442 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Local Convention Directory. 



isse. 

 July 16.- 



Timi and place of Meeting. 



Marshiill Co.. at Marshalltown. Iowa. 

 J. \V. Sanders. Sec. LeGrand, Iowa. 



Aug. 31.— Stark County, at Canton, O. 



Mark Thomson, Sec, Canton, O. 



Sept. 4 — ShebOTgan Co., at Sheboygan Falls, Wis. 

 Mattie B. Thomas, Sec, Sheboygan Falls, Wis. 



Oct 7.— Wis. Lake Shore Center, at Kiel, Wis. 



Ferd Zastrow, Sec, Millhome, Wis. 



Qct !■»— 14.— North American, at Indianapolis,Ind. 

 F. L. Dougherty, Sec, Indianapolis. Ind. 



Oct. 19. 31.-11110018 Central, at Mt. Sterling. Ills. 

 J. M. Hambaugh, Sec. Spring, Ills. 



Dec. 1, 2.— Michigan state, at Ypsilanti. Mich. 



H. D. Cutting. Sec, Clinton, Mich. 



tW~ In order to have this table complete. Secre- 

 taries are requested to forward full particulars of 

 time and place of future meetings.— El). 



One came out, but I put it back, and 

 cut out all queen-cells but one for the 

 colony. 







Bees Destroying ftueen-Cells.— G. 

 H. M.. Burr Oak, ? Mich., on June 25, 

 1886, writes : 



I had a colony that I divided on 

 June 4, and it did very well until it 

 swarmed, when it had 7 queen-cells ; 

 as fast as these hatched, the bees de- 

 stroyed them. I made an examina- 

 tion to see if they had a queen, but 

 found none. I then went to a hive 

 that had cast a swarm and cut out 4 

 queen-cells and put them in the 

 former hive, but they were destroyed. 

 I made another examination, but 

 found no queen. What shall I do 

 with them V 



[You do not say which part of the 

 divided colony it was that swarmed. 

 You say, "as fast as the cells hatched, 

 the bees destroyed them." Do you 

 mean the cells, or the queens V You 

 "made an examination;" did you 

 look for queen or eggs ? Y'ou say you 

 introduced more cells, and they were 

 destroyed. Was there not a virgin 

 queen in the hive at the time V Look 

 for eggs and brood, and if you lind 

 none, put in a frame of eggs and 

 larvie, and 3 days after introduce a 

 fertile queen or a queen-cell.— James 

 Heddon.] 



Bees Working Well.— Abe Hoke, 

 Union City,K3 Ind., on June 28, 1886, 

 says: 



Bees have worked well and gathered 

 lots of honey when the weather was 

 warm enough. I have one colony on 

 scales, and on Saturday, June 26, it 

 gained 7 pounds in weight. On Sun- 

 day, June 27, it was cold all the fore- 

 noon ; the afternoon was warmer, but 

 the colony lostlj^ pounds in weight. 

 There is an abundance of bloom, and 

 if the weather should get warm soon 

 we will have a. pretty good crop of 

 honey. So far I have had only seven 

 prime swarms, and no after-swarms. 



Honey-Dew.— J. J- Waller, Pleas- 

 ure Ridge Park, 5 Ky., writes as fol- 

 lows on June 23, ISSfi : 



I herewith enclose a few leaves 

 from a grove of black walnut, which 

 grows on my place, and ask that you 

 have them examined and report the 

 result through the American Bee 

 Journal. These leaves, as well as 

 all in tlie grove, have their upper 

 sides covered with a sweet substance 

 very much like dew in appearance. 

 Upon the under side there are a great 

 many very small, pale-green insects. 

 I do not find any on the upper part oi 

 the leaf. I examined a hickory tree 

 which is so situated that a part of the 

 leaves are under or near the walnuts, 

 and the rest some distance off. Those 

 near the walnuts are covered with 

 this sweet, while those at a distance 

 have none. I believe this sweet is 

 produced by the insect, but there is 

 one difliculty in the way, and that is, 

 that in order to reach all parts of the 

 trees the substance must be ejected 

 with considerable force, and I cannot 

 see why the under side of the leaf 

 would not contain it as well as the 

 upper. I have 64 colonies of bees, and 

 they are very busy gathering in this 

 " honey-dew." It has been about 

 three days since it first made its 

 appearance. Some ten years ago, 

 about this time of the year, and dur- 

 ing weather very much like the pres- 

 ent, this same kind of thing appeared 

 on the leaves of this grove, and the 

 bees gathered it in great abundance, 

 but it was so dark and disagreeable 

 in taste that it was almost useless. 

