THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



155 



turbing them. I heard that one man 

 had lost all— 5 colonies ; another, 3. out 

 of 50. I think that in small apiaries 

 they are half dead. Men who had 

 bees in good condition have lost much 

 less. I am going to use Ipound sec- 

 tions, 7 in a tier, i tiers to the hive, 

 and will tier up as needed. 



Using Comb Foundation.— John 

 McKern, Dryden.Q N. Y., asks : 



Does Mr. Demaree give a swarm 

 full sheets of foundation or only 

 starters, and are those swarms apt to 

 Ciist other swarms when working for 

 comb honey V I have had swarms in 

 2-story hives and working for ex- 

 tracted honey with plenty of room, 

 swarm out after they had been to 

 work some time. 



[By request Mr. G. W. Demaree re- 

 plies as follows :— £d.] 



My management depends on the 

 the purpose I have in view. If I wish 

 to prevent increase, I put the swarms 

 on half the usual number ot standard 

 frames, using only starters in them, 

 and fill up the spaces at the sides of 

 the frames with division-boards 

 cleated on their sides so as to make 

 them stand J^-inch apart. Over all 

 goes a metal queen-excluder, and on 

 this sets the first " tier " of surplus 

 cases. By this management the whole 

 force of the new colony (swarm) is 

 spent in producing surplus, and 

 comes out as a mere nucleus, and is 

 disposed of as such at the close of the 

 season, either by uniting or letting 

 them play out. If increase is desira- 

 able, I hive the swarms on full sets 

 of frames filled with foundation, and 

 give the colonies an abundance of 

 room as fast as they need it, practic- 

 ing the tiering system to supply their 

 wants. If the queens are old there 

 will be danger of swarms issuing, but 

 ordinarily no swarms will issue from 

 new colonies, if the queens are satis- 

 factory to the workers. This influ- 

 ence, or queen condition, gives us the 

 key to the situation.— G.W.Demakee. 



need be, except one colony that I 

 noticed on Jan. 20, had a little touch 

 of diarrhea, but they seem no worse 

 now than they were 10 days after I 

 first noticed them. *Do bees after 

 being attacked with diarrhea ever 

 recover V The colony was very strong 

 in bees, and heavy with stores when I 

 put them into the cellar. My bees 

 are all in lO-frame Simplicity hives, 

 and 1 put them into the cellar with 

 the covers on, just as they were on the 

 summer stands. 



[*Yes, after a cleansing flight.— Ed.] 



Happy Bees and Bee-Keepers.— 



Jacob Oswalt, Maximo,ot O., on Feb. 

 18, 1887, writes : 



I commenced the spring of 1886 

 with 20 colonies of bees in chaff hives. 

 During the summer I harvested 1,000 

 pounds of comb honey and increased 

 the number of colonies, by natural 

 swarming, to 3.5. Last fall my bees 

 gathered a fine lot of honey from 

 Buckwheat and fall flowers, and -I 

 allowed them to store it all away in 

 the brood-chamber. In November I 

 prepared them for winter on the sum- 

 mer stands in splendid condition. On 

 Jan. 23 they had a regular frolic, and 

 now they are all alive, strong and 

 doing well. I have now as many bees 

 as a novice can handle, and I feel like 

 the boy who caught the bear, " I can't 

 hold it, I can't let it go." The bee- 

 keepers of eastern Ohio are in good 

 spirits, and a good report may be ex- 

 pected from them the coming summer. 



tering, and produce much less honey 

 per colony. A man from this place 

 went to Arizona last fall, and when 

 he returned he told me that bees in 

 that Territory produced 300 pounds of 

 honey per colony, and that at no time 

 of the year could they not get enough 

 for their living. Here a bee-keeper 

 must be at the expense of making a 

 cellar, withstand blizzards, and often 

 lose 50 colonies of bees in one winter; 

 so I do not think that a bee-keeper in 

 California ought to grumble at the 

 low price of honey, for he can count 

 on scarcely any loss, and an almost in- 

 variable honey crop. As to organiz- 

 ing to uphold prices, I think that .such 

 organization would be quite ineffect- 

 ual—the country is too large for that. 



