1878. 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



19 



From Different Fields. 



^ HAVE kept bees for 15 years, in box hives most 

 W of the time. I now have 65 swarms; 60 in mova- 

 t^ ble comb hive, and 5 in box hives, which I shall 

 transfer next spring- if all goes well. I boug-ht 3 

 Italian queens and introduced them all right. I have 

 tried the fdn. and like it first rate. I have the right 

 to use the Isham box and like it pretty well. Do you 

 think I am on the right track? Bees have not done 

 very well this year; I had 44 in the spring, increased 

 to 65, and took about 500 lbs. of box honey. Weather 

 Is very dry. Enclosed please find the view of my 

 place. Benjamin Palkner. 



Wyoming, N. Y., Dec. 11th, 1877. 



Well, really friend F., I should think you 

 were pretty nearly on the right track \f I 

 were to judge from the excellent stereoscop- 

 ic view you have sent. Your picturesque 

 location, on the side hill, with your hives 

 aiTanged in terraces tier above tier, is very 

 pretty indeed, but I would suggest that you 

 place the hives a little farther apart, and the 

 rows a little closer together. You would 

 then get them a little nearer your honey 

 house, and thus save much laborious carry- 

 ing, if you should happen to get 100 lbs. of 

 honey from each hive some season. I should 

 rather think you had been patronizing pat- 

 ent hive men from the numoer of different 

 styles of hives we see. It seems to me there 

 would be a fine place for a Sabbath school 

 over among those trees on the top of the hill, 

 friend P., and if I were sure that were the 

 place where you were at work every Sunday, 

 I should not have the least doubt in the 

 world about your being on the "right track," 

 nor would you. May God bless and guide 

 you and all who call that pretty little spot 

 "•home." 



I started 1st of May with 60 colonies have 87 now; 

 made 6,000 lbs. surplus mostly extracted. Have sold 

 the same for $10. per hundred; I put it up in butter- 

 firkins, charging $1,00 for keg, then it did not make 

 much odds to me whether people took a full keg or 

 not. The month of May was a hard month here for 

 bees, mine were killing their drones when fruit ti-ees 

 were in bloom. Jas. Scott. 



Epworth, la., Dec. 13th, 1877. 



The grape sugar will prove a sure and ef- 

 fectual remedy for killing off the drones 

 during a dearth of honey, for it will keep 

 brood-rearing going nicely, and the bees do 

 not like it well enough to allow it to incite 

 robbing. As soon as honey from the fields 

 is to be obtained, they will abandon it alto- 

 gether. 



What do you think? N. C. Mitchell was in the south- 

 eastern pnrt of this county this summer and got up 

 a class. Even W. Meadows took lessons after reading 

 Gleanings. I had warned some of the bee-keepers 

 in that locality to beware of him, for I had heard he 

 was to be there. About 3 weeks ago a Mr. Lehman, 

 from Missouri, was in our city with the Lehman 

 hive. I told him I would call at the hotel and see his 

 wonderful hive, that even Mr. Langstroth admitted 

 was a better one than his. When I called on Mr. Leh- 

 man, he was not in. Though he was in our town two 

 weeks, he did not again call on me till the evening- 

 before he was to leave, and that night he had an en- 

 gagement. He ga\'e practical bee men a wide berth. 



I put my bees in the cellar on the 3d inst. Temper- 

 ature out door 40^, cellar had stood at 50^ and the bees 

 are buzzing and carrying out the dead. This is en- 

 tirely too warm, and some of these freezing nights 

 I will bring the temperature below 40^ if I can. 



T. G. McGaw. 



Monmouth, Ills., Dec. 15th, 1877. 



INTRODUCING QUEENS WITHOUT BEES WITH THEM. 



Your reply to Lawrence Johnson, (see page 230 

 Dec. No.) does not seem to me to meet the case. 

 When I commenced Italianizing I lost several valu- 

 able queens in just about the same way. I watched 

 proceedings and discovered that the bees would try 

 their best to sting the bees in the cage. I made up 

 my mind that if the workers were left out they would 

 be less vindictive. Since then I have taken out all 

 the workers, i. e., left only the queen in the cage and 

 have lost none in that way. This method gives the 

 new queen a better chance to take care of herself. 

 In one case bees and queen were all killed in about 

 two hours. Another queen was immediatley put In 

 the same cage alone and introduced successfully. 



G. B. Replogle. 



Unionville, Iowa., Dec. 12th, 1877. 



We have often introduced queens alone, 

 but never thought of its making the differ- 

 ence you mention. From what we have seen 

 of their ways of doing, we are somewhat in- 

 clined to think it not always the case. 

 Should careful exi^eriinents verify your posi- 

 tion in the matter, we will give it a place in 

 the A B C, and we thank you for calling at- 

 tention to it. 



There was a bee tamer here some lime ago who 

 was going to teach me to tame bees for 3f2.50. I told 

 him if he didn't want to be put in the humbug list he 

 would better not say anything more about bee tam- 

 ing. Some of our neighbors paid him for teaching 

 them the trick, but I don't know how it is done nor 

 do I care to; I went "through the mill" with patent 

 hives. They can't get me any more on patents nor 

 bee taming nor anything of the sort. I sold my hon- 

 ey for 20c per lb. in St,Louis, Mo., 



John Boerstleb. 



Gilead, Ills., Nov. 11th, 1877. 



I started in the spring of 1877 with 10 stands of Ital- 

 ians. I increased to 20 and sold 550 lbs. honey. I took 

 no honey from them after the first of July, and they 

 have plenty for winter. They have so much that it 

 runs out of the hive every time we have a cold spell. 

 What is the cause, and what the remedy? I would be 

 glad to have some light in the matter. The past sea- 

 son was mj' first in bee-keeping. I did not get as 

 large a yield as some of my fellow bee-keepers but 

 am satisifled with what I did get, and hope by the aid 

 of your Journal to do a little better next season. I 

 had 6 ovit of 11 of my queens, the past season, fertil- 

 ized by the blacks. One of my swai-ms went to the 

 woods, and I followed them to their new home. I 

 thought they should not get the better of me, so I 

 chopped the tree; took them home and clipped the 

 wings of the queen. That did not suit their taste, 

 and their queen was superseded by a hybrid. I shall 

 dispense with the hybrids in the spring. If you can 

 furnish me a half dozen hj^brid queens reared from 

 imported mothers, I will send my order in as soon as 

 they can be obtained. Joseph Hayman. 



East Ringgold, 0„ Dec. 14th, 1877. 



We think the honey runs out because the 

 hive is so large they cannot keep the whole 

 interior warm, and the frost cracks the 

 combs ; their breath also condenses on the 

 colder portions, forms icicles, and when a 

 thaw comes, this mixes with tlie honey, and 

 the sweetened water runs out at the en- 

 trance. The remedy is to have the winter 

 apartment small, and protected so tliat frost 

 does not get in. At present, it looks as 

 though we should be entirely unable to sup- 

 ply the demand for queens ; and to avoid 

 disai)pointing our friends, I think we had 

 better m;ike no promises at all. If you send 

 us your orders, we will do the best we can, 

 but we shall, in all probability, have to pur- 

 chase queens from North, South, East and 

 West ; and you really must not scold, if we 

 hand your order to some other person to fill, 

 in default of a better way. Of course orders 

 will be filled in rotation, as tar as possible. 



