114 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL, 



though I have had no pure blacks for 

 years, I soon found that I had two or 

 three colonies that were simon-pure 

 blacks, at least so far as color was con- 

 cerned. 



Now the question is, did my yellow bees 

 turn black ? or, were the few surrounding 

 blacks so powerful in character as to 

 overcome them ? — Dr. C. C. Millee, in 

 the Apiculturist. 



Bees do not mix the Honey. 



Bees, in their search for honey, visit 

 only one kind of flower on the same trip. 

 This is not accidental, but it is a wise 

 provision for preventing hybridization of 

 different varieties from the pollen which 

 bees always distribute in their journeys 

 from flower to flower. — Exduinge. 



Extracting in Cold Weather. 



If your surplus combs are not yet 

 extracted, keep them in a warm room a 

 half-day. Then the machine will as 

 readily throw out their contents, if still 

 liquid, as at any time during the Summer. 

 — Farm and Home. 



Bee Fever. 



This is a peculiar contagious fever to 

 which we are all liable ; ministers, law- 

 yers, and even doctors of medicine, have 

 been known to yield to it in a way that is 

 wonderful. I had an attack of it, myself, 

 12 years ago, and while the first stages 

 were the most severe, it continues in my 

 system to-day. Honey is an excellent 

 medicine, but when given as a remedy 

 for bee-fever, it will invariably have the 

 effect of making the fever more intense. 



Bee stings are said to be good for rheu- 

 matism and they are also good for bee- 

 fever ; I know of several cases where 

 bee-stings have given permanent relief. 



In the Spring of 1881, I had a ship- 

 ment of very cross bees, from Mississippi, 

 which came near giving me permanent 

 relief ; they pinned my clothes fast to 

 me, and had about cured me, when I 

 gave them Italian queens, and then they 

 would not sting me any more. The 

 result was that the fever came up to its 

 highest pitch again. 



In 1883, I "swarmed out" and went 

 to work for A. I Root, at the Home of 

 the Honey Bees, while my stay there was 

 very pleasant indeed, a letter from home 

 stated that my bees had wintered suc- 

 cessfully ; this was too much for me, and 

 I returned to the parental roof, on the 

 limited express. 



The same season I succeeded in getting 

 1,600 pounds of honey from my 11 colo- 

 nies, and increased them to 21, by 

 artificial swarming. 



The following season they increased to 

 50 ; the honey season was a failure, and 

 I was obliged to feed them nearly two 

 barrels of granulated sugar, in order to 

 pull them through the Winter. 



When it comes to* the point of feeding 

 50 colonies that are almost destitute of 

 stores, it comes near being a remedy for 

 bee-fever. I might have been cured then 

 and there if somebody hadn't whispered 

 to me that everlasting sticking to a thing 

 is bound to bring success. — Walter S. 

 PouDER, in Indiana Farmer. 



Strengthening Weak Colonies. 



If from any cause a colony becomes 

 weak in the Fall, I have adopted the 

 following plan to build it up with very 

 satisfactory results : 



I usually take off the surplus sections 

 late in the season, and in them are quite 

 a number of young bees that cannot well 

 be driven out with smoke, neither will 

 they desert the caps, or leave the sections 

 after being placed in the cellar or honey 

 house. 



I take the sections in which the bees 

 are clustering, to the colony I wish to 

 strengthen, and after first thoroughly 

 smoking the bees in the hive and sections 

 also, I brush the bees off, in front of the 

 entrance, and they will scamper into the 

 hive as lively as in swarming time, and 

 be readily accepted. 



Thereafter young bees can be intro- 

 duced from any hive without smoking, 

 and without any objection on the part of 

 the bees formerly introduced, or members 

 of the old colony, as they have, by this 

 time, become accustomed to the influx of 

 strangers, and accept their presence as 

 a matter of course, for they soon learn 

 that they are peaceably disposed, and 

 not there for the purpose of robbing. 



A few bees from a number of pros- 

 perous colonies will never be missed ; 

 whereas, if a frame or two is abstracted, 

 the loss will be apparent next Spring, 

 and the bees in those hives, thus robbed 

 of stores and brood, will not commence 

 working in the surplus arrangement, 

 nearly as soon ; not until the loss has 

 been made good. It will not do to borrow 

 from Paul to pay Peter, in a wholesale 

 way ; at least, that is my theory. One 

 colony in my apiary, built up in the 

 manner above mentioned, are, at this 

 writing, as strong as the strongest. — 

 A. C. Tyrrel, in ApicuUurtst. 



