328 



THE BEE-KEEPERS^ REVIEW. 



the rule. This, too, without any apparent 

 cause ! There are no more bees in my vicin- 

 ity now than there were then. No great 

 amount of ground has been broken up, and 

 the basswood trees and fruit have certainly 

 greatly increased. During the last ten years 

 I have cultivated from three to five acres of 

 sweet clover, which has now become scat- 

 tered far and near, and yet my average yield 

 is getting less all the time. My bees are 

 certainly a great improvement over what 

 they were ten years ago. And my hives and 

 fixtures are not to be compared to what I 

 then had. Then where is the trouble? I 

 hope some of our heavy bee men can tell me. 

 To be sure the bee business is not my only 

 bread and butter, as I can live without it ; 

 but I like the business as it affords a great 

 scope for new thoughts and devices. But 

 then, all these things become very tiresome 

 if the business does not pay. 



But how is the self hiver going to help us 

 out of this difficulty ? I believe that in our 

 section where there are more than 100 hives 

 in a radius of three miles, the locality is 

 overstocked, especially in poor seasons. 

 This fact was forcibly presented to me some 

 four years ago. I then had about 175 colon- 

 ies at my home place, and not over ten lbs. 

 surplus to a hive, and I thought that the 

 same condition was general. About this 

 time a friend invited me to his place some 

 six miles away to help him remove the sur- 

 plus honey from four hives that had received 

 no attention except putting on the sections. 

 What was my surprise when I found these 

 neglected, weed grown hives, each contain- 

 ing over fifty pounds of fine sections of 

 clover honey. The country was as dry as in 

 my vicinity, but upon inquiring I found 

 there were less than fifty colonies of bees in 

 that neighborhood. With the self hiver I 

 had no difficulty in running my apiary of 

 about 100 hives at home and another of 

 about the same number seven miles away 

 without help. Now, I could just about 

 as well have taken care of them had I put 

 them in four places of fifty each. But I do 

 not think 100 is too many if the locations 

 are judiciously selected. I am sure had I 

 kept my 225 colonies all at home I would not 

 have had a single pound of surplus. I got 

 but a few thousand pounds as it was, but I 

 did not have to buy sugar to feed for winter. 

 Of course this is only a pointer, and I hope 

 others will give us something better. 



Milan, 111., Nov. 23, 181)1, 



Bee-Keepers' Review. 



PUBLISHED MONTHLY. 



W. Z. HOTCHHSLSOfl, Ed. & PPop. 



Terms : — $1.00 a year in advance Two copies, 

 $1.90 ; three for S2.70 : five for$+.<>0 : ten or more, 

 70 cents each. ^^ The Review is stopped at 

 the expiration of the time paid for, 



FLINT, MICHIGAN, DEC. 10, 1891. 



Eight extra pages this month. 



Give the Mo. Bee Keeper credit for hav- 

 ing been the first to show up the fallacy of 

 "Golden Carniolans." 



A Report op the Albany convention is 

 what I expected to give in this issue, but 

 when I reached home I found more matter 

 in type than the Review would hold. How 

 I did hate to throw out a page or more of 

 little interesting items, but they had to go. 

 In the Jan. No. I will tell about the Albany 

 trip. 



The Alfalpa Fields of the West are now 

 attracting much attention. What is now 

 needed is reliable information in regard to 

 the true state of affairs in this much-lauded 

 region. This is to be given the readers of 

 the Review in a series of articles written by 

 R. C. Aikin, of Loveland, Colorado. 



portraits or writers. 

 With this issue of the Review a new feature 

 is added, that of accompanying each article 

 with a portrait of its author. Of course, it 

 will not always be possible to do this, but 

 when it is, the reader will be allowed to en- 

 joy a picture of each writer's face while 

 reading the words he has written. 



HOW the review is prospermjg. 

 During the first year of its existence the 

 Review brought in $50 more than expenses. 

 The second year the profits were $650. The 

 third year they reached $813. I have not 

 yet " figured up " for this year, but I know 

 the profits will not be far from $ 10t)0. A 

 large share of this money has been used in 

 reducing the indebtedness on my home 



