THE R 
JAW. 
(Tk apiarian. 
BEE PLANTS. 
Pnor. Beat, communicates tbo following in¬ 
teresting particulars to the Michigan Fanner, 
respecting plants to which bees are partial: 
‘‘I am frequently asked to identify or give 
names to certain plants upon which some person 
has seen bees «t. work. This does not usually 
occupy much of my time, especially if the 
specimens are well put up, as most of them are 
known at sight or after a few moments’ exami¬ 
nation. 
But the thought occurs to me: of what, benefit 
can it he to the person sending the plant to 
know whether it is Aster mocrophyUuii Aster' 
prenanthoid.es , or A ster grandijlorus ; whether 
it is Snli/lagn pptiolaris, fjolidago Canadensis, or 
Solidago Missoui'icnsis ? My examples are some 
which are included in a list lately received. 
Of Asters, we have in the Northern States 
forty-one species, besides perhaps forty to one 
hundred more which much resemble them to a 
person unaccustomed to Botany. Of Solidago 
or Golden Boils, we have thirty-seven species 
and some others much resembling them. 
Scarcely one of these has a separate or distinct 
common name. Asters look too nearly alike to 
bo distinguished from each other by any one 
but an export. The same is true of Golden 
Rods end of a vast number of other bee plants. 
If once told the name of the species, people 
cannot ho trusted, in many oases, to gather 
seeds or point out the plant. They will got the 
species and even the genera “ all mixed up.” 
Even the botanist gets Bomo of them mixed 
occasionally. 
Our country is renowned for the abundance 
and variety of her Asters and Golden Rods in 
September till the hard frosts appear. These 
arc found in onen or unwooded regions, in 
swamps, along streams, and on the prairies. 
The fact, is, there are nearly a hundred times as 
great a variety of flowers which furnish becB 
with food, as most people imagine. On checking 
off, for a noted bee keeper who wanted to mnko 
a list of bee plants, be seemed much surprised 
at the great number, and said he only wanted 
the best of them. Which are the host? The 
forty-one Asters are all good. In one locality, 
certain species abound in great numbers; in 
other places some disappear and others . take 
their places. To be sure t horn are some Asters 
and other plants affoiding good honey or pollen, 
that rarely exist in large numbers. The same 
is true of Golden Rods and of many other 
plants. 1 suppose a plant is desirable if it exist 
in large enough quantity to afford much food 
during a long period, or if it afford food at a 
certain time when most other flowers are scarce. 
I have made the action or behavior of insects 
on flowers a study for years. Some flowers are 
only visited in tbo morning or forenoon, as the 
Dandelion; others in the afternoons, others at 
all times of tho day when not raining. I tell 
no news by saying thn t Basswood and Raspberries 
afford good honey, while Tnlip tree and Lobelia ' 
afford honey which is unpleasant or unwhole¬ 
some to some persons.” 
Prof. Boat, after mentioning the number of 
species of plants much frequented by hoes in 
twenty genera, concludes as follows:—"If I 
have added correctly I give, above, about 1775 
species from which hoes get more or less honey 
or pollen These grow east of the Mississippi 
river and north of Kentucky in the United 
States. Some, like the Grasses and Pinos, have 
no showy or fragrant flowers and afford little or 
no honey. As a general rule those plants which 
produce odorous or showy flowers, afford honey 
and will ho visited by honey bees, unless the 
flower is of a shape which makes it impossible 
for tho bee to reach tho food. 
It w'ould be a groat sourco of pleasure, and in 
some cases, perhaps, of profit also, for every 
bee keeper to be a good botanist. In fact, 
every person should study botany more or less, 
as any one can if he only tries and perseveres. 
The culture it gives, the enjoyment, tho dis¬ 
cipline, all place botany in a high position as a 
science.” 
--4-44- 
THE HONEY CROP. 
