OQS 



fHE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



manufacture. The Vandervort, wliile 

 not equal to the Given, always showed 

 a superiority over the Dunhara. Now, 

 there are quite a luunber of Vander- 

 vort mills in use, antlsome in the hands 

 of those who do or have owned L)un- 

 ham mills, and 1 aslc for a report from 

 some of these parties who speak more 

 from experience tlian prejudice. I 

 have many one pound sections of honey 

 marked "G," "V," and "D," and we 

 are eating them on our own table, as 

 we need them, and tlie G's are the 

 only combs that you cannot detect 

 that foundation was used in. 



Mr. Caldwell closes by assuming that 

 there is no better machine than the 

 Dunham, because he says he "ventures 

 the assertion that where 1 pound of 

 Given is made and sold, 100 lbs. of 

 Dunham is disposed of in like manner.' 

 I suppose he really thinks that ex- 

 travagant statement is true. Stiould 

 I allow my mind to reason down to 

 my own little experience, I would 

 think the same of the Given vs. the 

 Dunham, because my trade is now all 

 Given, the demand for Dunliam and 

 Vandervort running down so light 1 

 stopped trying to make these sorts 

 at all. 



But let us examine this specimen 

 argument. Will Mr. Caldwell be so 

 kind as to let us know how many 

 pounds of foundation we sliall have to 

 sell from tlje Given mill next season 

 to make that the best mill, and its 

 work superior V I never knew before 

 that you could make and sell enougli 

 foundation of any sort to make it the 

 best foundation. J5y this reasoning 

 the Root foundation excels the Given 

 and V^andervcu't, if not all otiier sorts, 

 Dunhaui included. There certainly 

 was a time, only a few seasons ago, 

 when tlie Root was the best mill, and 

 its product the best foundation iu the 

 world, measured by this standard. 

 This standard, given by Mr. Caldwell, 

 is a great boon to apiarists; all we 

 need to do now, to place all the styles 

 of foundation in their proper class of 

 worst, bad, good, better, best, is to 

 take the foundation census. 



Doviagiac, Mich., Aug. 17, 1882. 



P. S.— At the "eleventh liour" Mr. 

 Caldwell is saved ; he says : "If there 

 is a better machine made, I want it,"' 

 and I say, Mr. Caldwell there is, and I 

 look forward to the near day when 

 you will know it as well as I do. 



For the American Bee JourDal. 



No "Gap" Here in Honey Flow. 



C. W. MCKOWN. 



Some speak of a " gap " in the 

 honey season. There has been no gap 

 here this season since wliite clover 

 first blossouied. It was 8 or 10 days 

 later blossoming than usual, but the 

 quantity was simply immense, and 

 plenty of rain has kept it booming till 

 the present time. The linden flow 

 was extra good (though several days 

 later than usual), and blossomed very 

 unevenly; wliile tlie blossoms were 

 dying on one tree, they were just be- 

 ginning to open on the next. Thus 

 it continued much longer than com- 



mon. While it was at its best, the 

 bees deserted tlie white clover to a 

 great extent, but returned to it when 

 the linden failed. There are about 

 forty acres of buckwheat near my 

 apiary, sowil at intervals for live 

 weeks. The Hrst sown is now white 

 with bloom, while the last is only 

 cleverly up. Very many bees are at 

 work on it, while some still cling to 

 the white clover, and the sweet clover 

 is by no means neglected. 



I have not weighed the surplus from 

 but one hive this season. Up to Aug. 

 7tli it had yielded 203i lbs. of extracted 

 honey. This, mark you, is from a 

 single colony, excluding the product 

 of two swarms it sent out. 



My bees are still swarming ; had 

 three swarms to-day. Such a long, 

 steady honey tlow has caused the 

 queens to lay iiiunensely, producing 

 bushels and bushels of bees. I have 

 put a great many swarms in with 

 other colonies, which is not advisable, 

 as in many cases I have found them 

 queenless soon after uniting. I think 

 No. 1 bees kill No. 2 queen, and No. 2 

 bees kill No. 1 queen. When swarms 

 cluster together, I invariably hive 

 them together. Have liadas niany as 

 four big swarms together in this way, 

 and gave them room by tiering up, 

 and it is wonderful liow quickly they 

 will gather 100 lbs. of honey. Wheii 

 they have clustered together at least 

 one queen is safe. 



