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SPANISH-NEEDLE. 



Good Flow of Fall Honey— A 

 Streak of L.uek. 



Written for the American Bee Journal 

 BY JOS. M. HAMBAUGH. 



Having two out-apiaries in connec- 

 tion with my home apiary and fai'm 

 work combined, has made this one of 

 the busiest seasons on record. Did I 

 sit down and pine over the discourag- 

 ing results of last year ? Hardly. I 

 simply made the best of circumstances, 

 and set myself to work with renewed 

 zeal, notwithstanding the taunts of the 

 "wiseacres" and "knowing ones," 

 who from the beginning said, " I told 

 you that you would get bee-stung." 



Well, my bees were divided as be- 

 fore stated, into three yards, the ones 

 at home composed of Italians and 

 hybrids, and all three yards were ac- 

 cessible to linden timber. White 

 clover was a complete failure, and 

 many colonies had to be fed to bridge 

 them over from fruit-bloom to bass- 

 wood, and when this bloom came — 

 which was the most profuse I ever saw 

 in this section — the bees seemed to 

 revel in their glorj% and our long-pent- 

 up enthusiasm was boundless. 



We were too sure, however, for 

 though the surplus receptacles were 

 quickly filled, the nertar seemed ex- 

 ceedingly crude, and we waited pa- 

 tientlj' to see the white cappings ap- 

 pear — the apiarist's criterion for ripe 

 honey. The golden plumes began to 

 drop, and seed-balls appear, and yet 

 our honey was uncapped. 



On July 19 the attention of the bees 

 was drawn to the river bottom, onl}- 

 from one-half to a mile distant, and 

 having adverse experience with honey- 

 dew and dark honey, I concluded that 

 I would not allow the linden honey to 

 mix with it, and I extracted, and now 

 comes the problem of getting rid of 

 about 1,000 pounds of unripe linden 

 honey. 



It was about this time that button- 

 bush began to yield quite a showing 

 for honey, and brood-rearing and 

 swarming was the order of the da}', 

 where colonies were not given plenty 

 of room, and this served to put all the 

 colonies in splendid condition for the 

 fall harvest. It was a sight to see the 

 seething mass of insects issuing from 

 a 3-stor3', 10-frame Simplicity hive, 

 with one inch blocks under the front 

 corners to give them vent, and one 

 would wonder how many of the 8- 

 frame divisible brood-chamber hives it 



would take to produce the same re- 

 sults. 



Never in my memoi-y have I seen 

 honej' come in as lively as it did dur- 

 ing the cereopsis or Spanish-needle 

 flow ; and the beauty of it was, it 

 seemed to be " already cooked," and 

 almost as soon as the cells were filled, 

 they were sealed. One colony pro- 

 duced 73 pounds of honey in five days' 

 time ; another one, 86 pounds in ten 

 days ; and the gross receipts from 42 

 colonies at the home apiary was 2,009 

 pounds of honey at one extracting, and 

 they had been extracted from but 5 to 

 8 days previous — an average of 47 

 pounds per colony. 



My other apiaries did remarkably 

 well, but the Italians and hybrids " get 

 away" with the ordinary bee by odds. 

 The total product of one Italian colony 

 of bees was 264 pounds. I am not 

 prepared to give any report just yet, 

 but it will aggregate nearly 10,000 

 pounds. So please do not class me 

 among " blasted hopes " and one of 

 the "bea-stung." 



Spring, Ills.,. Oct. 8, 1888. 



COIVVEBITIOW DIRECTORY. 



1888 Time ana Place ot Mteting. 



Oct. 20.- Wabash County, at Wabash, Ind. 



Henry Cripe, Sec North Manchester, Ind. 



Nov. 14.— Alabama State, at Montgomery. Ala. 



J. M. Jenkins, Wetumpka, Ala. 



Nov. 21, 22.— Pan-Handle, at Wheeling, W. Va. 



W. L. KiDsey, Sec, , Blaine, O. 



Dec. —.—Michigan State", at Jackson, Mich. 



H. i). Cutting. Sec. Clinton, Mich. 



tW In order to have this table complete, Secre- 

 taries are requested to forward full particulars of 

 time and place of future meetings.— Ed. 



More tban Half a Crop.— Daniel 

 Sheldon, Strawberry Point, Iowa, on Oct. 

