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THE AMERICAISI BEE JOURNAL. 



quenting tliem, and that the colors of 

 the petals may serve to attract insects 

 by way of advertisement, as colored 

 bills attract the eyes of busy men. 

 This view of the use of color and odor 

 in flowers may seem to smack too 

 much of trade and commerce, never- 

 theless it is tlie view to which science 

 now gives undivided support. We 

 have been so long accustomed to look 

 on tlie beauty of tlie floral world as if 

 it were exclusively for man's gratifica- 

 tion, that it is difficult for us to believe 

 that the delicately perfumed and 

 showy petals.of the rose or lily should 

 be primarily intended for the benefit 

 of tlie plant possessing them. But it 

 must be remembered that each organ- 

 ism lives for itself, has its own laws, 

 and does not possess any organ wliich 

 is exclusively for the advantage of 

 another. 



Curious Observations of an Early 

 Writer.— We lind the following in 

 Capt. "Wudrington's "Spain and the 

 Spaniards" in 1843. We presume the 

 writer referred to the " Keever " hive, 

 in use about that time : 



Bees abound in this district and 

 increase to such an extent that they 

 return an enormous profit to those who 

 take tlie trouble to care for or look 

 after them. The common hive is the 

 hollow stem of tlie cork tree which is 

 cut into suitable lengths, and is per- 

 haps the best material in the world 

 for the purpose ; next to it, is the com- 

 mon straw hive used in England ; both 

 these substances have the same valu- 

 able qualities of being non-conductors 

 of heat and cold. 



Tliey never had heard of such a thing, 

 mucli less practice it, as killing bees, 

 and were surprised when I mentioned 

 sucti a custom. 



I ascertained a very curious fact, in 

 their economy, tliat is well worth at- 

 tention. The Canon Cepres, so well 

 known in the first Cortes, being shut 

 up in the Convent of the Cartna at Se- 

 ville, by order of King Ferdinand, by 

 way of passing the time, applied him- 

 self to study the economy of bees, 

 which he had followed up at Cozalla, 

 and was so successful in his manage- 

 ment that ill a very short time he liad 

 a thousand colonies. When the civil 

 war commenced circumstances caused 

 their being neglected and dispersed, 

 and some colonies, finding no holes or 

 cavities to suit them, attached tliem- 

 selves to a beam in an outhouse, where 

 they made their combs in a similar 

 manner to thatby which the tree wasp 

 suspend their curious fabric from the 

 branches. 



They were so well satisfied with this 

 novel situation that tiiey never left it, 

 nor swarmed, but kept adding succes- 

 sive combs until tliey nearly reached 

 the ground, and hung from" tlie point 

 of suspension likea hugelivingstalac- 

 tite. The ownernever disturbed them, 

 but had the lower combs cut off, as 

 they were wanted, and the colony re- 

 mained for a considerable period witli- 

 out their showing the least disposition 

 to change it. 



Tliis is certainly rather important 

 information for the managers of apia- 



ries, iind may serve to confirm the 

 statements lately published on the 

 practicability of inducing the bee to 

 work downward. 



The Labor of Obtaiuing Correct Sta- 

 tistics. — The editor of the Bee-Keepers^ 

 MagaziM remarks as follows on this 

 subject : 



We realized the necessity for accu- 

 rate statistics when writing the article 

 on bee-keeping for Appleton's Ency- 

 clopedia, and later in the preparation 

 of an article on the same subject for 

 one of the late supplemental volumes 

 of tlie Enqicktpedin Britunnka. We 

 spent more time and hard labor in col- 

 lecting, culling and averaging in order 

 to fairly approximate the true amount 

 of the honey and beeswax production 

 of the United States, both collectively 

 and in geographical groups, than was 

 required for any other three questions 

 ill the discussion of the whole subject. 



We found tliat no reliance whatever 

 could be placed on this class of statis- 

 itcs emanating from the Department 

 at Washington, and this on the testi- 

 mony of Gen. LeDuc, at one time 

 Commissioner of Agriculture. We 

 found that the annual amount of 

 beeswax exported presupposed the 

 collection of more than a hundred 

 million pounds of honey to produce it. 

 We made various calculations from 

 many different standpoints, and, as a 

 result, we concluded that from 150 to 

 1200,000,000 pounds of honey could not 

 vary far from the actual production. 

