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THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



and easy to manipulate, which makes 

 it a good hive for farmers and those 

 who are not accustomed to handling 

 frame hives, hence it will serve a very 

 useful purpose in the way of introduc- 

 ing intelligent bee-culture. Mr. 

 Barnes was associated with his son, a 

 wounded and disabled officer of Indi- 

 ana volunteers, during the war. I 

 afterwards visited them at Jackson- 

 ville, 111., and was both pleased and 

 instructed, though I openly objected 

 to the hive. Mr. II. W. Hitt, of Mer- 

 ritt. 111., bought the righttomake and 

 vend it in tliis (Scott) county, and 

 though I see nothiug about it to pat- 

 ent, yet Mr. Hitt has done well in using 

 it himself this year, and many to 

 whom he has sold are much pleased 

 after trial. I have no interest in the 

 matter except a desire to see fair play. 

 As I have said, I do n'ot want the hive 

 for my own use, but believe it will do 

 good by leading people to use frames, 

 and hence better hives. With a mix- 

 ture of Syrian blood iu my queens, I 

 shall be forced to adopt a larger hive 

 than any I have now, though one. No. 

 19, takes 2.5 frames, 10x12 inches, and 

 forty-two 2-lb. sections. Bees are 

 booming. 

 Murrayville, 111., Aug. 30, 1882. 





the one picked up ; she failed to meet 

 a drone and through injury or other 

 cause has been unable to go out again, 

 and has become a drone-laying queen, 

 while the bees, realizing the situation, 

 have attempted to rear a successor 

 for her from the best resources they 

 had— drone larvfe. You had better 

 give them two or three frames of 

 capped worker brood and one with 

 eggs or newly hatched worker larvse, 

 to give an opportunity to rear a good 

 queen. Should the weather prove 

 favorable, and she become mated, you 

 will yet save that colony. It is the 

 only chance, unless you introduce a 

 good, prolitic queen.— Ed.] 



Drone Brood.— I commenced this 

 spring with one colony of black bees, 

 in a box-hive ; transferred them to a 

 Simplicity hive on the 24th of May ; 

 divided them on the 10th of July, 

 giving the new colony one frame of 

 larvfe from 2 to 3 days old ; had 6 

 queen-cells started next day ; 3 queens 

 were hatched on the 24th of July and 

 upon examining the hive I could only 

 find one queen, the others I presume, 

 must have been destroyed, as well as 

 the remaining cells. On the 28th of 

 July I found my new queen on the 

 ground in front of the hive, with a 

 quantity of bees around her. I picked 

 her up and put her in the hive. The 

 next day was very chilly and damp. 

 Since then, for about 2 or 3 weeks, we 

 had very unfavorable weather. Now, 

 this new colony has about half a 

 frame of capped brood in worker cells 

 with the caps raised considerably 

 higlier than in the old liive ; 5 cells, 

 which to me, from their shape, look 

 like queen-cells, as well as cells with 

 2 to 4 eggs in each. Will you please 

 let me know, through the Weekly Bee 

 Journal, the cause of the trouble, 

 and how I can remedy it. 



Holland Macdonald. 



Montreal, Can., Sept. 1, 1882. 



[The first queen hatched destroyed 

 the others and the remaining cells; or 

 it was done at her instigation. The 

 brood capped over is drone larvae, and 

 the cells which have the appearance 

 of being queen-cells are undoubtedly 

 filled with drone larvae. The queen, 

 *if there is one in the hive, is probably 



New Courage Added.— The cloud 

 with the silver lining has at last hove 

 in sight, bringing with it an atmos- 

 phere freighted with the scent of 

 fragrant autumn flowers. The here- 

 tofore despairing hopes of many bee- 

 keepers in this part of the country 

 have changed to those of rejoicing ; 

 the unfolding of each additional 

 species of flowers, seems to add new 

 courage to many whose hopes seemed 

 blasted but a few weeks ago. For the 

 past few days the honey flow has been 

 very great ; many colonies that were 

 scarce in stores but a short time ago 

 are now full in both brood and sur- 

 plus departments ; new boxes are fre- 

 quently added, which are filled in a 

 short time. A fair crop is now almost 

 ready to harvest ; if this cloud with sil- 

 ver lining should be so broad as to be 

 a month in passing over, what would 

 we poor fellows do V Bees swarming 

 and honey running to waste, for want 

 of storage ! The weather is fine, bees 

 are booming, honey rising, glucose on 

 the decline, fixtures in good demand ; 

 let the good work continue. 