 5, 18S8, says : 



Although the first bloom of white clover 

 yielded but little hooey here, basswond, 

 second bloom of white clover, lioise-niint, 

 golflen-rod, etc., have kept the industrious 

 little workers busy until they have secured 

 more than half a cropiu this S' ctioii. Bee- 

 keepers are not discouraKed here. I have 

 had uniform succes.-i in cellar wintering of 

 bees. I raise the hives up im inch blocks, 

 keep the temperature at about 40°, and re- 

 move the dead bees frequently. 



Buckwheat and Alsike 4Jlover. 



— C. A. Bunch, La Paz, Ind., ou Oct. 8, 1888, 

 writes : 



As I believe that buckwheat alway%pro- 

 duces nectar in this locality, I value the 

 plant very much. I do not think that it 

 produces a large amount of honey, though 

 It puts the bees in good condition for golden- 



rod, which out-stripped all plants and 

 honey or nectar-producing trees here this 

 season. There was ten acres of buckwheat 

 is less than one-half mile of my apiary, 

 which was alive with bees almost every 

 morning until 9 a.m., and on some warm, 

 misty days until later or nearly noon, al- 

 though August and September were very 

 dry months, with very little rain. I think 

 that my 38 colonies stored some over 200 

 pounds of honey from buckwheat in one- 

 pound sections, which is not so bad, X think, 

 considering the season we have had. I have 

 had a small amount of Alsike clover on my 

 place for the last two years, which seems to 

 be good as a honey-plant, as well as for pas- 

 ture. I expect to sow a half bushel of 

 Alsike clover next spring. 



No Surplus Honey.— Henry A.Hyle, 

 Redwood, N. T., on Oct. 5, 1888, says : 



I now have 5 colonies of bees, but I re- 

 ceived no surplus honey this year, and I 

 will have to feed my bees pretty well to 

 make up for the lacu of honey for winter 

 stores. 1 lost i colonies last winter. I have 

 a good location for keeping bees, and after 

 three years' experience. I think that I am 

 safe in keeping more bees than heretofore. 



Hardly an Averag^e Fall Crop. 



— W. M. Woodward, Custer Park, Ills., on 

 Oct. 6, 1888, writes : 



The honey crop has been slow here. 

 There was none at all until corn tasseled, 

 when honey began to come slowly from 

 corn, and has continued to come from 

 heart's-ease and other fall flowers.- The 

 fall crop is hardly an average one, but a 

 great blessing for these times. 



Molasses Barrels and Jug^s for 

 Honey.— F. C. Erkel, Le Sueur, Minn., 

 on Oct. 7, 1888, writes : 



My bees have done as well as could be 

 expected considering the season. I moved 

 35 colonies last spring, by wagon, 13 miles, 

 on 2 or 3 feet of hay, and found the combs 

 all in good condition with one exception, 

 and they were not very bad. I got no honey 

 from clover this year, but the bees made 

 things lively for a few days on basswood, 

 but it did not last long ; however, they filled 

 up below in the hive, and 1 got some nice 

 white comb honey. 



Autumn flowers yielded well, and 1 ob- 

 tained considerable comb honey from that 

 source, besides a little more than doubling 

 my stock. The bees were determined to 

 swarm late, and kept me busy putting them 

 back. 1 have more than 1 want now, and 

 think that I shall kill 1.5 or 20 colonies and 

 extract the honey. I have a great deal to 

 learn about bees yet, especially how to pro- 

 duce comb honey. 1 would like the follow- 

 ing questions answered in the Bee Jour- 

 nal : 1. My 10-frame Langstroth hives are 

 nearly all full. Would it not be advisable 

 to extract from two or three frames before 

 getting them ready for the cellar ? 2. Would 

 it be advisable to put extracted honey in 

 second-hand molasses barrels, such as can 

 be bought at groceries ? 3. How would 

 common one-gallon jugs do to put extracted 

 honey in. if the honey was heated to keep 

 from granulating ? 



[1. Yes. 



2. If you do not care to preserve the 

 flavor, the molasses barrels may be used. 

 If you do want the flavor preserved, use 

 new kegs or new barrels. 



3. If it granulates, you will find it trouble- 

 some to liquefy and handle it.— Ed.] 



