IH77. 



GLEANINGS IN B|:E OULTURE. 



129 



mexl d;^y the sun hmig Us foliage like wilted 

 'i'ah!):ige li'-ives. By heavy mulching and \ 

 Htuckets of water, we induced it to look up 

 ;igain. but it is far l)elnn(l its comrades, and 

 we iiave deci<led it best not to sever ''pa- 

 rental lios" in future at all, and if we are 

 (Cartful in lieing them close to the posts in 

 Jayingthem down, they are never in the way. 

 The ideii, that the culture of bees in any 

 way interferes with that of gi-apes is a joke 

 <ntirely outside of our exi>erience. Where 



grapes are trained thus, fowls if allowed 

 will malce sad havoc among them ; tlie l)ees 

 of course then work on thf bruised ones but 

 seldom otherwise. 



It may l)e \irged that the above is too 

 much trouble ; it is some, but the iine crops 

 of fruit that are almost sure to be secured 

 every season, should pay well for all the 

 trouble, and if you have more than is need- 

 ed for home use, you will find a ready sale 

 for such grapes at good prices. 



THE LAWN OR CHAFF HIVE APIARY, 



AVith these we can dispense with the grape 

 vines entirely, as their thick chaff packed 

 avails i)rotect them from the sun, as well as 

 from the frosts of winter. Such an apiary 

 may l>e made very pretty, for it is in reality 

 a ii.inature city, with its streets and thor- 

 oughfares. During the swarming season, it 

 will probably at times be quite a busy thor- 

 oughfare. Some expense and care is avoid- 

 f*d bj- this plan, it is true, but the hives cost 

 <;onsiderably more, and are rather unwieldy 

 to handle when bees are to be moved about, 

 sold etc. The fact that they can be safely 

 wintered on their summer stands, and that 

 very little preparation is needed to enable 

 them to winter safely, is much in their favor. 



THE HOUSE APIARY. 



This is a Aery old idea, having been rec- 

 ^•nimended and used at different times for 

 more than a century past. Witii the strides 

 that bee culture has been making recently, 

 new reasons have -come up for making it 

 de.siruble that the hives should be housed ; 

 and in spite of the difliculties, many house 



apiaries are now giving very good results, 

 and with perhaps less labor than when the 

 hives are kept in the open air. 



The objections to the house apiary, are, 

 first the expense, especially the first expense, 

 for one can make a start in bee culture with 

 a very small amount of capital, with the 

 out-door hives, and the sales of honey and 

 bees will at once furnish all the capital need- 

 ed, for a moderate yearly increase. With 

 the house, the capital must be furnished at 

 the outset to build the building, and a house 

 for 50 colonies, will cost much more than 

 the same number of hives. Most apiarists 

 prefer working in the open air to being 

 cramped up in a building, (no matter how 

 large it may be) even at the expense of hav- 

 ing to perform more labor and take more 

 steps ; secondly, in a building we are obliged 

 to get all the bees out of a room every time 

 we open a hive, and bees either dead or 

 alive, are very untidy when crushed by 

 careless footsteps on the floor of a room. 

 To avoid this, necessitates an almost in- 



