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C01>fVEXTI0X DIRECTORY. 



1888. Time and Place of Meeting. 



Aug. 21.-N. W. Ills. & S. W Wis., at Leaf River Ills. 

 D. A. Fuller, Sec, Cherry Valley, Ills. 



Aug. 27.— Stark County, at Canton. O. 



Mark Thomson, Sec, Canton, O. 



Sept. 8.— Susquehanna County, at Montrose, Pa. 



H. M. Seeley, 8ec., Harford, Pa. 



Oct. 3-5.— North American, at (!!ohimbus. O. 



W. Z. Hutchinson. Sec. Flint, Micb. 



Dee. —.—Michigan State, at Jackson, Mich. 



H. D. Cutting, Sec, Clinton. Mich. 



I^^ In order to have this table complete, Secre- 

 taries are requested to forward full particulars of 

 time and place of future meetings.- GD. 



SEkmS^MiQM 



CSood Season iu Xexasii. — A. C. 



Ateu, Round Rock, Tex., ou Aug. 4, 1888, 

 says : 



Tlie report of my honey crop up to the 

 present lime is as follows : From a little 

 less tlian 100 colonies worked for extracted 

 honey, I have taken 7,000 pounds, with at 

 least 3,000 pounds more surplus now in tlie 

 hives. Bees are now working on cotton 

 and morning-glory, gathering a surplus 

 slowly, with broom-weed, rich-weed, etc., 

 still to bloom in a few weeks. Horse-mint 

 produced a great deal of honey this year. 

 On the whole, this will be a pretty good sea- 

 son here. 



The \¥na Basil.— Mrs. J. B. Curiee, 

 of Tamaroa, Ills., on July 27, 1888, writes : 



I enclose a specimen of a bee-plant ; it is 

 perennial, and about 2 feet high. Jt has 

 white blossoms with purple edges. It 

 grows in the prairie fields, and is covered 

 with bees from daylight until sundown. 

 Our bees pass over a field of buckwheat in 

 bloom iu order to go to this plant. It roars 

 like a swarm of bees when I walk among 

 the plants. I do not know the name of the 

 plant. My Chapman honey-plant has been 

 in bloom for a month, and the bees are 

 working on it finely. 



[This is Pycnanihcmum.llnif<iHum, one 

 of the wild Basils, but having much less 

 fragrance than Its congeners. It has often 

 been noted as a good honey-plant.— T. J. 



BUKRILL.J 



Uniting' Oolonivs and Italianiz- 

 ing — R. A. Williams, Poultney, Vt., on 

 Aug. 6, 1888, writes : 



I coranienced the past winter with 8 colo- 

 nies of bees, mostly in Langstroth hives. 

 The tops of the hives were filled with quilts 

 or bran sacks. They were wintered on the 

 summer stands, which are protected, for the 

 most part, from the north and west winds. 

 All of my colonies wintered in fair condi- 

 tion, and I have increased them, by natural 

 swarming, to 16 colonies, besides one swarm 

 that absconded. There has been a large 

 amount of white clover here, but it did not 

 seem to contain much honey. About all of 

 my surplus honey will be obtained from 4 

 or .5 colonies— from 30 to 60 pounds each. 

 The rest of the bees have ample stores for 

 winter, save a few late or second swarms. 



My bees are mostly blacks, with some 

 that are J^ or ^ Italians. 1 have wondered 

 if it were best to Italianize my bees ; but I 

 know that it would be a hard matter to 



keep them pure (some in this vicinity hav- 

 ing tried it, but failed, as they would mix 

 with the blacks, which are on all sides, 

 from % to 2 and 3 miles away). 



1 would like advice in regard to the fol- 

 lowing : I usually take up at the close of 

 the honey season, all that I think have not 

 honey enough to winter on, sprinkle with 

 peppermint water, and put the bees in with 

 a strong colony, with plenty of stores, tak- 

 ing the honey where there is not more than 

 14 to 16 pounds. I prefer to do this rather 

 than teed the bees ; and besides, I am in 

 need of the honey, and care less for the 

 number of colonies. Is my way right? 

 Can you suggest a better way ? I have 

 kept bees for eight years, but I have learned 

 more since I read yonr book—" Bees and 

 Honey"— and have taken the American 

 Bee Jouknal, than all the years previous. 



[Oh, yes ; it is better to unite the weak 

 colonies before putting them into winter 

 quarters. Your plan is good.— Ed ] 



Wever Say Fail.— H. E. Hill, Titus- 

 ville. Pa., on Aug. 4, 1888, says : 



Last year was a failure in this locality 

 for honey producers, and this season is 

 worse. "No surplus" is my report for 70 

 colonies, in fair condition ; while in 1886 I 

 took from S3 colonies in the same yard, 

 3,000 pounds of finished comb honey, and 

 .500 pounds of extracted, after transferring 

 the bees from boxes during fruit-bloom of 

 that year. Two entire failures in succes- 

 sion are discouraging : but " never say 

 fail !" 