I began the season with 60 and have 

 more than doubled notwithstanding 

 all the uniting, doubling up and piling 

 together I have done. Think I shall 

 have a big report to make when the 

 season closes. 



Gilson, 111., Aug. 17, 1882. 



For tbe American Bee Journal. 



Queen Shipping Cages. 



W. Z. HUTCHINSON. 



To have queens arrive in good con- 

 dition is very desirable to both ship- 

 per and receiver. To open a queen 

 cage upon its arrival, and tiiid the 

 queen dead, is often a greater disap- 

 pointment and loss to the purchaser 

 than the sending of another queen is 

 to the breeder. As Mr. Foppleton re- 

 marks, on page 411, it is a great ad- 

 vantage to know that a certain num- 

 ber of queens are sure to arrive in 

 good condition within one or two days 

 of a given lime ; and, to lielp bring 

 about such a happy state of ;iffairs, in 

 general, please allow me to describe 

 the cage and feed that I have been 

 using ilie past year. 



The cage is the old-fashioned 

 wooden cage, made by sawing up t 

 lumber into strips IJ inches wide, 

 boring H inch holes, Si inches apart 

 from centre to centre, then boring two 

 I holes close by the side of each inch 

 and a half hole. Of course the holes 

 are bored nearly through the strips of 

 wood. With a J inch round iron a 

 hole is punched through the thin i)ar- 

 tition that divides the large hole from 

 the two small ones, and it is through 

 these i inch Ifoles that the bees gain 

 access to the feed with which the i 

 holes are tilled. After a strip of wood 



has been made up into cages, it is cut 

 np into pieces of different lengths ; 

 some pieces containing only one cage, 

 others two, while the longest pieces 

 contain three cages. After reaching 

 their destination, the cages are easily 

 separated with a saw. 



But it is to the kind of feed with 

 which the cages are provisioned that 

 I attribute my wonderful success in 

 sending queens during the last year ; 

 the loss being only one queen out of 

 400. The queens have been sent to 

 nearly every State and Territory in 

 the Union, including California, Utah, 

 Texas, Georgia and Maine; also to 

 Canada. This feed in simply granu- 

 lated sugar moistened with honey to 

 the consistency of a stiff paste. I wet 

 the sugar wiili honey pretty thor- 

 oughly, then allow it to stand a day or 

 two, when the sugar will settle to the 

 bottom (it does not dissolve), the 

 honey can then be scraped from the 

 top, and the sugar will be of the 

 proper consistency for putting into 

 the cages. Mr. I. It. Good, of Nap- 

 panee, Ind., who is the discoverer of 

 this feed, prepares it by putting in 

 plenty of li5ney, and, after allowing it 

 to stand a few days, pours it into a 

 dish or box having a wire cloth bot- 

 tom, which allows the excess of honey 

 to drain out. ]\Ir. Good has shipped 

 hundreds of queens this season, send- 

 ing them all over the country, and has 

 lost only two. He says that this kind 

 of feed is better than anything else 

 when sending bees by the "pound. 



During the warm weather I send 

 about ten bees with a queen ; but, as 

 the weather gets cooler, it is, I think, 

 better to use a larger cage, and put in 

 more bees and more feed. I do not 

 put in old bees with jagged wings, 

 neither those that have just hatched, 

 but bees that are, as nearly as I can 

 determine, about a week old. 



In order that you may see exactly 

 how the cage is made, and then, per- 

 haps, be enabled to give your readers 

 a better description of it than I have 

 done, and also that you may see the- 

 condition in which its bees and queen 

 arrive, 1 will send you a cage contain- 

 ing an untested queen and eight or 

 ten bees. 



Rogersville, Mich., Aug. 15, 1882. 



[The cage and bees have been re- 

 ceived. We cannot improve upon 

 Mr. Hutchinson's description of the 

 cage. There were 10 bees accompany- 

 ing the queen, and all were as bright 

 and lively in the cage, four days after 

 their arrival, as they were when put 

 in. With this cage and description of 

 feed, we are convinced a queen with 

 her retinue will endure a fortnight's 

 journey with [lerfect safety. We have 

 seen many of Mr. Good's shipments 

 this season, and in no instance was 

 there even a dead bee in the cage. A 

 great mistake is, frequently made in 

 giving the queen and bees too much 

 ;i.ir in shipping long distances, or for 

 continued confinement, as they quite 

 easily chill, and changes in climate, or 



