loo"; 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



1083 



longer rows —a hundred or two hundred col- 

 onies thus occupying a single shed, the depth 

 of the hives' length, with open front. The 

 fronts of the hives thus painted form a strik- 

 ing front to the shed. The writer has traced 

 Biljle history from the Creation down to the 

 Acts of the Apostles, depicted on the fronts 

 forming the side of a single shed. 



Hives so constructed lend themselves easi- 

 ly to transportation. With a bit of evergreen 

 stuffed in the entrance just at nightfall the 

 bee-keeper can load as many as a hundred 

 colonies on a single wagon; and when well 

 on the road the evergreens are removed and 

 the bees allowed to cluster on the outside for 

 better ventilation. 



Carniola is the home of migratory bee- 

 keeping, and each year late in the summer 

 the bee-keepers of the upper valley move 



ELABORATE DESIGNS ON THE FRONTS OF OLD 

 CARNIOLAN BEE-HIVES. 



down to the broad buckwheat-fields of the 

 lower valley. "In die Heide " is a well- 

 known expression, and there they are — num- 

 bering thousands of colonies rowed out to 

 harvest the great crop of honey from the 

 acres of buckwheat. 



On a certain day the bee-keepers all as- 

 semble, and barter and sell their crops of 

 honey and their bees; and on this day colo- 

 nies numbering into the thousands are sul- 

 phured and the honey-combs cut and thrown 

 into great tubs to be jammed and strained. 

 Of late years, since this race of gentle bees 

 has become world-famed, and the value of 

 their bees known, this wholesale slaughter 

 has been largely alxandoned, and now the 

 honey is cut from the rear of the hives and 



the colonies united for the winter. Travel 

 by rail is now large4y supplanting the old 

 wagon transportation, and the great cere- 

 monial days of old are fast passing away. 



The Carniolan bees are now quite well 

 known in this country, and their excellent 

 qualities fully demonstrated. They are very 

 gentle, good honey-gatherers, somewhat 

 larger than blacks or Italians, and strong 

 vigorous Uyers. Very prolific, coupled with 

 the quality of extreme quietness, they are 

 most excellent winterers; and, gathering a 

 minimum of propolis, are particularly well 

 adapted to comb-honey production. They 

 are, in the main, well marked with steei or 

 dusty gray bands with the queens varying 

 from a light brown to a deep bi'onze. The 

 drones are the largest of any race of honey- 

 bees. Combining all these qualities it is not 

 surprising that bee-keeping is such an im- 

 portant and successful industry in this little 

 Austrian province. 



The adjoining province to the north, 

 Karntner, has also many bee-keepers, and 

 the bees are about of the same type— if any 

 thing showing even a less tendency to yellow 

 than toward the Italian border. 



Some of the more educated people who 

 know German have tried to introduce the 

 Berlepsch hive from Germany, but with not 

 much success— so conservative are these in- 

 dependent mountaineers. Many carry on a 

 successful queen-trade with France, Switzer- 

 land, and Germany — some even sending 

 queens and nuclei to Holland and England. 

 A great exchange of nuclei goes on in the 

 absence of the perfection of sending queens 

 by mail. Queens in most instances are rear- 

 ed naturally in full colonies, and fertilized 

 perh'ips in nuclei in the full-sized hives— aft- 

 er-swarms being largely so utilized. 



WHITEAVOOD FOR HIVES. 



Some Argiiment.s in its Favor. 



BY F. GREINER. 



In my former communication I omitted to 

 comment on what I found in the A B C pf 

 Bee Culture with reference to whitewood 

 lumber. It is stated that this lumber shrinks 

 endwise, and that it is, for that reason, un- 

 suitable for hives. Science may say lumber 

 shrinks endwise. When a very delicate 

 measuring instrument, a sort of micrometer, 

 is used, a stick of timber or a board of white- 

 wood may b.e found to have lost an infinites- 

 imally small fraction of Jj inch; but for 

 practical purposes whitewood shrinks no 

 more than other kinds of timber, or about as 

 near nothing, so far as it can be detected. 

 Whitewood has been used in these parts of 

 New York in barn-building, mixed in with 

 other timbers, and no perceptible shrinkage 

 has ever been noticed. Houses have been 

 sided with it, and late years bee-hives have 

 been made from it, and it serves the purpose, 

 not as well as soft white pine, for there is 

 probably no better timber gi-owing anywhere 

 than this; but it can be or it may be used 