 Such information as has been fur- 

 nished by the Department hitherto, 

 has only served to belittle the profes- 

 sion, hence the urgent necessity of 

 some plan which sliall give accurately 

 the facts, and so enable beginners to 

 enter on tlie business understand- 

 ingly- 



mend boxes to be turned over them so 

 as to keep robber bees out. 



Feeding Bees.— A writer in the Ger- 

 mantown Telegraph gives his method 

 of feeding bees in winter, as follows : 



In the first place let me say that I 

 would prepai-e the feed in the shape of 

 a syrup, thus : Take of pure, clean 

 water two pounds to four pounds of 

 sugar ; A coffee or extra C is best. 

 Bring the water to a boiling heat and 

 then add the sugar ; stir well until it 

 again boils and skim off all impurities; 

 then let it cool and fill up glass tumb- 

 lers and tie cotton cloth over each, and 

 turn them upside down over holes in 

 the top of the hives, if of the old-fash- 

 ioned box or gum log, and you will 

 have the satisfaction of seeing the 

 tumblers soon emptied and stored in 

 the brood combs. If you are using a 

 good movable frame hive you can feed 

 your syrup in the top of it in the fol- 

 lowing way : Take some old bits of 

 combs and lay ill thesurplus chambers, 

 and pour the syrup over them, and the 

 bees will take it all down. Feed as 

 fast as they empty the glasses or 

 combs referred to. We should always 

 feed all weak stocks late of an even- 

 ing, wliich will prevent robbing in a 

 treat degree. If you use the glass 

 umblers to feed from, would recom- 



Follow Some Well-Digested Plan. — 



The Indiana Farmer makes the fol- 

 lowing very sensible observations on 

 the above subject : 



Work with the bees, for the year 

 1882 is now done. Are we all satisfied 

 with the result taking everything into 

 consideration ? Have we learned by 

 mistakes made? Will we profit by 

 them in the future V Will we learn 

 wisdom by the mistakes of others, or 

 must we continue going over the same 

 ground to pay th^ penalty of experi- 

 ence V These questions, in the ab- 

 stract, were called to mind by a letter 

 from a correspondent now before us. 

 Early last season he wrote us, asking 

 some general questions of guidance 

 for the season's work, stating at the 

 time that he had some knowledge of 

 the business, but knew that we were 

 successful and wanted simply a gen- 

 eral outline of work. He had then 10 

 colonies. We gave the required infor- 

 mation as best we could, warning him 

 of pitfalls in the line of some experi- 

 mental suggestions which he contem- 

 plated. 



Our general directions were to build 

 up the colonies as fast as possible, 

 strengthening the weaker ones from 

 the strong when it could be done 

 without injury to the latter, allowing 

 each colony to swarm once ; putting 

 on and removing sections, removing 

 queen-cells to prevent afterswarms, 

 natural increase, building up nuclei, 

 etc. 



Now he says : " I wish I could in 

 some manner convince our many bee- 

 k6eping friends, especially beginners, 

 of the folly of trying to follow the 

 many theories advanced by Tom, 

 Dick and Harry, as to bee-keeping. I 

 am a little ashamed to confess my 

 failures, but in the hope it may be of 

 benefit to some one, I will make a par- 

 tial confession. I was not entirely 

 satisfied with the directions you gave 

 me. I concluded to work 4 colonies 

 with your plan, the other 6 according 

 to my own notions, with the hope that 

 I would make a better showing in the 

 fall and be able to tell you so. The 4 

 colonies each sw^armed once, and gave 

 me 30 pounds each of nice section 

 honey, with from 10 to 20 each in un- 

 finished sections, each first swarm 

 filled their hives with comb and made 

 some 60 pounds of honey altogether. 

 Two of them swarmed again in 

 August, I gave these six frames each, 

 taken from the other colonies. So I 

 have from the 4, 10 colonies in good 

 condition, and about 210 pounds of 

 honey. 



My letter is already much too long 

 to tell you of the mistakes I made with 

 the other 6 colonies. Suffice it to say. 

 I shall in the future work all my colo- 

 nies on a plan similar to the one you 

 gHve me and shall experiment with 

 one or two selected for that purpose 

 only. My earnest advice to all begin- 

 ners isto follow some well known plan 

 of work until they become well enough 

 versed in the business to have one of 

 their own." 



