108 



TEte AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



completely closed with frozen snow, 

 ice and dead bees ; the covers frozen 

 fast to the hives, limbs of the trees, 

 and long icicles pendant from the cov- 

 ers and porticoes, all round them. I 

 opened the entrances as well as I 

 could, and, in most of them, the bees 

 seemed lively and in force, coming 

 out as soon as relieved. The honey 

 boards being off and cushions or 

 quilts being on the frames, saved 

 them from being smothered. Three 

 colonies, 1 think, are dead, and more 

 probably, will be if such a state of 

 tilings continue much longer. I have 

 over 120 colonies in a cave that I do 

 not feel much anxiety about, but could 

 not get to see them as the outer door 

 ■was frozen fast. 

 Atlanta, 111., Feb. 5, 1883. 



For the American Bee JoumaL 



" Why I am a Novice." 



B. F. WOODCOCK. 



I can recollect of no period of my 

 boyhood when I did not long for a col- 

 ony of bees. My aspirations ran no 

 higher, at first, than one colony ; but 

 I wished for that more than any other 

 earthly possession. My father was a 

 lover of honey, but a despiser of bees. 

 The latter propensity predominating, 

 he chose to buy his honey, much to 

 my discomfiture. 



When about 15 years of age, I con- 

 cluded to have a colony of bees, at all 

 hazards. A visit to the apiary of D. 

 Z. Kagarice (a disciple of Langstroth, 

 and a resident ot Bedford, Co., Pa.), 

 confirmed me in this resolution. 1 

 made a conditional contract, and 

 went home highly elated with my 

 prospects, while visions of an abund- 

 ant supply of nature's choicest nectar, 

 passed through my mind. 



As my exchequer had never risen 

 to half the amount necessary to pur- 

 chase a colony of bees, I was obliged 

 to make my wants known to my 

 father, who positively declined fur- 

 nishing any specie for that purpose. 

 I then proposed to work out until I 

 earned the sum required, but was re- 

 fused the privilege. My ardor ex- 

 ceeding my judgment, I continued to 

 importune him about the matter, un- 

 til he, one day, gave me very dis- 

 tinctly to understand that he was 

 running that ranche, and that while 

 he did there would be no bees buzzing 

 around his ears. 



My air castle crumbled, the pros- 

 pective bee yard vanished, and I 

 threw up the sponge. I'ermit me to 

 say (without intending the least re- 

 flection upon my father), that cold 

 water of this kind has dampened the 

 aspirations of many a boy, and turned 

 him from a vocation for which he was 

 naturally adapted, to one for which 

 he had neither inclination or adapta- 

 tion. 



I have neglected to state that, at the 

 age of 10 or 12, 1 was the possessor of 

 a miniature apiary of bumble-bees. 

 I secured the nuclei in the fields, 

 early in the summer, and transferred 

 them to box hives about (ixfi inches 

 square and 5 high. I placed these on a 

 broad board, elevated about a foot 



from the ground, and put a good roof 

 over them. I did not divide for in- 

 crease, neither did they swarm. In 

 tlie fall I used brimstone to secure 

 their treasure, and was as happy over 

 my pint cup full of honey as is Mr. 

 Heddon over his thousands of pounds. 



To atone in part tor my " blasted 

 hopes," I paid frequent visits to Mr. 

 K. and his apiary, and would sit, for 

 hours, an attentive listener to bis 

 plain practical exposition of the habits 

 and instructive wisdom of the honey 

 bee. 



After attaining my majority I again 

 applied for the privilege of starting 

 an apiary on the old homestead, prom- 

 ising to buy the bees myself and share 

 the surplus honey with the family, 

 but my father could not be persuaded 

 that he would not be a target for their 

 javelins (as he terms them), and 

 kindly refused. 



Having selected a partner for life, 

 who, by the way, is an apiarist of no 

 mean pretensions, I, or rather we, 

 came to the Hawkeye State, and in 

 the fall of the same year (1876), pur- 

 chased two colonies of black bees. Of 

 my subsequent experience I shall 

 have something to say in the future. 



I am very much pleased with the 

 Weekly Journal, and prefer it to a 

 monthly. 



Felix, Iowa, Jan. 7, 1883. 



For the American Bee JoumaU 



Half-Pound Sections and Separators. 



