5G 



T«® jEBimmicaH MMM jmx^mmmL,. 



cellar, with the mercury 28° below zero 

 outside. 



Sowing Alsike Clover Tor Bees. 



I can endorse all of Mr. Baldridge's 

 article on page 10, except that I would 

 sow 4 pounds of Alsike seed on most 

 land, and not on thin, dry, sandy land. 

 It will catch in wild-grass sloughs. It 

 thrives best with red-top clover or 

 pasture. If for seed, sow 10 pounds 

 per acre, and it will not lodge so badly. 

 Be sure to get clean seed, and not 

 mixed with sorrel, as some Eastern 

 seed is. 



Muscatine, o Iowa, Jan. 16, 1888. 



BEE-CELLARS. 



Wintering and Insuring; Bees in 

 Cellars. 



Written for .the American Bee Journal 

 BY E. W. COUNCILMAN. 



This article is written in appreciar 

 tion and corroboration of Mr. A. C. 

 TyrreFs article on page 25, on " Bee- 

 Cellars." Three j'ears ago I built a 

 bee-cellar, and finished late in the fall 

 so that the mortar in tlie walls had not 

 time enough to get dry. But the cold 

 winter came on, and I put in it 25 col- 

 onies. Of course the combs became 

 somewhat mold}', but I lost only 2 

 colonies. 



Last winter, the cellar having had 

 plenty of time to become thoroughly 

 dry, I had no moldy combs, and I put 

 out every colony on the summer stands 

 that I had put into the cellar. This 

 winter I have 80 colonies in the cellar, 

 and from the best of my judgment I 

 believe that I will carry them all 

 through. 



Now as to the secret of my success : 

 Of course I wanted to discover all I 

 could about the conditions, and as a 

 consequence a thermometer has been 

 in constant use during all temperatures 

 of weather. The temperature in the 

 cellar has ranged from 32^ to about 

 45°. Always in going into the cellar, 

 I would hear that low, contented hum, 

 except perhaps towards spring, and 

 during the warm, soft weather. 



I have thought many times of mak- 

 ing the cellar warmer, even by artifi- 

 cial heat, thinking that the bees would 

 use less honey, perhaps breed faster, 

 and come out stronger in the spring ; 

 but after comparing Mr. TjTrel's ex- 

 perience with my own, I have con- 

 cluded to adopt David Crockett's plan, 

 when he hit the "bull's eye:" "Let 

 well enough alone." 



Insuring Bees in a Cellar. 



In regard to insuring bees, men- 

 tioned by Mr. A. C. Waldron, on page 

 8, I would say that my bees are in- 



sured in the Dutchess County Mutual 

 Insurance Company. We have no 

 trouble here in getting our bees in- 

 sured, any more than any other valua- 

 bles in the cellar. 



Bee-inortalitr In tlie Cellar. 



I had a similar experience in regard 

 to mortality among my bees, as Mr. 

 Pinkerton describes on page 11 ; and 

 besides, quite a number of my colonies 

 had the diarrhea. I attributed the 

 trouble to honej'-dew (a substance with 

 which I am not much acquainted). I 

 found a black, sticky substance stored 

 in the hives (in some hives large, and 

 others small quantities), which bee- 

 men called "honey-dew." The bees 

 which ate of this black and sticky 

 substance, and especially those colo- 

 nies that had stored a good deal of it, 

 had the diarrhea, and large (luantities 

 of bees would be found dead in front 

 of the hives. Up to the present time 

 this winter, I have swept my cellar 

 twice, and I have carried out perhaps 

 not to exceed four quarts of dead bees. 

 Last winter, from about half the num- 

 ber of colonies, up to the present time 

 I am sure I had carried out twice or 

 thrice that quantity. , Indeed, I was 

 frightened, for I thought that my bees 

 were all going to die. 



The mortality among bees through- 

 out this State, and many other States, 

 was terrible. Those who claimed to 

 be competent to judge, estimated that 

 one-half, or more, of the colonies died 

 before the honey season was reached 

 last spring. 



Mj' cellar is 14x18 feet, about 7 feet 

 high, and has a cemented bottom. The 

 walls are 2i feet thick, and laid in 

 cement. A 4-inch stove-pipe extends 

 from near the bottom, near the centre, 

 up through the kitchen floor, and is 

 attached to the kitchen stove-pipe. 

 This is all the ventilator the cellar has. 

 The bee-cellar is separated from the 

 vegetable cellar hy a sliding door. I 

 have been very successful in wintering 

 my bees. The temperature ranges 

 from 40° to 45°. 



Newark Valley, jN. Y., Jan. 13, 1888. 



BEE-KEEPING. 



Wliat I Know and AVIiat I do 

 Not Know about Bees. 



Written for the American Bee Journal 

 BY J. M. HICKS. 



I know that the year of 1887 was, as 

 a honey year, in many localities a very 

 poor one, and especially in this locality. 

 We had no honey, but plenty of drouth. 

 I know that but few bees have been so 

 fortunate as to have gathered stores 

 suflicient to last them through the win- 

 ter ; that I was not the only bee-keeper 



who failed to get an ounce or a pound 



of honej' as a surplus from my apiary 

 the past season, l)ut I let the bees keep 

 all that the}- gathered, and fed them 

 over 400 pounds of honey besides, in 

 order that they should be well pro- 

 vided with honej' for the winter. 



I am frank to confess that the last 

 year has been the poorest throughout 

 Indiana, as a honey season, that I have 

 witnessed in 50 years, and there will 

 not be a hundred pounds of honey 

 placed on the market, of the 1887 crop, 

 for each thousand pounds of 1886 crop, 

 or, in other words, not one-tenth as 

 much honey was gathered the last year 

 as was gathered in 1886, and I predict 

 that whoever eats honey on the good, 

 old buckwheat cakes for breakfast, will 

 pay a handsome price for both honey 

 and buckwheat flour. 



I know that the science of bee-keep- 

 ing is fast simmering down and into 

 the hands of only those who will pay 

 proper attention to the business, in 

 order to make it a success. I also find 

 that it is not those who can count the 

 greatest number of colonies that make 

 the most money at keeping bees, hence 

 it is quite evident that a locality or 

 certain neighborhood may become 

 overstocked with bees, just the same 

 as a given number of acres of grass 

 can be overstocked with cattle, horses 

 or sheep. 



Xlie Unknonrable In Bee-keeping. 



I do not know that bees can be suc- 

 cessfully kept where there is no natural 

 resources for their support, and no ef- 

 fort made bj' the bee-master to supply 

 pasture for them to gather honey from; 

 neither do I know that bees can be 

 made profitable in any apiary unless 

 they receive proper care and attention 

 in order to make them so. I have also 

 long since found out that pure Italian 

 bees, and the black or German bees of 

 this country, cannot be kept in the 

 same apiary and have all the increase 

 pure of either race. Neither do I 

 know (as some profess) that a pure 

 Italian queen that has mated with a 

 black drone, can produce pure Italian 

 drones aftei'wards, notwithstanding the 

 opinions of some naturalists to the con- 

 trary ; and furthermore, I have not yet 

 learned that virgin queens can produce 

 drones that can be relied upon in 

 further propagation of their race ; or 

 in other words, I do not know that 

 such drones can be of any use in the 

 fertilization of other queens, either 

 Italian or native. To sum it all up, I 

 am still of the opinion that if a book 

 was written containing all that we did 

 not know, it would be a much larger 

 volume than the one would be if all we 

 know about bees were published in it. 

 Attend to the bees, and they will pay ! 



Battle Ground, *o Ind. 



