18 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL, 



Jan. 12, 1899. 



scale insects which thicklj' dotted the leaves. Suddenly the 

 bees and other sweet-loving insects commenced to visit the 

 same leaves for the honey-dew which dropt from the coccids, 

 and the birds at once ceast to come. In a few days cold, or 

 preferably nectar in other places, kept the bees and their 

 companions from the place, and the birds a;;-ain commenced 

 their good work. This alternation of bird and bee visits 

 occurred .several times. Such observations make the value 

 of the expensive secretion to the insects clearly evident. 



On the other hand, the honey-dew always becomes foul 

 with the black smut or fungus that attacks sweet substances 

 on tree or bush. We can hardly doubt that it is a serious 

 evil to the plants, and are unable to see any good that comes 

 to the plant from it. I fully believe it is always harmful to 

 vegetation, and I feel certain that plants do not originate 

 it to their own hurt. 



I referred above to certain acorn-infesting larva: that 

 secrete nectar. I have never seen them, but have often 

 heard of such— principally from Missouri— so often that I 

 think they may be more than a myth. Yet I am free to say 

 that I should feel more certain if I actually saw them. I 

 can see how oak-tree plant-lice, which are by no means rare, 

 might lead to an erroneous conclusion. 



Ergot— a fungus which attacks rye and other plants — 

 is also said to secrete honej'-dew. If this be true, then I 

 feel .sure that the sweet in some way benefits the fungus. If 

 it does the fungus no good, then I believe it, too, has other 

 origin. 



I hope all readers of the American Bee Journal will 

 closely observe this honey-dew, whenever they have oppor- 

 tunit}', and see if insects are not always its source, and re- 

 port their observations in these columns. 



In California, where scale insects and aphids are so 

 common, it is very easy to study the honey-dew, and the 

 black, repulsive fungus, which our orchardists denominate 

 "smut." The walnut tree, this season, has been infested 

 generally with an aphid, and the honey-dew and smut have 

 always attended it. 



It is not to be inferred that this honey-dew is unwhole- 

 some. It is a secretion, and not an excretion. It has a simi- 

 lar origin to honey, and may be as delicious. Much Aphid 

 honey-dew is deliciously wholesome, and the honey from it 

 is superior. Most if not all of the coccid honey-dew on the 

 other hand, is dark and of ill flavor, and its presence in 

 honey, or as honey, is greatly injurious, and can never be 

 sold for the table. I have .sold it by the barrel for manu- 

 facturing. This was used to make cookies, and was said to 

 be all right by the manufacturer. I explained all to him, 

 yet he gave the ruling price. 



Often this honey-dew is produced in exceeding quanti- 

 ties, and I have known it to crj'stallize on the plants, espe- 

 cially on pine and larch trees, so as to encrust them with 

 white, and become very conspicuous. 



Our conclusions, then, which we reach tentatively, are 

 these : Honey-dew is always a secretion froin insects. It 

 is always whole.some, and often delicious. It may be pro- 

 duced in exceeding quantities, and become the source of 

 much honey. In such cases, coccid honey-dew honey will 

 often be rank and ill-flavored, and should be kept as much 

 as possible by itself, and sold for other purpose than table 

 use. Honej'-dew is secreted by insects to serve them in at- 

 tracting bees, etc., which shall repel the bird enemies of 

 the nectar-secreting insects. Los Angeles Co., Calif. 



Something About the Wintering' of Bees. 



BY C. D.WEXPORT. 



THE honey crop in this section the pa.st season -ivas 

 lighter than that in 1897, but the quality of that I se- 

 cured was much better, owing mostly to the absence of 

 pollen or bee-bread in the sections, and this was largely 

 due to precautions taken to avoid this serious .source of loss 

 that often occurs in this locality. 



Mr. Herrick, of this State, made the remark in the 

 American Bee Journal a short time ago, that there will be 

 less bees in Minnesota next spring than there are now. I 

 fully agree with him as to this, for I never cellared bees be- 

 fore in as poor condition as mine were this year. Their 

 poor condition was owing partly to rea.sons or causes I do not 

 understand, aiui in part to the fact that there was a drouth 

 and consequent dearth of honey the latter part of the sea- 

 son, on account of which brood-rearing stopt earlier than I 

 believe I ever knew it to do before. For this and other rea- 

 sons colonies were, as a rule, weak. I doubled up a good 

 man)' of mine, and have them in pretty fair condition. 



