THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



219 



ister " properly kept, it would be im- 

 possible tor these mistakes to occur. 

 We can liardly imagine liow to account 

 for the failure of the queen sent you 

 in July, if she had been bred and tested 

 by the person from wtiom you ob- 

 tained her.— Ed.] 



Combs Destroyed by Cloths.— Bees 



are bringing in pollen imd some lioney, 

 although tliey are sitting on fences, 

 trestles and anything convenient, on 

 account of the Hoods which have 

 swept througli liere. My bees brought 

 in pollen in December, and they have 

 not quit brood-rearing during the 

 winter. I have failed to keep my ex- 

 tra combs over winter on account of 

 moths. Will some one give me their 

 plan of preserving them V I hung 

 mine in a tight room, and burnt sul- 

 phur at the rate of one pound in two 

 weeks, and yet they ruined tliem. 



W. G. McLlNDON. 

 Lake Village, Ark., March 28, 1S82. 



[You did not use sulpliur enougli. 

 They should be fumigated with it 

 several times, at intervals of about 

 10 days, and using at least a pound of 

 tlie sulphur at each operation. If you 

 have interchangeable second stories, a 

 good phm would be to fill a hive with 

 combs, then set on a second story with 

 no bottom, fill that with combs, then 

 put on a third, and so on till all tlie 

 combs are hung in bottomless hives 

 over each other ; now put on an empty 

 second story, place in this an iron pot 

 with some live coals in it, then plenty 

 of sulphur, and cover the hive ; open 

 the entrance of the lower hive to af- 

 ford a draft. Sulphur fumes being 

 heavier than air, tliey will slowly de- 

 scend, and destroy all insect life. The 

 operation will need to be repeated 

 about three times, to kill the larvie 

 which may hatch after the first and 

 second operations. The trouble with 

 fumigating with sulphur ordinarily is 

 that, unless the room is very close, 

 the combs get very little smoke, as 

 they are usually hung up, and the 

 fumes do not ascend, but escape from 

 the lower sides of the building. — Hd.] 



Houey from Com.— I can tell Mr. 

 Maliinthat bees do gather lioney from 

 earn tassels, and if he will call at my 

 house he can have some very nice 

 corn honey to eat, which my bees 



f:athered late last fall from a patch of 

 odder-corn that I sovv'ed just before 

 ^harvest. The weather set in dry, and 

 it made very little growtli till in 

 ■September, when the rain came and 

 the corn started growing. It soon 

 tasseled out and blossomed profusely, 

 and as there was no frost till late in 

 the fall, my bees had a rich liarvest. 

 The way tliey filled up their section 

 boxes wasa joy tobeliold ; tliey worked 

 on that corn as long as there was a 

 green tassel left. Prooably that corre- 



spondent ill Gleamnc/f;, referred to liy 

 Mr. !Mahiti, is a closer observer tlian 

 he (Mr. Mahiii) is aware of ; but that 

 bees gather houey from corn tassels is 

 no new feature to nie. Wliat say 

 other bee-keepersV Now, I want to 

 ask a question— do bees ever refuse to 

 work on melilot clover V I liad a 

 patch last summer, tlie seed of which 

 I obtained from Chicago, but the bees 

 paid no attention to it. I inclose a 

 sample of the seed, is it genuine. 

 West Liberty, O. L. Z. Lantz. 



[The seed you send is genuine. AVe 

 never but once before heard of bees 

 refusing to work on sweet clover, and 

 in that instance there were but few 

 stalks of it within reach. There is, 

 however, a variety of sweet clover 

 whicli produces yellow blossoms, on 

 which we do not believe the bees will 

 work to any extent ; but the white 

 blossomed [vielilotus alba) will, if 

 growing to any extent, always be 

 covered with bees.— Ed.) 



Feediiigr Maple Sugar.— I am winter- 

 ing my bees in a cellar, and am feed- 

 ing some of them with maple sugar, 

 by laying it on the frames. Is it good 

 feed for them V C. M. Slack. 



Eldred, Fa. 



[A mild winter, such as this has 

 been, it may do ; iiut we would be 

 fearful of the consequences, unless 

 they were out-of-doors and could fly 

 frequently.— Ed.] 