A. J. FISHER. 



Mr. Heddon requests all to give 

 their opinion on the half-pound sec- 

 tions. It is my opinion that they are 

 too small to be profitable to the bee- 

 keeper. It is true that some may de- 

 mand them, but are they willing to 

 pay the extra price above the one- 

 pound sections to make them profit- 

 able to the bee-keeper? I say, no ; 

 considering the extra expense of con- 

 struction and the less amount of 

 honey obtained in them, my opinion 

 is that the bee-keeper that put his 

 honey up in half-pound sections will 

 never compete with that one who uses 

 sections from one to two pounds. 



Those who are contemplating using 

 the half-pound sections during the 

 coming season should take the advice 

 of F. C. Benedict, on page 8, who, I 

 think, talks squarely on the half- 

 pound sections. As for separators, I 

 think I will have no use for them in 

 the future. 



I use a section box 13^ inches and 

 1 11-16 inches thick, and have eight 

 and nine of them combined together, 

 as one solid box, without separators, 

 making a capacity of about 9 pounds. 

 And I am one of those who claim that 

 honey will be stored in a box of that 

 style, where the bees can assemble in 

 a large cluster and keep up the re- 

 quired beat for comb building, much 

 faster than if each box was separated 

 with a piece of tin or wood, besides 

 the expense of construction, to use 

 tin or wood. 



Economy is the road to wealth. 

 I Those tin separators, with kinks in 

 I them, filled up with bee glue, are 



dirty and sticky things to handle. In 

 the above style of box I have no such 

 dirt or traps to work with, and I ex- 

 pect to crate my honey too. 



Am I riglit or wrong in regard to 

 more honey being stored without, 

 than with separators V What does 

 Mr. Heddon say to this question ? I 

 predict that the time will come with 

 " the knowing ones," that tin separa- 

 tors will be ■' things of the past." 

 Can we not have, from the knowing 

 ones, more discussion upon the ques- 

 tion of how to get the most honey in 

 a given time in the most marketable 

 shape (not in half-pound sections), 

 and benefit all concerned 'f 



East Liverpool, O. 



For the American Bee Journal. 



A Eeport from Kansas. 



HIRAM J. WARD. 



After keeping bees 14 years I am 

 going to try and make my first thor- 

 ough report, at least as far as amount 

 of surplus honey and marketing the 

 same is concerned. Ttie forepart of 

 the year 1882 was very backward, be- 

 ing cold and wet, and as I am situated 

 where there is no basswood, nor white 

 clover, my bees were compelled to 

 live on fruit and wild tlowers, until 

 alsike clover began to bloom. They 

 gathered no perceivable surplus until 

 the middle of June, and then for only 

 a few days, and not enough to fill any 

 sections. For about six weeks they 

 only gathered enough to live upon, 

 but I had a lot of old combs partly 

 filled with honey from the bees that 

 died in the winter of 1880-81, and I 

 gave them to the bees, to stimulate 

 breeding, hoping for a change in the 

 weather, and sure enough, it came 

 about the first days of August. On 

 the 7th, I had a natural swarm, and 

 others on the 8th, 9th and 10th. 



I had given up all hope for the bees, 

 and turned my attention to the farm, 

 and marketing early apples (for I have 

 a large orchard), but as soon as they 

 began to swarm, I knew there was 

 honey, and so on Aug. 8, I extracted 

 my first honey from an eight-frame 

 Langstroth hive, without top story, 

 emptying a few combs only, to give 

 the queen room, and put on the top 

 story full of sections. From that time 

 until frost, I had all I could do to 

 take the honey and keep them from 

 swarming. 



This being my first year with 

 Langstroth hives and sections, I had 

 some trouble to get the sections evenly 

 filled, for I have never used any sep- 

 arators yet. I have used three kinds 

 of hives; the original American, the 

 Quinby and the Langstroth, but I am 

 putting all of my increase into Langs- 

 troth hives now, and shall change all 

 from the American into them, by 

 degrees. » 



I commenced in the spring with 17 

 colonies, and increased to 25 by nat- 

 ural swarming, and took 437 pounds 

 of comb honey in sections, and 872 

 pounds of extracted, and have sold 

 all of the comb at 22^^ cts., and nearly 

 all of the extracted at 14 cts., at home. 

 Total. $220.40 ; an average of $12,963^ 



