1895. 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



349 



Giant Bee of India.— Ruth E. Taylor, of Bellona, 

 N. Y., the Secretary of the Ontario County Bee-Keepers' Asso- 

 ciation, sends the following " Petition," with the request that 

 it be published in the American Bee Journal : 



Whereas, The Honorable Secretary of Agriculture, in 

 his last report to the President, says : "The Entomologist 

 strongly recoiuraended as a part of the work of this fiscal 

 year, the attempt to introduce into the United States from 

 Ceylon the giant bee of India ; 



Whereas, It now remains with the bee-keepers and 

 farmers to unite in petitioning the proper authorities to carry 

 out the work recommended by the Entomologist ; therefore, 

 be it 



Resolved, That we, the bee-keepers of Ontario County, 

 New York, in convention assembled, respectfully ask the pub- 

 lishers of the bee-papers to print and distribute with their 

 paper a petition to be circulated by each subscriber. The ex- 

 tra expense to be shared pro rata by the various bee-keepers' 

 societies throughout the United States. 



Signed, C. A. Olmstead, 



E. H. Perry, 

 Edwin Hutchinson, 



Ruth E. Taylor, Sec. Committee on Resolutions. 

 Bellona, N. Y., May 6, 1895. 



It seems to me, that, so long as nearly all the testimony 

 is against the feasibility of getting any benefit from "Apis 

 dorsata," it would hardly be a desirable thing to go to any ex- 

 pense in the matter. If the government has any money to 

 spend in advancing the interests of the bee-keepers of the 

 United States, I think there are scores of other ways in which 

 it could be applied that would result in infinitely more good 

 to the pursuit in general. If the North American Bee-Keep- 

 ers' Association could secure a grant from the goverment, such 

 as the Ontario (Canada) Bee-Keepers' Association has, I be- 

 lieve much more practical benefit would come out of it than 

 to spend the same amount on an effort to domesticate the 

 "big stingers" of India. 



By the way, I have yet to hear that very many of our best 

 and leading apiarists are asking for the importation of " Apis 

 dorsata." If more than a half dozen of them are really in 

 earnest about the matter, it will be news. 



Hon. Eugene Secor, of Forest City, Iowa, has 

 been publishing a valuable series of articles on "Tree-Plant- 

 ing," in his local newspaper, in which he considers the ques- 

 tions, what to plant, how to plant, and where to plant. He 

 advises against such varieties as the cottonwood and the Lom- 

 bardy and white poplars, and points out that there are at 

 least 50 varieties of decidous trees of much higher commer- 

 cial value, which do well in the Northwest, besides a very fair 

 list of evergreens and conifers. He suggests dealing direct 

 with growers of stock rather than with agents, who may or 

 may not be reliable, and he urges the planter to get reliable 

 information, as a means to which he calls attention to the 

 fact that there are five horticultural societies in Iowa, not run 

 to make money, but to disseminate information such as the 

 planter needs. 



No better authority on this subject, than Mr. Secor, could 

 well be found. Honey-yielding trees will also have a chance. 



Unla-wful to Adulterate Honey. — A subscriber 

 living in California, in a letter dated May 14, writes thus : 



I heard that the recent legislature of this State passed an 

 act making it unlawful to adulterate honey. Shortly after 

 the adjournment of that body Gov. Budd signed the Act, and 

 it became a law. I have not seen the Act, and do not know 

 much about it. I am not sure that the person who told me 

 about this law read the item or telegram rightly, but I am in- 

 clined to think he did. I will look the matter up some day 

 that I happen in a law office, or meet one of the members of 

 the late legislature. 



Bee-keepers will be interested to know all about this. I 

 trust our good friend who reports the above, will soon find out 

 all about it, and send whatever he learns in regard to it. 



/Kn)Qr)q i1r)c Bee-Papers 



Conducted liy " GT^EAXBR." 



WHAT TO DO WITH UNFINISHED SECTIONS. 