Color, Pleasui-e and Profit.— I ap- 

 prehend the color most eagerly sought 

 after, by the m;ijority of apiarists, is 

 the color of the pocket, and those 

 which give the most universal satis- 

 faction are the greenback color or gold 

 metal hue. It matters not to the 

 great mass of bee-keepers whetherthe 

 contents of the hive are gathered by 

 brown, black, yellow, or leather- 

 colored bees, provided these products 

 svv'ell tlie aggregate amount of profits 

 each year, and return to their owner 

 satisfactory remuneration for the 

 labor bestowed upon them. The profits 

 are what 91) out of 100 keep bees for. 

 Talk of keeping bees for pleasure, 

 without profit, if you can show me 

 such ail apiarist, I must candidly con- 

 fess that I have seen a curiosity of 

 the genus homo. If bending over 

 hives, examining nuclei, extracting 

 honey, cutting out and inserting queen 

 cells, rendering beeswax, caging and 

 shipjiing queens, and writing a score 

 of letters daily is a pleasure to while 

 away the leisure moments from other 

 pursuits, I must cheerfully confess 

 that I will be somewhat careful about 

 calling for pleasure too often when 

 traveling. What the mass of bee- 

 keepers want is plain, practical knowl- 

 edge in the mode of keeping bees. 

 What cares the average bee-keeper 

 for the fine hair-splitting points re- 

 garding the col<ir of the bee ; they 

 would rather have one inch of Mr. 

 Doolittle's plain, practical experience 

 conveyed to paper in his instructive 



manner, than reams of fine points and 

 theoretical reasonings. I think all of 

 even a limited experience, are ready 

 to admit that, by judicious selection 

 from colonies possessing the most de- 

 sirable qualities, we can breed our 

 bees up to a high standard of profit. 

 Fredonia,N. Y. U.E.Dodge. 



Bokhara or Sweet Clover.- 1 would 



like to know if Bokhara clover and 

 sweet clover are one and the same 

 thing? 2. How much is sown to the 

 acre. 3. What istlie cost per lb. V My 

 bees are in tlie cellar and doing well. 

 Have not lost any yet, nor do I ex- 

 pect to. I am beginning; but will re- 

 port my progress next fall, all being 



well. A. SUBSCIUBER. 



Columbus, Ont. 



[1. We believe Bokhara or sweet 

 clover [melilotus alba) to be the same ; 

 at least we fail to observe any differ- 

 ence, and we have frequently seen 

 them growing together. The bloom, 

 too, is apparently the same. 



2. Five or six pounds. If in drills, 

 a little less. 



3. The retail price in Chicago has 

 been 30 and 50 cents per lb. The for- 

 mer for domestic, and the latter tor 

 imported seed. — Ed.] 



Grease In Foundation. — In manu- 

 facturing foundation comb, is grease 

 of any kind extensively used V and if 

 so, isit sometimes, or very frequently, 

 of a filthy nature, or that taken from 

 diseased animals ? Quite recently I 

 saw it asserted in a very influential 

 paper, that such is the ease. 'If it 

 savors of the oleomargarine fraud, I 

 want to know it, for above everything 

 else, let my "sweetness" be pure. 

 As your valuable Journal occupies 

 the'front rank in publications of the 

 kind, will you kindly give your views, 

 and the facts as far as you are able, 

 to the public, through its columns, as 

 there are doubtless a great many 

 others, like myself, who would be glad 

 to hear from you on tlie matter. Bees 

 are doing well, and, as a general 

 thing, no thanks to their keepers, for 

 there is very little intelligent care 

 given them in this countrv. 



Salado, Tex. \V. P. Hancock. 



[It is not true that grease is used in 

 the manufacture of foundation. It is 

 possible that some inexperienced per- 

 sons may have tried greasing the rolls, 

 to release the sheets from them, but 

 even such would soon be obliged to 

 abandon the practice, as their bees 

 would utterly refuse to work it out, 

 and customers would be apt to return 

 it to the manufacturer because of its 

 worthlessness. The freshest, purest 

 and brightest wax in the foundation, 

 makes it most acceptable to the bees, 

 and, consequently, most profitable to 

 the bee-keeper. Even soap-suds. with 

 which to wash the rolls, is very ob- 

 jectionable.— Ed.] 



