120 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



May 



is like, we have only to brush the chaff lorward, 

 rJiise the quilt a little, and then if one colony lacks, 

 we can take Irom those that have to spare, and give 

 them abundance at once. I think I was fortunate in 

 building a house for my bees and packing them with 

 chaff, a.« I formerly wintered them out ot doors, and 

 many that used to be successful that way, have lost 

 heavily this winter. My bees did not attempt to fly 

 out much when the weather was too cool. 



I think friend Ila Michener will be able to give a 

 different report from that on page 78, March No. I 

 know the best swarm he has is one of those packed in 

 chaff, and while he has lost none thus packed, he has 

 lost by other methods, lost the one he had prepared 

 accoriling to Mr. Muth's plan, and even those he had 

 in his Irost " proof" wirtering house did not come out 

 altogether right. I think Mr. Michener experiments 

 too much with his bees, but I suppose he wants to 

 find out the best way of managing them so as to secure 

 the most profit with the least expenditure of capital, 

 etc., etc. Anson Minok. 



Low Banks P. o. Ontario, Canada. 



TerjTxs : Sl.OO I*er A.nnvini. 



[Including Postage.] 

 Foi' Club Rates see Last Page. 



3vcEI^I3^c^^A_, IvOi.a."^'. i, ist'T'. 



But love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, 

 hoping for nolhing again.— Luke, 6 ; 35. 



The month of April has with us been one of the 

 most beautiful ever known for liee culture. 



Our friend Hardin Haines says it "aint so," that he 

 has got 1(5 different kinds of hives in his apiary. The 

 type should have read six. 



OUK neighbors Shaw, Shane, and Dean, have all 

 wintered entii'«;ly vvithout loss. Do you not think we 

 are getting to be (luite "smart" here in Medina Co.? 

 Friend Ilice has also winteicd his house apiary with- 

 out loss if we understand him eorrectl). All who 

 have used the chaff, report most favorably in regard 

 to it. 



We have been selling bees for the past few days 

 quite lively. By odering hybrids for $7,00, we have 

 got rid of all that vve:-e undesirable. As the demand 

 seems to be more brisk for bees than for honey, we 

 think we shall try raising bees for awhile; with the 

 filled combs we have yet on hand since last season, 

 we think we can turn out pure Italians to order on 

 shoTt notice. With imported queens at 85,00— see 

 friend Bloorl's advertisement— it seems there ou.?ht to 

 be little excuse for keeping hybrids at all. 



A sunsCKiBEK says grape sugar for feeding bees 

 can be purchased for 3)<iC per lb. by the barrel at the 

 factory in Davenport, Iowa. With this and the fdn., 

 it would seem that some enterprising Yankee should 

 give us a nice colony of pure Italians in a new, one 

 story Simplicity hive, for an even $10, the queen to be 

 the daughter of an imported mother. If in an old 



hive, the price should be Sl,00 less. We will give the 

 names of all who will do this, one insertion free of 

 charge in our next number. Our reasons for doing 

 this are that we wish to enable our readers to save 

 the expense of shipping by purchasing as near home 

 as possible. 



-^►-♦♦* — 



Advertising in Gleanings seems to be profitable 

 sometimes, after all. Listen : 



The notice of combs for sale last summer, was final- 

 ly a complete success. I sold 430 by it. , 



P. T. NUNN, Peru, O., March 15th, 1877. 

 My mother advertised her bees last spring in 

 Gleanings and A. B. J., three times. She sold near- 

 ly 700 colonies of which at least 400 were the result of 

 her advertisements. 



Geo. Grimm, Jefferson, Wis., Apiil iOth, '77. 

 t m ■•■ ^ ■ 



GLOVES, HOW THE V WORK. 



The following is from a friend who says he can not 

 afford to take Gi^eanings, but asks so many questions 

 that we would almost prefer semling him it free, to 

 undertaking to answer them. His experience with 

 gloves is about the same as that of all who imagine 

 them an advantage, yet it never occurs to them that 

 it is the gloves that make the bees sting. 



1 made two, two story hives, but the bees would not 

 work in the upper story at all, 1 therelore made the 

 rest one story. I liavc Hi stands but have not had one 

 dollar's worth of hone\ Iroin them as yei. 



I put on a bee veil and buckskin gloves and went 

 after the bees last week; finding they liad lieeu build- 

 ing across the frames, I took the honey knife, gotten 

 of you, cut down between the frames,and got a few out 

 that way ; I then cut and fitted the comb in straight, 

 soldered it together with hot wax and put them back. 

 1 received about lUOO stings through the buckskin 

 gloves ; had my hanUs been bare I do not know how I 

 would have fared. 1 am going to try and fix things so 

 as to extract some honey this summer and expect to 

 get the tools to do it with, of you. 



lI.,GouLUiNG, Bulterville, Oregon, Mar. 30. '77. 



We wonder if his conscience (Ud not trouble him 

 after seeing so many of the llitle fellows give up their 

 lives in stinging those gloves? A little smoke would 

 have prevented getting a single sling, even if no veil 

 or gloves were used at all, and the lives of all these 

 innocent workers vvouid have been saved. 



THE NEW FEATURE OF OLTU .JOURNAL. 



Doubtless most of our readers .vho have taken 

 Gleanings for a term of years have been annoyed by 

 the repetition that we find it impossible to avoid, if 

 we do justice to the hosts of new beginners that are 

 coming on the stage each year lor the first time. This 

 we have decided to try to remedy, it can not well be 

 done by a text book, for a text book is in many res- 

 pects out of date in a single year. Should we publish 

 only a single thousand, perhaps before half of them 

 were sold something new would turn up that would 

 render them almost worthless, or in fact worse than 

 no information at all, on certain points. To remedy 

 this, we are going to the expense of having a book 

 kept \\\> in type that we may revise it every month, or 

 every iveek if need be. In other words, as fast as we 

 iliscover a mistake in this book, or a way in which it 

 can be improved, the improveuieut will be made be- 

 fore another copy is sent out. Besides this, as the 

 book will be published in numbers of 8 pages each— 

 we give the first in this number of Gleanings— we 

 shall use these in answering questions; instead of the 

 laboriiius work of answering by postal, or inserting 

 the same thing over and over again in Gleanings, 

 we shall simply mail the number treating of the ques- 

 tion asked, and leave it to the good nature of the 

 questioner to send us .5c for our trouble or not, as he 

 chooses. This metho<l of imparting information will 

 be something like the tank of ice water at our door. 

 It is given freely to everybody, and they are to pay 



