r>i:voTi:i> to i3e:i:« aind no?<fEY, A1V33 hoaxes its^tjbkjestss. 



A. I. ROOT, 



Publisher and Profirietov 

 Mediiia, O. 



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Published Moutbly. 



r terms: «1.00Per Annum in Atl- 



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Vol. IV. 



OCTOBER 1, 1876. 



No. 10. 



THE 



PAPERS" ABTD THEIR IDEAS OF 

 BEE MATTERS. 



^E are in receipt of a very pleasant let- 

 ter from Hon. Henry Bligh, Vicar of 

 Abingdon, England, and among other things 

 he mentions and encloses some newspaper ex- 

 tracts I'egarding the stinging of a donkey which 

 was heedlessly tied in front of one of his 

 hives. Some "onplea?antness" occurred be- 

 tween his donkeyship and the bees and as he 

 was securely tethered, the bees stung him to 

 death. The item was taken up by the papers, 

 and they unfortunately decided that the whole 

 trouble was the result of the modern system 

 of bee-cultnre, and that had the bees not been 

 made furious by being deprived of their "hon- 

 est earnings," all would have been "lovely." 

 Their reasoning seems to have been as thought- 

 less as that of Prof. Riley, when he said the 

 depredations on the fruit wei'e the result of 

 the bees getting "hungry" because their own- 

 ers had neglected to feed them enough. A 

 bee-keeper of only moderate experience knows 

 that it is the powerful stocks only, that make 

 raids upon other hives, the groceries, or or- 

 chards ; and a colony which has reached the 

 point where they are without food, is abso- 

 lutely unable to make even a defensive attack, 

 let alone the ofiensive. We are glad to note 

 that the Abingdon Herald promptly cor- 

 rected the error, and apologized, when inform- 

 ed that the hive was well provisioned and had 

 a crop of surplus on the top, that had not 

 been disturbed during the season. 



Now we wish to be permitted to say a word 

 to the Agricultural and other papers which are 

 ill the habit of having a bee department. It is 

 very unsafe for an Editor who is not a bee- 

 keeper to clip items indiscriminately from 

 other papers. If some practical man near by 

 can be induced to furnish the items, they will 

 1)6 fresh and up to the times, and almost al- 

 ways practical and reiiable. About two years 

 ago we spoke of an item going the rounds of 

 the Vv^hole Agricultural press,\nd then it had 

 to go through the miscellaneous papers, the 

 Editors doubtless thinking it must be valua- 

 ble, just because it was to bo seen everywhere. 



We wondered then why it were not possible 

 that something of real merit or value could 

 not have a similar rur. Now, the Prairie 

 -f^^/'OTc'r has jast brought out the same thing 

 again, word for word,''and as they have been 



giving us some really valuable items of late, 

 we cannot think what does possess them. The 

 very title of the item, PruPMuj of broods, is un- 

 meaning jargon, and the matter itself might 

 be supposed to have been written before the 

 time of Huber. Should any one follow its 

 teachings, they would do their bees a positive 

 injury. 



We fear that Editors are sometimes careless 

 about the matter that is u.sed, and that many 

 times they either do not take the trouble to 

 examine, or have not the means of determin- 

 ing whether items belonging to these special 

 pursuits are fresh items of value and interest, 

 or only floating trash without value or sense. 



If we may take the liberty once more, we 

 would suggest that the Rural JVeio Yorler has 

 wasted nearly a column of their valuable pa- 

 per, in criticising one of J. W. Shearer's arti- 

 cles in the Magazine. The worst feature of it 

 is, that the tone is one of unkind criticism., 

 something we feel is certainly not needed to- 

 ward one so pleasant and honest as our friend 

 the Rev. Mr. Shearer. He has written much 

 that is very valuable, and if he really is at 

 fault in the harmless and unimportant points 

 mentioned, can we not let it pass with a gen- 

 tle reminder or mention of his error? Unkind 

 words between Editors will surely injure 

 most those who utter them, and the papers 

 that give place to them. Tell us of our faults 

 to be sui'e, but please do it in a neighborly 

 way. Words that are spoken, are easily recall- 

 ed, but those that appear in print, go far be- 

 yond our reach. 



"Father does a swarm of bees gather 50 lbs. 

 of honey in a day ? " 



"I tliink not my son." 



"Well, the Rural Ncio Yorker says they often 

 do, and that they will on a fair calculation 

 make §25,00 worth in 20 days. Can we not 

 believe what we read in the papers ?" 



In iho. Rural for Sept. 9th, the statement is 

 made, and we are also informed that the 50 

 lbs. comes in the long days of Augu.st when 

 the white and alsikc clover are in bloom. Al- 

 though the article is copied, (and has already 

 commenced going the rounds) the editor makes 

 no note, comment or caution; and can we 

 blame good, sound sensible farmers, for sayirig 

 a great part of our agricultural papers are the 

 work of men who do not really know what they 

 arc talking about V Has our friend Shearer, 

 ever uttered anv thing so mischievous? 