V. II. Ormsby. 



Pierpont, O., Sept. 4, 1882. 



Harvest abor.t Ended.— Our harvest 

 is about ended for this year. We 

 have had a fine crop considering what 

 our bees had to contend with ; the 

 basswood and plum blossoms failing; 

 white clover was rich with honey, and 

 we have had several honey-dews, one 

 occurring yesterday. The bees work 

 lively on the leaves while the dew is 

 on tliem. Bee men in this county are 

 scarce. A good many lost heavily, 

 and concluding it did not pay, quit the 

 business. C. Follett. 



Osage, Iowa, Sept. 4, 1882. 



Late Swarm. — I send you a couple 

 of weeds for name ; they grow plenti- 

 ful in low places, and my oees are on 

 them a good deal. Please let me 

 know what they get from them. I 

 had a large swarm of Italians to-day. 

 It is so late I am afraid they will be 

 too weak to winter. I gave them 4 

 frames of honey, which left .5 empty 

 frames with no foundation. 2. l)id 

 I do wrong in giving them full frames? 

 3. Give me the best plan to do with 

 themV They are gathering honey 

 fast now ; the buckwheat will be out 

 of bloom in a day or two. It has been 

 a poor year in tliis section for bees. I 

 had 9 colonies in the spring and have 

 only had 4 swarms. I have only one 

 colony that is working in the top 

 boxes, and they all came out strong in 

 the spring. 4. Is it a common occur- 

 rence for bees to swarm before the 

 young queen is out of the cell ? I ex- 

 amined the parent colony after it 

 swarmed, and found the queen-cell 

 capped. 5. Do you think the young 

 oueen will meet a drone this fall ? 

 There is only one drone flying, but 

 there are some drones just hatching 

 iu the parent colony. Geo. Kemp. 



Navan, Ont., Aug. 31, 1882. 



[1. The yellow flower is a solidago, 

 of which the goldedrods are also 

 species. The bunch of pink flowers 

 are P. hydro-piper, for which there 

 are almost a score of common names, 

 among which are smartweed, hearts- 

 ease, blackheart, etc. Both are good 

 honey plants and late bloomers. 



2. You done right. 



3. With plenty of bloom of which 

 you sent specimens, and your empty 

 frames full of foundation, we think you 

 will have no trouble in wintering, 

 especially with the four frames of 

 honey you gave them. 



4. Yes ; they do so as a rule- per- 

 haps always. 



5. Yes ; if the weather is favorable. 

 Bees never swarm naturally, under 

 favorable circumstances, without 

 making ample provision for a per- 

 petuation of the parent colony, hence 

 they are as scrupulous to provide 

 forthcoming drones as queens. — Ed.] 



Ready for the Fair.— Our bees are 

 booming here now. I took from one 

 colony, last Saturday, 77 poutuis of 

 comb honey, and had before taken 40 

 pounds from the same colony. The 

 honey was in sections with foundation. 

 I have extracted from another colony 

 11(5 pounds, and taken 10 one-pound 

 sections. Both of the above colonies 

 were divided in June. I have just 

 finished extracting, and am ready for 

 the fair. J. L. Strong. 



Clarinda, Iowa, Sept. 5, 1882. 



Honey from Celandine.— Bees are 



booming now and I have just been to 

 ascertain what source they are gather- 

 ing from. A large tract of low land 

 covered with trees and bushes, near 

 here, was burned over at the time of 

 the drouth last fall, and this season is 

 covered with celandine in full bloom, 

 which is just swarming with bees to 

 the exclusion of nearly everything 

 else. I have extracted .527 lbs. from . 

 37 colonies— all that they gathered 

 from clover and basswood, and in- 

 creased from 44 to 66, with a good 

 prospect of getting enough for win- 

 ter from celandine. Nearly all of 

 the bees have their backs covered 

 with white pollen, which adheres to 

 them in crawling into the peculiar 

 shaped flower. Have any of the 



