216 



THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW. 



ft. long, and wide and high enough in lower 

 story to take the frame crosswise. The par- 

 titions between the brood nests are half-inch 

 board, and 1.') in. from center to center. The 

 top stories are built to take the frame across 

 the other way. and are 'JO inches lony, which 



makes it easy to remove lower frames. The 

 spaces at sides and ends, and below each 

 row of hives, are tilled with chaff. Chaff 

 cushions are used in top story in winter. 

 The entrances pass out from under the 

 brood-nests something like this: 



The portico on Nos. 3 and .5 prevents bees 

 mixing. As I said, this house is a success 

 summer and winter. I would rather handle 

 bees in it any time than elsewhere. When 

 it is warm, and I want to work in the "open 

 air" with a nice shade overhead, I just open 

 all the doors. When robbers are trouble- 

 some, I open one door in front of the hive I 

 am working, and all the bees that take wing 

 fly out. In extracting, bees can be skaken 

 into top story or in front of entrance. When 

 I said that I intended to adopt this prin- 

 ciple unanimously, I meant that I would 

 place the colonies close enough together in 

 winter to keep each other warm. But I re- 

 serve this subject for another time. 



Oliver Foster." 



Bro. Hill's Beview of Advanced Bee Cul- 

 ture. 

 Last month I gave a short extract from 

 the review of " Advanced Bee Culture " as 

 Bro. Hill, of the C/wft/f, is giving it to his 

 readers. This extract was given to show that 

 the work was not being fairly done. I will 

 now give the article entire and then take up 

 the task of i-eplying to Bro. Hill upon those 

 points where we differ. 



" We have received a copj'of the new book 

 with the above title written by W. Z. Hutch- 

 inson. It contains 100 pages the size of the 



Guide. Price r)Oc., paper cover. It is got- 

 ten up in the finest 8tyle,and the typographi- 

 cal features are an honor to our profession. 

 The title has a tendency to lead the pur- 

 chaser to expect something new and superior 

 to any other book published. We fear that 

 friend Hutchinson has undertaken more in 

 giving out this impression than he 

 can fulfil. The first topic in the new 

 book is " Care of Bees in Winter." 

 We have reviewed it carefully and fail to 

 find anything in it either advanced or new 

 and the good things practical and sensible 

 are entirely omitted. The subject is nicely 

 treated from a literary or rhetorical point of 

 view, but is of no practical value as an in- 

 structor for bee-keepers because it lacks de- 

 tail and system. A greater part of the article 

 is made up of how to do things wrong in- 

 stead of telling how to feed and prepare bees 

 for winter at the propei time. He takes so 

 much space telling how to do the work out of 

 season in a disagreeable, impractical way, 

 and at times is apt to leave the impression 

 with the reader that neglected bees can be 

 just as well cared for in January as in Sep- 

 tember and October. It looks to us as if a 

 book calculated to teach advanced bee-cul- 

 ture should tell how and when to do the 

 work, and not devote two-thirds of its space 

 telling how to patch up old sores causediby 

 neglect of slow, afternoon bee-keepers. 



To give directions for opening hives in a 

 cellar or on summer stands during cold 

 weather, for the purpose of robbing one hive 

 to help another is not even advanced or 

 sensible. Considerable space is used in tell- 

 ing how to feed candy to bees during cold 

 weather. This is not new or advanced, be- 

 cause A. I. Root fifteen years ago boomed 

 the candy feeding, enthusing bee-keepers 

 to use it until he had large sales of it at a 

 profit to himself and at a loss to his custom- 

 ers. About the most amusing thing we have 

 heard was of a bee-keepers' wife figuring up 

 the Root candy bill, with the ridiculous 

 losses of colonies and failures of surplus her 

 husband had sustained. 



Advanced practical bee-keepers now a- 

 days feed during October granulated sugar 

 syrup, mixed with honey, warm, and in good 

 bee feeders. This food is stored in the 

 combs around and above the cluster con- 

 venient for the bees in the natural way. The 

 idea of a man's writing up advanced bee cul- 

 ture and tell about robbing and spoiling a 

 good colony to fix up a poor one, and then 

 daubing around with candy, carpet rags, etc., 

 all wiutei', is, to say the least, bad taste. 

 One-fifth of the article is devoted to killing 

 mice, making this one of the most im- 

 portant features in wintering bees. He gives 

 the temperature at which the cellar should 

 be kept but does not say anything about 

 what the results or effects would be if such a 

 temperature is not maintained. He says 

 nothing about a stove in the cellar fired 

 with hard coal to keep up the tempefature 

 and to ventilate. He says nothing about an 

 ice box the full height of the cellar with a 

 door to put in the ice and a ventilation at 

 bottom and top. The box should have heavy 

 ribs nailed perpendicularly inside to keep 

 the ice away from the sides so that the air 