The Need of Frequent Flights.— 

 Green R. Shirer, Greene, 5 Iowa, on 

 March 2, 1887, writes : 



I examined my bees yesterday and 

 found 4 colonies dead and 3 others 

 nearly so ; the rest had a good flight 

 then, and I think they will come 

 through all right. I had 51 colonies 

 in the fall packed in chaff on the sum- 

 mer stands ; they nearly all have 

 diarrhea pretty badly. There are 

 signs of a general break-up in the 

 weather, and if our bees can have 

 frequent flights they will be all right. 



B., 



Good Results.— W. H. Graves, New 

 Carlisle,-o Ind.,on Feb. 26, 1887, says: 



1 had 36 colonies, spring count, in 

 1886, and increased them to 70. They 

 gathered over 2.000 pounds of comb 

 honey in one and two pound sections, 

 which I have sold in my home market 

 for from 9 to 14 cents per pound, 

 mostly for 12}^ cents. 



Bees Recovering from Diarrhea.— 



Chas. W. Banker, Menomonee,x) Wis., 

 on Feb. 28, 1887, writes : 



I put 17 colonies of bees into the 

 cellar about the middle of November, 

 1886, all in good condition except 2 

 that were a little light in stores, but 

 had plenty of bees; they seem to be 

 all right as yet. When I put the bees 

 into the cellar the temperature was 

 450, Fahr., and after the middle of 

 January the mercury dropped to 35°, 

 Fahr. ; it has ranged from 3.5° to 38° 

 ever since, and still they are quiet and 

 seemingly m as good condition as 



Hand-Holes in [Crates, etc.— J 



of Iowa, asks the following : 



[1. What is the best method of cut- 

 ting hand-holes in the ends of ship- 

 ping-crates V 2. Also of making holes 

 in brood-frames for wiring 'i* 



1. The. usual method is to use a 

 wabbling-saw, that is, a saw unevenly 

 fastened on the saw-arbor ; but we 

 use and prefer a cutter-head in place 

 of a saw. 



2. Punch the holes with a set of 

 brad-awls operated by a treadle.— Ed.] 



Bees all Right.— T. F. Bingham, 

 Abronia, p Mich., on March 1, 1887, 

 says : 



My bees are in fine condition, both 

 those that are out-doors and those in 

 the cellar. They have not seemed to 

 care whether they had a flight or not, 

 but to-day every bee that desired to 

 do so, had a flight, and are all in good 

 condition. 



Honey-Production in California.— 



J. W. Johnson, jMcPall^o Mo., writes : 



On page 118, Mr. Segars, of Califor- 

 nia, wrote about honey-production in 

 that State, and bewailing the low 

 price of honey, but he forgets that in 

 that country they seldom have any 

 loss of bees, aiid secure twice as 

 much honey per colony as we do here, 

 while we lose many colonies in win- 



Frequent Flights for Bees.- D. M. 



Stoler, Saxton,9 Pa., on Feb. 2.5, 1887, 

 writes : 



My bees had their first flight on 

 Jan. 21, completely spotting hives and 

 snow in relieving themselves. We 

 have had five weeks of mild weather 

 since then, bees flying every few days 

 during this time. I saw them work- 

 ing on rotten apples and gathering 

 water. I had to close the hives on 

 Jan. 30 to prevent robbing ; also one 

 colony carried out a few dead young 

 bees. I am wintering my bees on the 

 summer stands, with nothing around 

 the hives ; some are in Simplicity and 

 some in the Chautauqua double- 

 walled hives. All are doing well so 

 far. Twelve inches of snow fell in 4 

 hours to-day, with indications for 

 colder weather. 



Successful Wintering.— J. W. San- 

 ders, Le Grand,© Iowa, on March 3, 

 1887, writes : 



Our long cold winter is pratty well 

 gone, and at this time, from the re- 

 ports I get, bees seem to be winter- 

 ing finely. I have not heard of any 

 signs of bee-diarrhea yet. I put 61 

 colonies into the cellar, and with one 

 or two exceptions all seem to be doing 

 well ; still the next four weeks may 

 make a change. I have kept the tem- 

 perature of the cellar, by close watch- 

 ing, from 38° to 46°. I believe the 

 great problem in successful wintering 

 is plenty of young bees in the fall ; 

 plenty of good honey in store ; see 

 that all are prepared late in the sea- 

 son for winter; and a good cellar for 

 wintering, where the temperature is 

 easily kept above 40°, and well sup- 

 plied with pure air. 



