THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



411 



7. In u poor season, when bees do 

 not iri»tl>ev enough honey for winter, I 

 must feed my colonies, and my neigli- 

 bor must do the same thing or kill his 

 bees ; and my yard is overstocked if I 

 have only one colony. 



S. Therefore, my neighbor cannot 

 lower my average in honey, but the 

 season can. 



9. The expression, " bees can graze 

 a field,"" is wrong; for bees have no 

 teeth like a sheep or cow, and cannot 

 eat the whole plant at once, but they 

 will only sip the sweets out of the 

 blossoms and other parts of the plants; 

 while those plants grazed ort by ani- 

 mals, require several days, and per- 

 haps weeks, to give another nourish- 

 ment. Therefore, we can overstock a 

 a clover held with sheep or cows, but 

 not with liees. 



Fulda, Ind. 



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Bees are Busy. 



The colonies which were wintered 

 in a dry and well ventilated cellar, in 

 this locality, came out strong in bees 

 in the spring. I have 100 colonies, 

 and liad the first swarm of this season 

 on May i'7. There is plenty of white 

 clover, and the bees are busy. 



David Rciwe. 



Lime Ridge. Wis., June l(i, 1SS4. 



Increased Experience. 



I wintered 110 colonies on the sum- 

 mer stands without loss. In the 

 spring I found 2 of which were weak, 

 and I doubled them up. I lost one 

 by rolibing. Bees are doing well, and 

 have stored some very nice section 

 honey. Financially, I am ahead on 

 last season's crop, and also have ad- 

 ded some experience. 



Jas. McConnell. 



Clav Village, Ky., June 12, 1SS4. 



Use of Comb Foundation. 



When I wrote to the woman spoken 

 of in my last article, I told her not to 

 be ashamed of her ignorance, but to 

 live up to all the light slie had, and 

 r more would come to her. I told her 

 that comb foundation is made of bees- 

 wax ; that a tew enthusiasts thought 

 they could make it of paralline, but it 

 all melted down in a heap, and they 

 did not try it again ; also, that it is 

 made on a" little machine something 

 like a clothes wringer ; and that it is 

 good to use in bee-hives for the fol- 

 lowing reasons : ]■. It saves wax, as 

 bees are said to consume from 16 to 20 

 pounds of honey in making a pound 

 of comb. If the comb foundation is 

 furnished them ready for use, it saves 

 them a lot of honey and a great deal 

 of time. 2. It enables one to have all 

 worker-comb in the hive. 8. It com- 

 pels the bees to build straight combs. 

 I told her that I thought the Italians 

 are the best race of l)ees out ; and 

 that the only moth-trap in the world. 



is a strong colony, and that they 

 would attend to the moths. I in- 

 formed her that the honey-board was 

 formerly used directly over the brood- 

 nest ; that it is an "article made of 

 wood ; and that it is now superseded 

 by a piece of Indian-head muslin the 

 size of the hive, and laid on next to 

 the bees. I told her that the very 

 first thing for her to do is to get mov- 

 able-frame hives and put her bees into 

 them, so that she could see what they 

 were doing at all times, 



Mah.vla B. Ciiaddock. 

 Vermont, 111. 



North, East, "West and South. 



The Bee Journal does its adver- 

 tising wonderfully well. It brought 

 to me responses from Canada to the 

 Gulf of Mexico, and from the Alle- 

 ghanies to the Rocky Mountains. 



Wji. M. Rogeus. 



Shelbyville, Ky., June 12, 1884. 



Swarm Separators. 



In making a swarm separator, as 

 described by Mr. Secor, on page 380, 

 do the division-boards extend to the 

 bottom-board, and as near to the top- 

 board as the frames; viz: % of an 

 inch V If not, how will bees sepa- 

 rate if the separator fills the hive flush 

 on all sides V I wintered my bees in a 

 cellar, and they all were strong quite 

 early this spring. Fruit bloom is 

 abuiidaut. I took 7.5 pounds of honey 

 from 3 colonies— 2.J pounds each— last 

 week. As yet, I have had no swarms, 

 and I do not want any before June 20. 

 There are about 120 colonies within a 

 radius of a mile here. Will we soon 

 be overstocked ":' T. F. Kinsel. 



Shiloh, O., June 16, 1S84. 