 Perhaps I may report further when 1 

 see the outcome of this, tome, strange 

 and unnatural affair. 



[The insects are aphides, too crush- 

 ed to be identified. They are proba- 

 bly Aphis punctatilla. They work on 

 the under side of leaves, and, as in 

 all such cases, the nectar falls upon 

 the upper surface of the under-hang- 

 ing foliage. As suggested by Mr. W., 

 they often eject the nectar with some 

 considerable force. The plant-lice 

 were never more common and widely 

 distributed than this season. I pre- 

 sume the dry season is very favorable 

 to this growth and development. 

 Usually this nectar does no harm to 

 trees ; last year seemed an exception 

 in the case of blackberry plant-lice in 

 Northern Michigan.— A. J. Cook.] 



been extracting right along, except 

 the last week in May and the first in 

 June, but I had to do so with the 

 hive-entrances reduced to a one-inch 

 passage, and heavy smoking in open- 

 ing the hives. The bees cluster out 

 heavily around the hives, and it is 

 with some difliculty after a day or two 

 that they go to work again. The hives 

 are well ventilated. In bloom we 

 have plenty of alders and white clover 

 yet, some bell-flower-shaped vines in 

 the woods, and plenty of very small 

 shrubs with yellow bloom, something 

 like the asters, but the bees bring only 

 pollen from these. There is plenty 

 of honey in the hives, but I have been 

 sick for two weeks, and had no help 

 in extracting. I have now 100 good 

 colonies, 16 nuclei, and 26 colonies in 

 box-hives. 



Report from Mississippi.— L. J. 

 de Sobotker, Riverton.^D Miss., on 

 June 26, 1886, writes : 



We have had some very changeable 

 weather, being warm, sultry, chilly 

 and rainy for the last ten days. There 

 has been a check upon the supply of 

 nectar, and the bees have been very 

 much inclined to robbing. I have 



Questions.— H.Weidman, Riverside, 

 O N. J., writes thus on June 24, 1886 : 



I would respectfully submit the 

 following questions to be answered in 

 the Bee Journal: 1. Will the size 

 and shape of the brood-frames have 

 any bearing on the future successful 

 wintering of our bees V 2. It being 

 well known that bees in building comb 

 always build the straight rows of cells 

 horizontally, and the foundation being 

 made the same way. would it not be 

 an advantage to have the rows of cells 

 run vertically instead of horizontally 

 in the foundation V Would this pre- 

 vent the bees from slanting the cells 

 along the top-bar of the frames? 

 Would it make the comb stronger or 

 weaker ? Would it retard the work 

 of the bees anv. or not. in drawing 

 out the foundation.V Would it be 

 possible to make bees build comb in 

 this way without the use of foun- 

 dation ? 



[1. After experimenting and obser- 

 ving for 18 years, I am confident that 

 if the depth of brood-frames has 

 aught to do with successful wintering 

 of bees, its influence is so slight that 

 it is utterly obscured by other and far 

 more potent influences. I prefer long 

 frames to short ones, whatever their 

 depth may be, because I believe that 

 fewer and longer ranges of comb give 

 the cluster better access to their 

 stores during long cold spells in win- 

 ter. This, however, is by no means 

 a vital factor, and I advise construct- 

 ing hives for the convenience of the 

 apiarist. 



2. I have used considerable of the 

 Dadant comb foundation, made with 

 cells in rows vertically, in which po- 

 sition many claim the foundation is 

 less liable to stretch and sag. I have 

 never noticed any difference in the 

 despatch or excellence of comb-build- 

 ing and combs. Bees always row 

 the cells horizontally, if not guided, 

 but I think they gain nothing by fol- 

 lowing that instinct. I have noticed 

 no difference in the slant of the cells, 