The weather in November, up to the middle of the 

 month, was so mild that bees were able to enjoy good 

 flights at short intervals, but about the 20th, when mine as 

 well as all others around here that I know of, were out yet, 

 this section of the country was struck by a storm that the 

 local papers say was the most severe ever known here for 

 the time of year — it was 18 degrees below zero, with a most 

 terrific wind. I was away from home at the time, on ac- 

 count of which my bees .suflered much worse than they 

 would if I had been at home, for the covers from manj' hives 

 were blown off, others tipt over and off the bottom-board, 

 and besides the intense cold the air was full of ice and fly- 

 ing snow, but no colonies perisht outright, altho with a few 

 hives tip over, both cover and bottom-board were off, and it 

 should be understood that they were exposed in this way 

 from some time in the nig-hl until late in the afternoon, 

 when I arrived. For owing to an accident, the man left in 

 charge was unable to attend to them. 



The most severe cold had not occurred yet, but before 

 this aft'air took place it would have been hardly possible for 

 me to believe that bees could exist under such conditions 

 as some of these did. The colonies in the hives disturbed, 

 as was to be expected, suffered a severe loss in bees — in 

 some cases a third or more of their number perisht. I was 

 not surprised at this, but was surprised to find a large loss 

 of bees in many colonies, the hives of which were not dis- 

 turbed in any apparent way by the storm. In many there 

 were from one-half to one and one-half quarts, loose meas- 

 ure, of dead bees on the bottom-boards and between the 

 combs. Other colonies no stronger, and in some cases 

 much weaker, in hives as near alike as machinery can make 

 them, lost hardly half a dozen bees. 



The only way I can account for the loss is that the bees 

 that froze may not have been with the main cluster, but the 

 condition of the weather for two or three da3-s previous, and 

 the fact that the storm increast in severitj' gradually, and 

 the large amount of dead bees in some colonies I deem it 

 improbable that this wholly, if in part, accounts for it. But 

 if this storm had not visited this section, I believe there 

 would still be a large loss of bees here the present winter 

 and coming spring, but this is only my opinion, for there 

 are very many things about our pursuit that I know but 

 very little about, and this is one of them. 



A few years ago, however, under conditions that I fear 

 were somewhat like this year, many practical bee-keepers 

 in this State, or the southern part at least, had a large v,'in- 

 ter and spring loss of bees, owing, I believe, to cau.ses or 

 reasons unknown, tho manj' believed it was on account of 

 colonies going into winter quarters with too large a percent 

 of old bees, owing to the fact that colonies did not that fall 

 have as large a percent of old bees as in other years, when 

 there was practically no winter or spring loss. I can but 

 believe that this had little if anything- to do with it. One 

 thing in favor of bees this winter is, that in my immediate 

 locality, at Iea.st, their winter food, if natural stores, con- 

 sists mostly of good clover and basswood honey, and I do 

 not believe that being exposed to severe cold before being 

 put into winter quarters would necessarily, of itself, war- 

 rant an opinion as to poor wintering, for I have sometimes 

 left bees out late until they had been exposed to a number 

 of severe cold spells, then cellared them, and in some cases 

 I was unable to see but what they came through the winter 

 and spring in as good condition as the average of those car- 

 ried in early. 



As an instance. I remember a number of years ago, 10 

 colonies in an out-yard were left over from the last load 

 hauled home, and I decided to let them stay there all winter, 

 and take their chances. But a week or ,so after New Years 

 the weather became .so bitterly cold that I chang-ed my 

 mind, and they were brought home and put into a cellar. 

 Only one of tliese colonies died that winter or spring, and 

 they had been exposed in single-walled hives to nearly or 

 quite 30 degrees below zero, and without a flig^ht since some 

 time in the latter part of November. 



The best authorities tell us it is best to put bees in, if 

 they are wintered in-doors, before severe cold weather oc- 

 curs, and this is undoubtedly the very best of advice : still, 

 as I have shown, they will sometimes, at least, winter well 

 under adverse conditions. 



Before closing, I will relate an instance of bees endur- 

 ing severe cold after they were put out in the spring in poor 

 condition. 



The previous fall I put in about 100 colonies with stores 

 largely composed of hone3--dew. About the first of January 

 most of these colonies were badly affected with diarrhea, or 

 dysentery, known by the hives being badly spotted. 

 Towards the latter part of February there was a warm spell. 