[Will Mr. Secor please reply to the 

 above V There is not much danger of 

 overstocking the radius of a mile with 

 120 colonies.— Ed. 1 



Heavy Bloom. 



We are having a fine honey flow, 

 and have had a iieavy bloom of locust 

 and tulip. Now we have white clover 

 in abundance. On yesterday morn- 

 ing the leaves of the grape vines, 

 chestnut and oak trees was fairly 

 glistening with lioney-dew. 



AV. E. Statheiis, M. D. 



Middlebourne,W. Va., June 11, 1884. 



What do we Know ? 



I have been studying bee-lore for 1-") 

 years. I have formed theories, plan- 

 ned hives, frames and sections, and 

 have built for my own use a good cir- 

 cular saw. I have made my own 

 hives, etc., etc.. and yet I find' that I 

 am absolutely an old-fashioned know- 

 nothing. I have read Mr. Root's and 

 Prof. Cook's bee-liooks, and the Bee 

 Journal ; and I find that all of these 

 authorities are at sword's points, and 

 that all the correspondents of the 

 bee-papers are as opposite in their 

 opinions and practices as it is possi- 

 ble to be. I have looked in vain for 

 some one person whom I could follow 

 with a certainty of success, and iis 



freely as 1 would a teaclier of any of 

 the common branches of human 

 knowledge. I have learned one thiiig 

 of which 1 am certain ; i. e., that bees 

 will sting ; though I do not think I 

 have learned that as thoroughly 

 as some others have. I wish that 

 some one would brimstone all these 

 quarrelsome writers, editors, novices, 

 etc., etc., and let the " fittest survive" 

 to teach the " young idea how to 

 shoot." Stop quarreling, write sense, 

 and the common sort at that, and the 

 moment any writer cracks \\x> any 

 hive, which is not as simple as a hol- 

 low tree, charge him .5 dollars a line 

 for inserting his valuable foolishness. 

 S. RuFus Mason. 

 Purple Cave, Neb., June 10, 1884. 



Unripe Extracted Honey. 



The Bee Journal for 1883 says : 

 " The sale of extracted honey is dull 

 on account of too much unripe honey 

 on the market," In the first place, 

 who puts this unripe honey on the 

 market 't' It must be beginners or 

 some who are trying to spoil the sale 

 of extracted honey, or trying to see 

 how much honev can be produced liy 

 one colony of bees. When the combs 

 are sealed i^, of the way down, they 

 are ready for the extractor, and no 

 sooner. My bees came through the 

 spring in fine condition. I have had 

 6 swarms, and my hives are full of 

 honev and bees. I have the Syrians, 

 and I believe that in .5 years' time 

 they will stand at the head of all races 

 of bees. I hived a swarm 8 days ago, 

 and they have their 8-frame Langs- 

 troth hive full of combs and brood; 

 and there is no comb foundation in 

 the hive either. Colonies which have 

 not swarmed, have their combs sealed 

 fully I3' of the way down. The tem- 

 perature at which I keep my cellar for 

 wintering bees, is 36° to 4o^. 



Fayette Lee. 



Cokato, Minn., June 7, 1884. 



ftueen Rearing. 



I In-ed, last year, from fine young 

 queens reared last year, young queens 

 which almost all proved fidgety little 

 queens, and very shy. Their workers 

 died to a great extent, during the 

 winter, and the colonies fizzled out 

 this spring. I have reared, this sea- 

 son, of the same queens, the finest 

 queens I ever saw, and the most pro- 

 lific ones, and I have come to the 

 conclusion that it is as poor policy to 

 rear young queens of queens reared 

 the same season. I wish, through the 

 metlium of the Bee Journal, to 

 hear the opinions of the bee-keepers 

 who are not queen-breeders, as to 

 their experience and opinion in this 

 matter. If my opinion is correct, 

 queen-breeding from a young queen 

 reared the same season, would be as 

 bad a policy as in-and-in breeding, 

 and perhaps worse, and to ascertain 

 this fact would be of importance to 

 apiculture. Gust. Mubhard. 



Portland, Oreg. 



1^ The Southwestern Iowa Bee- 

 Keepers' Association, will meet in 

 Corning, June 28, 1884, 



W.J. Oliver, Sec. 