Ionia Co., ^licli., Convention. — 



Harm Smith, of Ionia, Mich., Secretary of 

 the Association, sends the following re- 

 port : 



The Ionia County Bee-Keepers' Associa- 

 tion met in convention at the City Hall in 

 Ionia, Mich., on Aug. 3, 1888, 17 members 

 answering to roll call, 8 being new mem- 

 bers. The following statistics will indicate 

 the condition of the honey yield : 



Number of colonies reported, 878 ; in- 

 crease since May 1, 1888, 40; losses since 

 May 1, 38 ; sold since May 1, 13 ; honey 

 taken, pounds of extracted,70 ; honey taken, 

 pounds of comb, 761. The present condi- 

 tion of the brood-nest is ?.i filled. From re- 

 ports abroad, the same condition of affairs 

 exists throughout the northern States. 

 There is very little, if any, surplus of 

 clover or basswond honey taken anywhere. 

 The failure is attributed to cold, and es- 

 pecially cool nights. Colonies are generally 

 reported strong, and the fraternity are hope- 

 ful of a good fall yield. The convention 

 adjourned to the spring meeting, when 

 called by the executive board. 



Alsike Clover Yiel«le«l ^Vell.— 



Thos. Stokes, Minesing, Ont., on Aug. .3, 

 1888, writes : 



As I sit and listen to the joyful patter of 

 the soft rain on the roof to-night, I feel a 

 good deal more buoyant as regards the 

 future welfare of the bees. After seven 

 steady weeks of dry weather— with the ex- 

 ception of a few light showers, none of 

 which wet the ground over an inch deep— 

 tills is a glorious day, shower after shower, 

 until the ground is pretty thoroughly 

 soaked. Alsike clover has yielded very 

 well here during meadow blossom ; in fact, 

 my best colony produced 50 pounds of ex- 

 tracted honey in six days from it. During 

 those days it was warm, and the sun was 

 partially hid by summer clouds, with little 

 wind. The bees coining over from the back 

 of the hive dropped down at the entrance 



like pouring peas out of a pail. This clover 

 is sown more every year by farmers, simply 

 for hay and pasture, as no seed is raised, 

 and those that had it in this dry season 

 have cut a far larger tonnage than the 

 others ; so it will still be in vogue among 

 them. So far the bees have averaged 50 

 pounds per colony of extracted honey, with 

 good prospects ahead. 



Culver'.s Pliysic— C. H. Dibbern, of 

 Milan, Ills., on July 30, 1888, writes : 



I send you a specimen of a plant which I 

 find growing wild, that is new to me. It is 

 just now coming into bloom, and seems to 

 be very rich in honey. I counted six bees 

 on one head, and quite a number had two 

 and three, and they seem to stay quite 

 awhile, like they do on the Chapman honey- 

 plant. I shall cultivate some of this another 

 year, and would like to know its name. 



[The plant is Leptandra Virglnica, or 

 Culver's physic— T. J. Buheill.J 



TSo Swarms and JSo Honey.— O. 



R. Goodno, Carson City, Mich., on Aug. 6, 

 1888, writes : 



It continues as before— no swarms from 

 the 100 old colonies, and as yet I have seen 

 surplus honey in but two sections, and a 

 tablespoon would hold all they contain. 

 One week ago I had 79 colonies so full of 

 bees that they were hanging on the outside 

 of the hives. Some have enouEh to winter, 

 and others not enough to last them 30 days. 

 Tliere are not enouah drones to mate the 

 queens that fly. Many light colonies, when 

 disturbed, will "ball" the queen, and kill 

 her. Bees are working on buckwheat for 

 two or three hours in the morning ; they 

 have access to nearly 100 acres. In the 

 afternoon they spend their time in petty 

 quarreling. The air is full of one bee try- 

 ing to carry off another, with no disposition 

 to sting each other, but from the alighting- 

 board one will catch another by the leg, 

 and they go sailing through the air, some- 

 times becoming detached, and both return 

 to the hive. 



CJovernnient of Bees.— John W. 

 I'igg, Riverside, Iowa, writes as follows : 



The desire of man to govern bees, and 

 obtain knowledge of their habits, etc., was 

 the incentive to efforts which, by the Rev. 

 L. L. Langstroth, resulted in the invention 

 of the movable comb-frame. With the use 

 of tills invention began the control of bees, 

 aided much by later inventions, especially 

 in the use of the extractor and comb foun- 

 dation. 



Contemporary with the advancement in 

 the control of bees, there have been increas- 

 ing opportunities to observe their habits 

 and disinclinations ; but apiarists, except a 

 few, have seemingly been satisfied in their 

 t!Overning, and have not recognized that it 

 is a discordant government, as opposed to 

 what is natural or self-government, with 

 the adaptation of hives to certain habits and 

 tendencies of bees. 



Always mention your Post-Office, 

 County and State when writing to this 

 office. No matter where you may happen 

 to be for the hour when actually writing— 

 never mention anything but your perma- 

 nent address. To do otherwise leads to 

 confusion, unless you desire your address 

 changed. In that case state the old as well 

 as the new address. 