The best and most profitable way for the average bee- 

 keeper to dispose of unfinished sections, I am convinced, is to 

 extract all that will not sell as second grade for as much as 

 extracted honey will bring, and use them for bait sections the 

 next season. There is a value in these nice, white combs for 

 this purpose, that is not appreciated by very many. — H. R. 

 Boardman, in Gleanings. 



LINING FOR SOLAR WAX-EXTRACTORS. 



The best inside lining for a solar wax-extractor of small 

 size is Russia iron. Zinc and galvanized iron would darken 

 the wax, and, besides, would reflect back too much of the 

 light. Of course, if you can get an asphaltum that will not be 

 affected by the heat or the wax it will make no difference 

 what metal you use. The asphaltum used by photo-stock 

 dealers for painting developing-trays would be about the 

 thing. For large-sized extractors there is nothing better than 

 matched boards of butternut-wood, or something that will not 

 shrink much. These, of course, should be painted black. — 

 Gleanings. 



BEE-PARALYSIS — CONTAGIOUS, BUT NOT HEREDITARY. 



T. S. Ford, of Columbia, Miss., in Review, takes the 

 ground that bee-paralysis is contagious and not hereditary. 

 The introduction of an infected queen would infect a colony, 

 but an infected worker, he thinks, would do the same thing. 

 He says : 



"The discussion in reference to this subject that has been 

 going on at intervals for the past year has led me to believe 

 that the disease is not so virulently infectious as I first be- 

 lieved. The rapid spread of the infection through my own 

 apiary may have been due to the fact that my hives were all 

 under one shelter, and not over a foot apart. Doubtless it is 

 a daily occurence for bees to enter the wrong hive by mistake 

 and in this way diseased bees could infect a healthy colony. 

 And if it spreads by contact as Baldensperger thinks, robber 

 bees in the act of cleaning out a diseased colony could get the 

 bacillus, and in this way carry home the seeds of the malady." 



SPREADING BROOD IN SPRING. 



There is much said recently in the American Bee Journal 

 about the practice of spreading brood in the spring, the major- 

 ity taking ground against it. It is very safe advice when 

 applied to the bee-keeper in the cold corners of the East ; but 

 here in California the spreading of brood can be indulged in 

 with but little danger to the colony, and it is largely practiced 

 here in the spring. It is safe to say that all of the leading 

 bee-keepers do thus enlarge the brood-nest, and equalize until 

 the honey-harvest commences. It pays in dollars. — Rambler, 

 in Gleanings. 



AN AVERAGE Y'lELD OF HONEY. 



I think some will read with a little surprise the statement 

 of Chas. Dadant (page 29.3) that their average yield does not 

 exceed 50 pounds of extracted honey per colony. It only 

 shows that he observes more closely than the majority. For I 

 have an idea that a great many suppose their average yield to 

 be away above what it is, and would be somewhat surprised at 

 the result if they should keep an accurate record and figure 

 the average. Even those who do keep a record have a kind 

 of misty idea that their average is a good deal more than the 

 figures will show. Such a one will think: "My average 

 crop is about 75 pounds, but for the past seven years the crop 

 has always fallen below the average, never exceeding 50 

 pounds." He's waiting for his crop to come up, but doesn't 

 seem to think that his average has been pulled down to per- 

 haps 30 pounds. 



SECURING THE BEST BEES. 



B. Taylor, in Review, tells how he manages. The colo- 

 nies that first build up and swarm are the ones he breeds 

 from. The mother colony is left on the old stand so as to be 

 strong to rear good queen-cells, and these cells are used for 

 others. He further says : 



"After I have started enough nurseries in this way to 

 supply me with queens, each swarm is set where the parent 

 colony stood, the supers are moved to it, a queen-excluding 

 honey-board being put under it, and the parent colony moved 

 to the other end of the same stand, with its entrance turned 

 in the opposite direction from the new swarm. I want all the 



