GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 
Nov 
130 
tt acted. One colony gave 204 lbs. box honey and a 
strong artificial swarm. Wc have no losses out-door® 
In winter, no disease whatever. The honey is 1'rom 
Blue Thistle and White Clover— of the former there 
are hundreds of acres near us. O. M. Brown. 
Winchester, Va. Sept. 29th, 1874. 
Those who advertise for honey in our col- 
umns, will we think take all you can produce. 
The “Blue Thistle” must be of considerable 
value, especially if it furnishes honey four 
month* in the year. Even if it is a bad weed, 
so long as Virginia farmers continue to grow 
it, we hope the bee-keepers of that section will 
endeavor to utilize the honey it produces, as 
far as possible. 
FRIEND NOVICE;— I have thought for some time 
l would send you a report of this season’s operations, 
and as we have got through extracting and looking 
over the bees preparatory to winter, have now got at 
it. We (T say we. for my wile' and I are in company 
in this business, she does the work while I superin- 
tend, being disabled,) have 52 colonies, just what we 
had one year ago this time, and twelve more, than five 
months ago. We put upper stories on 34 of our Lang- 
strotli hives, put t wo colonies in Long Idea hives ami 
four at making box honey. When white clover had 
done blossoming we bad just one box of honey (6 lbs.), 
and that was over half full from the year before. 
They did better on buckwheat however, for we have 
about 150 lbs. now. The thirty six we extracted from, 
brought in about 4250 lbs., and all have enough to 
winter on, perhaps more. From the clovers we got 
1300 lbs., we have several acres of Alsike, and it is 
splendid for bees, but Catnip for the amount of honey 
per plant, beats anything I ever saw. If all the cat- 
nip within range of our bees were gathered together, 1 
don't think it would cover more than an acre of 
ground; but he that as it may, from what there was, 
our bees gathered sixty gallons that weighs over 12 
lbs. to the gallon. I carry a little of the seed in my 
pocket all the time and when I see waste places on 
my 'farm that I think might as well be raising some 
honey as not, I scatter a pinch of seed. It wilt grow 
in fence corners or brush heaps lirst rate, and we are 
going to make such places useful. If it will pay to 
raise any plant for bees exclusively I think that plant 
is catnip— have so much faith in it that 1 shall try 
some next year at any rate. 
The clovers are go'od, and catnip is good, but for a 
sure thing give me buckwheat. It has not failed to 
give a good crop of honey for seven years in success- 
ion to my personal knowledge. The honey crop is 
more certain than the seed; this year both are good. 
We have on hand now over a ton of honey from that 
source, and they gathered all their winter supplies 
from it, which would he about 1500 lbs. more. Buck- 
wheat honey is dark colored and is not worth quite as 
much as clover, mine is lor sale at 12 cts. per lb. here, 
barrels Included. Catnip 14c. It is as light colored as 
clover but not of so good a flavor, at least in our opin- 
ion. 
And now Mr. Novice If you think we have done well, 
take a good share of the credit to yourself, lor 1 verily 
believe if it had not been for your so persistently ur- 
ging bee-keepers to extract their honey we would 
have been “fooling with box honey” yet. 
J. L. WOLFENDEN, Adams, VVis. Oct. 13th, 1874. 
May continued prosperity be the lot of both 
you and your wife friend W. To you in your 
misfortune ’twould seem that she is a “help- 
meet” truly. May wc take the liberty to kind- 
ly suggest that she in her ambition be not 
allowed to do too much of the heavy work in 
the Apiary. A few men in our land show the 
effects of too much hard work, but far greater 
is the number of wives and mothers that even 
at an age that should be the prime of life, show 
unmistakable evidences of too much care, and 
alas too often also, the effects of work physic- 
ally beyond their strength. Who lias not oc- 
casionally contrasted the happy girl of 20, 
with the worn out woman of 40 or 50. 
We should really like to hear from Mrs. W., 
for we feel sure from the way you write that 
she too has had a pleasant summer amid the 
Vices. Scatter the catnip seed by all means. 
We think it can never prove a troublesome 
weed in any event. 
Of course we can’t help admiring the way in whir-', 
you keep things lively about that apiary of yours: a 
we look in from month to month, we are forcibly V. - 
minded of looking in on a hive ol' busy workers, at ih,- 
commencement of the warm season": we never 
things in statu quo, as the latins say, but lind that 
great changes are made even in three days. We are 
sorry you have got cider mixed with your winter feed, 
but if you had enough of those combs sealed up in 
August with sugar syrup, you will be all right yet. 
We think we can winter almost anything but from 
your description we don’t want any eider in our win- 
ter stores. 
J. 1\ Moore, Binghampton, N. Y. Oct. 12th, 1874. 
We thank you for your good opinion friend 
M., but we can hardly feci that we deserve 
very much credit, when so many are going 
way ah cad of us in increase of stock as 
well as surplus honey. Wc try to console 
ourselves by thinking if we do remain down 
towards towards “the foot of class” we proba- 
bly shall be nearer the mass of our readers 
than if we were side by side with you and 
Doolittle, who get more box honey than we do 
extracted. 
Don’t know hut 1 ought to say something about 
bees if it has been a poor season lor honey, in conse- 
quence of the most severe drouth ever known, even 
by the “oldest inhabitant.” From 21 colonies have 
taken 1700 lbs. honey and increased to 45 colonies. 
Henry Farmer, Ilart, Mich. 
Will not clean old rag carpets, if whole, do for bee 
quilts? say two thicknesses— a strip of quilt might lie 
put around the edges so that it would tuck down 
better aud make tight, what think ye ? 
Wesley Brown, Homer, >!. Y. Oct. 14th, 1874. 
Old carpet does very well but they are more 
apt to be so hard as to kill bees, and in tearing 
them loose from the frames the propolis some- 
times pulls out pieces that may thus get into 
the honey. The requisite qualities in a quilt 
seem to be softness, pliability, porosity and 
strength. W c have made some experiments with 
various fabrics but none seem to answer all 
purposes so well as those we have described. 
Coarse woolen would many times do were it 
not for the fibres pulling out and making the 
hive untidy, to say nothing of its getting into 
the honey. 
My report of Apiary is estimated at 2500 lbs. comb. 
500 fbs. ext’d honey, and (5(5 swarms natural and arti- 
flcial. Started to ’winter 48 hives, lost in winter, one, 
in spring, one, leaving me 4(5 for the above result. 
J. L. Davis, Delhi, Mich. Oct. 10th, 1871. 
Now r am an old man verging on 72 and have, all 
my days 1 may say, kept bees in different kinds of 
box hives. I am now trying frame hives; my frames 
are 12 inches deep by 10 long, but the thing that- 
bothers me is, the bees work their comb across the 
frames and also stick thorn to side of hive. 
John Dawson, Pontiac, Mich. Aug. 23rd, 1871. 
Have all combs built between two good ones 
and also put a finished comb next the side of 
the hive, if they persist in it. Some colonies 
seem much more disposed than others to build 
comb irregularly. 
I think we shall have to put Gleanings on the list 
of the tardy- I have not rec’d the Oct. No. yet. 
J. Pratt, Mallet Creek, o. Oct. 13th, 1874. 
Now friend P., and several others, we here- 
by protest against being put on any such list, 
for we have mailed every No. so far, promptly 
on or before the 30th of each month, and we 
beg you in future to conclude that the Post 
j Office Dcp’t has failed, that the cars are off the 
I track or that Uncle Sam lias suspended busi- 
