20 



THE BEE-KEEPEBS' REVIEW. 



very small cork hives and incorrectly man- 

 aged. A beginning has been made, and the 

 apiculture of Portugal, like its science and its 

 literature, will be modeled on that of France. 



F. Maguin'reports a backward condition 

 of bee-keeping in the Argentine Republic, 

 owing to repressive laws, though it has as 

 many natural advantages as Chili for the 

 production of honey. Competition of other 

 than Chilian honey, it seems likely, is not 

 to be looked for very soon from South 

 America. E. Whymper makes no mention 

 of bee-keeping in Ecuador in his book 

 " Travels among the Great Andes of the 

 Equator. " 



Leipziger Bienenzeitung. — At the Leipzig 

 convention, G. Lichtenthaeler, in an essay, 

 declared he had no more apprehensions 

 about curing foul brood. His practice is to 

 contract the colony to % or }2 its previous 

 space, cutting out and destroying the brood 

 when ;50 to 50 per cent, is diseased, and 

 leaving no entrance but the flight-hole. It 

 is then left alone until the disease disap- 

 pears, which is in one or two months, some- 

 times three. He does not give the extent of 

 his experience. The theory is, that by so 

 doing the formic acid of the colony is con- 

 centrated ; also that the bees are enabled to 

 deal with every cell, throwing out the dead 

 larva^ before they become completely rot- 

 ten. 



The new Zaehringer smoker (Review, p. 

 168) has victoriously driven the ordinary 

 smoker out of the field, says Alois Alfonsus. 



The same writer reports an experiment 

 simultaneously performed by Herren Gu- 

 enthen and Seidel to ascertain the normal 

 form of the excrement of bees. Each 

 drummed out or brushed off colonies into 

 straw hives, which were set over sheets of 

 paper. (It is not clear from his description 

 whether the hives were set directly on the 

 paper or at a little height above.) The pa- 

 per became thickly strewed with excrement 

 in the form of dry grains. 



Herr Thobe reports a case of queenlessness 

 caused by a second swarm taking off with 

 it both queens from the queen- cells which 

 the bee-keeper had left with the old colony, 

 after it swarmed the first time. 



Bienen-Vatek. — The Vienna Association 

 printed 25,000 pieces of wrapping-paper, for 

 honey-glasses, with an appropriate discourse 

 on the advantages of the use of honey, and 

 places them at the disposal of its numbers 

 at cost prices. 



J. Winkler, the proposer of this arrange- 

 ment, has some remarks which come in 

 very appropriately when one is trying to 

 decide whether honey is a luxury or a staple : 

 " InSchwechat there was formerly no firm 

 that handled table delicacies. A merchant 

 undertook to introduce the business. The 

 public became accustomed to delicacies ; 

 they became necessaries, and the merchant 

 had a good trade. It was not long until 

 another business man established a second 

 house, which flourishes also. But should 

 both houses close, the public would again be- 

 come accustomed to do without them. Is it 

 not the same with honey as with delicacies ? " 



The members of the Vienna Association 

 and its branches in ISiM had 19,295 colonies 

 of bees, of which 12,i^4() were in frame hives. 

 The average yield of honey was nearly 8 

 pounds and 7 ounces to the colony ; of wa^, 

 8J2 ounces. Some might be inclined to sus- 

 pect overstocking them ; but that idea seems 

 not to have entered the heads of the powers 

 that be, who are energetically pushing the 

 spread of bee-keeping by traveling lecturers, 

 etc. 



Dr. Dzierzon and Pastor Weygand, at the 

 Leipzig convention, supported the state- 

 ment that colonies which are too strong do 

 not yield a proportionate amount of surplus. 



L'Apicoltoke. — The editor believes that 

 a strong colony will procure enough for its 

 daily consumption at a time when a mod- 

 erate one is drawing on its reserve stores, or 

 will store surplus when the other is barely 

 maintaining itself ; hence concludes that a 

 colony boiling over with bees after the main 

 flow, though it may not be a special advan- 

 tage, is not on the other hand a disadvantage. 



Dr. Metelli sustains the opinion that the 

 quantity of reserve stores influences the pro- 

 duction of brood in spring. 



He also says egg-laying is facilitated, 

 among other things, by the presentiment, 

 due to natural selection, that there will be 

 a good flow. Though evolution is generally 

 accepted, this is going pretty far for a state- 

 ment of fact. 



Prices of honey in Italy, says Dr. Dubini, 

 are from nearly 9 to 10 i5-5 cents a pound for 

 the best quality. Wholesale prices are less. 

 Sections average a little over 13 cents. 



G. Barucco is of the opinion that when 

 the forage is distant only a couple of miles 

 or so, that the bees will gather enough for 

 their own use, but little or nothing for the 

 bee-keeper. Last year he irrigated his own 



