there may have been a 

 fertile worker — anything is quite as 

 probable as that a queen would be lay- 

 ing eggs within five hours after emerg- 

 ing from the cell. — Ed.] 



Chaff Packing Ahead.— Last fall I had 

 10 colonies of bees (4 in chart hives and 

 in simplicity) all strong. The first 

 Sunday in December was pleasant and 

 the bees had a jollification, after which 

 there was not a day that they could 

 safely leave the hive until March 15 and 

 16, when they had a good flight, which 

 they very much needed. I have 7 left : 

 4 strong (in chaff hives) with brood ; 2 

 comparatively strong, and one rather 

 weak, being what was left of 2 colonies 

 that had dysentery. All wintered on 

 the summer stands. I think chaff hives 

 would have saved this loss. The ground 

 is now bare and frozen and we have had 

 cold northwest winds for 3 days. As 

 far as I have been able to learn, the 



loss lias not been heavy in this section. 

 The Weekly is a positive necessity. 

 May it ■' live long and prosper." 



P. F. Twitchell. 

 Andover, O., March 28, 1881. 



Bees and Grapes.— I noticed an arti- 

 cle in the Bee Journal for March 2d, 

 page 68, in regard to bees and grapes. 

 1 have had both for over 10 years in one 

 yard ; the bees never troubled my 

 grapes, and I have the Isabella, Con- 

 cord. Delaware and Augustine, and 

 40 colonies of bees ; bees are not over 

 10 rods from grapes. My bees are in 

 the cellar yet, but do not yet know how 

 they will come through. 



Thos. Pierce. 



Gansevoort, N. Y., March 21, 1881. 



Chaff Did It. — I commenced the 

 spring of 1880 with 8 colonies of bees. 

 I obtained 400 lbs. of honey, mostly ex- 

 tracted, and increased to 28 colonies. I 

 sold one last fall and packed 27 in chaff; 

 they are all alive up to date, 5 are 

 rather weak, the balance are in good 

 condition. About % of the bees in this 

 part of the country are dead. 



C. II. Wrigiit. 



Conneautville, Pa., April 2, 1881. 



Are Bees Taxable!—!. I have a good 

 deal of honey in old comb taken from 

 box hives, with considerable bee-bread, 

 and this honey is quite bitter in flavor- 

 will it do to place over the brood frames 

 to feed with? Some of the honey I 

 think is sour. 



2. Can I use old strained honey that 

 haspollen in it to stimulate the queens ? 



3. I had bees starve with sugar candy 

 over the cluster, but not a cell of honey. 

 The candy was very hard — was that the 

 reason ttiey could not eat it ? 



4. Can bees be taxed the same as other 

 property? A. G. Mayiiew. 



[1. The bitter honey will answer to 

 feed over the frames. If soured, feed 

 outside the hives, when the bees are fly- 

 ing freely, thus leaving it optional with 

 them to take it or let it alone. 



2. Yes. 



3. Perhaps it was. 



4. Yes, as other personal property. 

 The statutes in different States vary 

 somewhat in regard to taxable personal 

 property.— Ed.] 



Bees Gone to Rest.— My bees did well 

 last season, considering the small sup- 

 ply of nectar yielded by the flowers. 

 White clover and basswood, from 

 whence we get our greatest supply, was 

 a total failure, and our bees did not get 

 much until fall. Our fall crop was fair. 

 I started in the spring with 14 colonies, 

 increased to 22 and obtained 700 lbs. of 

 comb honey in nice shape. I packed 

 part of my bees in chaff and the rest I 

 covered with straw to the depth of 2 

 feet, except on the fronts, which 1 cov- 

 ered first with a board set slanting 

 against the hive, then a little straw over 

 that. However, they were not prepared 

 in this way until the last of November, 

 with the thermometer at 20° above zero, 

 owing to my having been away to school 

 for 3 months. They were very strong 

 and had plenty of honey as near as I 

 could ascertain. But alas ! when I ex- 

 amined them on March 5, I found all 

 quiet, after having been confined for 

 about 125 days ; there were none short 

 of stores, but the hives were daubed 

 badly, showing that long confinement 

 was ttie principal cause. Many lost }£; 

 some %, and others all. I think % of 

 the bees in this section have died, but I 

 am not discouraged. I shall start anew 

 if there are any bees to be had. Mr. Ed- 

 itor, do you not think the reason for 

 bees not swarming last season was on 

 account of a forewarning of this cold 

 winter? Success to the Weekly Bee 

 Journal. A. B. Loomis. 



Carson City, Mich., March 4, 1881. 



[No ; bees have no forewarnings any 

 more than has humanity. The condi- 

 tions were not right for swarming, 

 either from want of honey-flow, or from 

 an absence of sealed brood, threatening 

 crowded colonies in the hive.— Ed.] 



