48 



GLEAKINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Jan.' 



Early-amber sugar, it seems, has taken a new 

 start. When in Kalamazoo, Prof. Cook said they 

 now made it as white as granulated sugar. I asked 

 him to send me a sample, but he said he might just 

 as well dip it out of the bowl before us, for it was 

 one and the same thing. This is truly good news. 

 If any one can tell me where they are able to refloe 

 it to that degree, I shall be glad to get further facts 

 in the matter. 



Again this 5'ear we are receiving cards like this: 

 "Don't stop my journal; keep it going. I have sub- 

 scribed through " My friends, we would will- 

 ingly trust you, or we would accommodate in al- 

 most anyway; but when we send anybody goods 

 they must be charged somewhere; and when the 

 pay comes, somebody must be credited. If we 

 charge it to you, and somebody else sends us the 

 money, how shall we know whom to credit it? We 

 can't see any way to fix it, so you can send the mon- 

 ey to somebody else which you are owing us. 



labeling filled sections. 

 We have been considering the matter of grading 

 sections, as you know, but there are some consider- 

 able difficulties in the way, to say nothing of extra 

 handling, etc. A new feature has just come up: 

 Put a nice label (something like Jones's, that won't 

 soil) on all the dark or rough-looking ones. It is not 

 a very great task, after they are all tilled with hon- 

 ey; and as this label must go right to the consumer, 

 it can easily tell him whose honey he wants to call 

 for next time he wants some. Who will give us a 

 design for a neat one? 



Every little while some friend wants to know 

 the price of a thousand circulars; and when told 

 they will cost, say, $6 00. he sends $3.00 for 500. It 

 can't begin to be " did," boys. Don't you see we 

 should have all the type to set, any way? and to run 

 500 more through the press is but a trifling matter. 

 If 1000 cost $6.00, 500 ought to be at least $5.00. 

 Another friend sent 50 cents for a hundred labels 

 with his name and address on. The clerk Avrotc 

 back that we couldn't put name and address on for 

 less than a dollar, of the kind he specified. His re- 

 ply was, that if we couldn't print 100 for the 50 cent s, 

 print as many as we could for the money, and send 

 them along. The point is, that the 50 cents wouldn't 

 pay for setting up the type, etc. 



THE square list. 



Any one conversant with the history of our laws 

 knows how vainly we have tried to stop intemper- 

 ance by legislation. Time and again some new plan 

 or measure has been adopted and tried, only to find 

 it didn't work well in all cases, and so it was dropped 

 and some other measure tried. It is proving much 

 the same with the plans we have been trying for 

 years past to restrain unscrupulous (or unlucky, if 

 you choose) brothers from buying supplies, bees, or 

 honey, that they can't pay for. Whom shall we 

 trust? is still the unsolved problem. In the Black 

 List I tried to tell whom you should not trust, and 

 in the Square List I tried to tell whom you might 

 safely trust. Neither one worked as I expected it 

 would. Procrastination has proved a more trouble- 

 some sin than dishonesty. Some got into the Black 

 List only because they were too Inzy to keep out, 

 and eventually paid all up, and more too. Some got 

 into the Square List who were so lazy, if nothing 

 worse, that they had no sort of a right there. While 

 it la my duty to publish promptly the name el every 



man who is laying plans to get money without any 

 intention of doing as he agrees, I can not see that it 

 would be right to publish the names of those who 

 buy unwisely, and then can noi pay. We will do 

 this, however: When you are in doubt, drop us a 

 postal, and our book-keepers will tell you in a few 

 words the habits of almost any man in the bee busi- 

 ness. 



• • 



ft 



Or Department for duties to be attended to 

 this niontli. 



OEVERAL have written about the bees 

 ^^ coming out of their hives when it was 

 ' so cold they could not get back. For 

 a colony containing many old bees, I believe 

 this is nothing very unusual ; nor need it be 

 regarded as alarming while the numbers are 

 few that thus perish, say half a dozen a day, 

 or such a matter, for a bee, when he feels 

 himself to be of no further use to the popu- 

 lace, usually takes himself off out of the 

 way with the remaining strength he has, and 

 I don't know but that this happens oftener 

 in a good strong healthy colony than any 

 other. Still, we must face the fact that 

 colonies do sometimes winter, Avith scarcely 

 a dead bee either outside or inside of the 

 hive. Perhaps such have only young bees. 

 Who can enlighten usV Another thing that 

 may make the bees come out and die, may 

 be too much ventilation, with too small a 

 cluster of bees. I saw bees tumbling around, 

 on the snow in a kind of a dizzy way, before 

 one of our hives in November, and upon ex- 

 amination I found them to be a very small 

 cluster, in the ends of just a few combs con- 

 taining solid sealed honey. They had got 

 chilled through, and had "the dysentery. A 

 larger cluster, milder weather, or a smaller 

 chamber to cluster in, would, I think, either 

 one have checked the trouble. There is still , 

 a third cause for bees coming out when they 

 ought not, and I do not know but that it is 

 one we ought to consider more. You all 

 know of the reports we have had stringing 

 along for two years, indicating plainly that 

 bees went through the severe winter of two 

 years ago with the hive cracked from top to 

 bottom, or with the honey - boxes all on, 

 when whole apiaries, nicely packed, didn't. 

 I fear we are putting too much chaff over 

 our bees, or putting it in cloth sacks that are 

 not open enough. Some covering is surely 

 needed over the cluster ; but I am inclined 

 to think that a heavy colony will do better 

 with something pretty loose, rather than too 

 many warm pillows — friend Muth's straw 

 mat," or two inches of chaff spread over 

 coarsely woven bagging or burlap, for in- 

 stance. 



Lastly, bees will have the dysentery, and 

 come out of their hives on the snow, when 

 wintering on natural stores, when they 

 would do nothing of the kind on stores made 

 of granulated sugar. If they still have the 

 dysentery when every thing else is all right, 

 make the Good candy, as described last 

 month, and put it right over the cluster, so 

 they will eat it instead of the honey stored 

 in their combs. In making it for such a 

 case, I would use only the best clover or 



