AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



829 



bees to movable-frame hives, which are 

 very cross blacks, but by giving them a 

 tremendous dose of smoke I can handle 

 them. 



I wrote to the Southern queen dealer 

 about my ups and downs, and that the 

 queen's journey had been too great. The 

 dealer had seen what was described in 

 the Bee Journal of March 10th, and 

 answered as follows : 



" I want you to stick a pin at some 

 place, that I will send to you a three- 

 banded Italian queen-bee free, which I 

 will handle roughly before I mail her, 

 and I want you to throw her around 

 before you introduce her. She will be 

 mine until youh&ve her safe in the hive, 

 then she is youfs." 



Well, that made me restless. I then 

 sent to New York State for queen-bees, 

 and received and introduced them O. K. 

 I then again ordered more five-banded 

 Italian queens from the South, and I 

 introduced those O. K., and sometime in 

 September I received the rough-handled 

 queen. It was one Saturday, and I was 

 not at home when the mail was brought. 

 The cage waa laid aside until Monday 

 morning. I found her all right. I hope 

 the dealer will see right here what I did 

 with her. I took the cage with queen 

 and threw her into a tree, and she fell 

 through the limbs to the ground. This 

 I did three times, and found her all 

 right. I then removed a queen from 

 some hive, and introduced her with suc- 

 cess. 



The dealer also told me this in a 

 letter : 



"I (or one of the boys did) threw her 

 clear over the house, and the cage struck 

 the lightning-rod as it went, but I found 

 her O. K., and mailed her." 



I have 10 colonies on the summer 

 stands, with all good young queens, but 

 I am glad to say the five-banded ones 

 are the very best in breeding up this 

 fall. I am very sure that I can have 

 those hives boiling over with bees by the 

 right time next spring. 



I am thankful for what the Southern 

 dealer has explained to me and others. 



I will also say that last week, when I 

 placed the rims between the bottom- 

 board and hive, and some protection in 

 an empty case on top, I opened the hive 

 of the rough-handjed queen, as I call 

 her, with very little smoke. I took out 

 one frame until I came to an outside 

 frame of the cluster where I had seen a 

 small lump of bees. All at once I 

 noticed the queen among them, and two 

 or three were fighting her terribly, and 

 very soon the bees and queen flew up 



and fell in the grass in a rolling condi- 

 tion. I hurried the frame in, and be- 

 fore I got there the bees and queen were 

 off. It was a nice day, but early next 

 morning a wet snow fell about 4 inches 

 deep, but in two days the snow was 

 gone, and I then examined the hive 

 again, and found her all right at home. 

 What caused this ? Will any one tell ? 



I am troubled with little ants around 

 the bee-hives. I tried everything that I 

 had seen given in the Bee Journal, and 

 it did not destroy them. They will 

 crawl when it is too cold for bees to fly. 

 I keep my bee-hives in a nice lawn in 

 the summer, kept cut with a mower, 

 and white sand under the hives, which 

 are 6 inches from the sand on stakes 

 driven into the ground. 



Brickerville, Pa., Nov. 18, 1892. 



iHiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiMHimiiiTm 



Report of the Carolina Bee- 

 Keepers' Convention. 



Written for the American Bee Journal 

 BY A. L. BEACH. 



The fourth annual meeting of the 

 Carolina Bee-Keepers' Association met 

 at the Court House in Charlotte, N. C, 

 on Dec. 1, 1892. The meeting ad- 

 journed to the private office of Dr. J. B. 

 Alexander, and was called to order by 

 the President. 



J. K. Rankin offered prayer, after 

 which the roll was called, and the usual 

 number answered to their names. The 

 minutes of the last meeting were read 

 and approved. The Secretary's and 

 Treasurer's reports were read and ap- 

 proved, after which the convention en- 

 tered into a discussion of the most 

 prominent features of the pursuit. 



The question, " How can we best 

 bring about a more general interest in 

 bee-keeping," claimed the attention of 

 the members at length. The plan most 

 favored was that all honey-producers 

 work together in getting up a honey 

 exhibit which would show that there is 

 more than the "name " in this pursuit. 