Honey As Food.— We have just been 

 baking honey ginger snaps, " a la New- 

 man," as given in " Honey as Food and 

 Medicine." We are puzzled to know 

 how one person can embody all the re- 

 quisites for an Editor, Doctor and Cook, 

 and a Minister, too, by the way he 

 quotes Scripture in this valuable little 

 work. Perhaps he has a help-meet — as 

 the Irishman says, " sure and hasn't he 

 a wife ? " Honey producers should al- 

 ways place honey before their guests, 

 take it to fairs, ministers' donations, 

 festivals, sociables, excursions, old set- 

 tlers' picnics, etc., use it in the dressing 

 and canning of fruits, and teach the 

 people, by precept and example, that 

 honey is good. Mrs. L. Harrison. 



Peoria, 111., April 4, 1881, 



First Swarm.— Last season was very 

 severe on bees in our State. We had 

 rain from April until December 31, al- 

 most every day. The moth worm and 

 the scarcity of honey in the flowers 

 caused us to lose 2-3 out of 38 colonies. 

 Our bees have been working well since 

 the first of this month. We had a natu- 

 ral swarm this morning from hybrids; 

 we put them in a Langs troth hive ; they 

 appear to be all right! Success to your 

 Weekly. W. B. & F. P. Thompson. 



New Iberia, La., March 31, 1881. 



Took The Bees Out.— I have put my 

 bees out on their summer stands. I lost 

 8 out of 46. I had them in a room above 

 ground ; they are out of honey now, so 

 1 must feed them, though it is cold and 

 I fear it will injure the bees some. A 

 word to all : see if your bees have 

 enough honey. Fayette Lee. 



Cokato, Minn., April 1, 1881. 



g^The Southwestern Wisconsin Bee- 

 Keepers' Association will meet at the 

 residence of W. B. Wallis. at Darling- 

 ton, Wednesday,Mayll, 1881, at 10 a.m. 



There will be an opportunity given for questions 

 and answers. Interesting papers will be read, among 

 which may be mentioned : 



Location of Apiary, by E. France. 



Implements of the Apiary, by R. D. Wilson. 



Feeding Kxtracted Honey to Produce Comb Hon- 

 ey, by Dr. C Abraham. 



Foundation, and its Advantages, by D. R.Sylvester. 



Bee Forage, by H. Gilmore. 



Preparation for Winter, by George Fox. 



Wintering Bees, by Reese Powell. 



Advantage in Preparing Papers, by E. France. 



Profitable Bee-Keeping, bv E. Pike. 



Bee-Keeping, will it Pay ? by N. E. France. 



The Prize Essay of the N. K. Convention, on How 

 to make the Apiary the most Profitable, by George 

 W. House, of Fayetteville. N. Y. 



A cordial invitation Is given to all. 



N. E. Fuance, Sec, Platteville, Wis. 



l|S" The Michigan Bee-Keepers' Asso- 

 ciation will convene in Pioneer Rooms 

 of the State Capitol at Lansing, May 5. 

 The following is the programme : 



Regular order of business. 



Annual address by Pres. W. J. Ashworth. 



Address by T. G. Newman, editor of American Bee 

 Journal ; subject. Rise, Progress, Present Condition 

 and Future Prospects of American Apiculture. 



Essay— Profitable extentof bee-keeping, by James 

 Heddon, Dowagiac. 



Essay— Requisites of an Apiary, by H. A. Burch, 

 South Haven. 



Essay— Some important facts in bee-keeping, by 

 Prof. A. J. Cook. Michigan Agricultural College. 



Discussions and remarks. 



Examination of exhibits. 



All exhibitors of supplies are requested to send 

 samples to the Secretary, with prices and descrip- 

 tions attached, and all transportation charges must 

 be prepaid by the exhibitors. GEO. L. Pkkkv, Sec. 



HiT Programme of the Northwestern 

 Bee-Keepers' Union, to be held at Has- 

 tings, Minn., May 17, 1S81 : 



1.— Address of Welcome, by J. N. Searls. 



2.— Reports of committees. 



3.— Reports from all— number, kind and condition 

 of bees. 



4.— A paper by Pres. A. Tidball, on honey-produo- 

 Ing plants and flowers. 



r».— A paper by Dr. P. Barton, of St. Paul, on honey 

 as food and medicine. 



»>.— Apiary culture and our fairs, by Hon. William 

 Avery, of St. Croix Falls, Wis. 



7.— A paper on sales of honey, by F. B. Dorothy, of 

 Taylor's Falls, Minn. 



S-— A paper on wintering bees, by L. Day, of Faxm- 

 ington. 



9.— Progressive bee-culture, by J. G. Teter. 



The above subjects will be open for discussion. In 

 addition to the above, the following subjects are sug- 



1.— Essential properties of a good bee hive. 



2.— How to prevent and cure foul brood. 



3.— How toprevent spring dwindling. 



4.— Comb Foundation, with dividing and natural 

 swarming. 



Appointment of committees. 



Election of officers. Adjournment. 



IF" All bee-keepers are cordially Invited. Enter- 

 tainment free. F. B. Dohotht, Sec. 



H^ The North Western Wisconsin 

 Bee-keepers Association will meet at 

 Germama Hall, LaCrosse, Wis., on 

 Tuesday, May 10, at 10 a. m. All inter- 

 ested in bee-keeping are requested to be 

 present. L. H. Pammel, Jr., Sec. 