■ ( 
The. great advancement in tho production of : 
honey in the United States during the past few 
years gives us an inkliug of what may he done 
in the future. The American Grocer in speaking 
of this advance remarks that from the insignifi¬ 
cant and tincerjain pursuit of a few years ago, it 1 
has arisen to its present position as an honor- 1 
able, healthful and lucrative employment. It is ( 
not so long since the price asked for honey was 
a fancy one, and when only tho rich and ex- < 
travagant used much of it for the table. 1 
The extraordinary yield of honey during the t 
past season has more than ever demonstrated t 
tho necessity for increasing the channels through t 
which this delicious nectar may find its way be- i 
fore the public. The efforts of the dealers have 1 
already resulted in taking it from the list of 
luxuries and bringing it into gei/eral demand 
for families of moderate means, and it has 
taken its place beside such articles as butter, 
cheese and cream. Bee men don't like to 
acknowledge the fact that honey at. five cents 
a pound returns rnoro on the investment and 
labor required than most other farm products, 
but it is, nevertheless, true. They seem very 
much afraid that merchants who are now turning 
their attention to its sale will cut down the 
prices and spoil the market. 
The law of supply and demand governB the 
market price of commodities, whether wheat or 
never having lost my bees from cold winters or 
from any other cause. At first I left the hives 
standing out of doors all winter, now I carry 
them into the cellar. 
I knew nothing about bee keeping when I be¬ 
gan, all 1 know about it now is that they are of 
but very little trouble or expense to me. They 
furnish my family with plenty of honey to eat, 
and some to Bell every year. 
Last spring I started with four swarms. I have 
just carried seven strong ones into my collar, 
killing three weak swarms, to save what honey 
they had. Wo Lave had about 150 or 200 pounds 
of honey this season. I usually kill tho late 
honey ; and, in soiling, the question is not what | weak swarms in the fall. I uso no patent or 
cither can ho afforded for, hut what it will 
bring. Tbo demand for honey, as a luxury, has 
heretofore absorbed all that was produced, and 
made it so dear that comjatratively few could 
afford it. Now, with the modem appliances 
discovered to direct these busy workers for 
man’s benefit, bee keeping is destined to develop 
a sourco of untold wealth to the country, and 
bees will be kept in sufficient numbers to gather 
the millions of tons of sweets formerly wasted. 
Exaggerated and incredible as this expression 
may seem at the first glance, with the record of 
200,000 pounds of surplus honey gathered in one 
season by bees kept within an area of ten miles 
as a basis for an estimate, the statement is no 
longer mere hyperbole of speech. 
4 4 4 - 
THE WAX MOTH AND FOUL BROOD. 
Mb. Pettigrew, a well-known English api¬ 
arian, in writing to the Journal of Horticulture, 
says: 
Wax moths and the disease of foul brood have 
been rather prevalent this year. We never 
noticed so many wax moths flying about hives as 
we have Been this season, yet wo have not found 
tho combs of healthy hives injured by them— 
i. e., hv their grubs, though these have beeu 
frequently found on tho boards of healthy 
hivos. generally where the inside edges of tho 
hives touch and rest on the hoards. Tho grabs 
of wax moths aro covered for a time with a 
downy or wool-liko substance. While in this 
stale, and while growing into it, it is not easy to 
determine how and by whnt means they are fed. 
for the combs above them remain uninjured till 
the maggots begin to burrow among the cells, 
devouring the wax as they burrow. In eating 
the wax they leave tho pollen, which falls as 
dust on the boards. 
The wax moth is a kind of small butterfly of a 
dirty white or creamy gray color, and doubtless 
lias a keen scent for wax. Last summer 1 
placed a hive of combs in a hot-house and 
another in an open shed. Tho ono in the shed ! 
was covered with a piece of cocoanut matting. ' 
Of course the moths could not penetrate the ! 
matting, hence they deposited their eggs in or 
on it. fioon it became one mass of woolly mag¬ 
gots. These were given to tho hens before they 
began to food on the wax. Tho combs in the 
hot-house were oaten by tho grubs. I do not 
think that tho moth does much harm in this 
country to healthy hives, hut as it is sometimes 
hatched in all kinds of hives itis well to examine 
them frequently and keep their boards clean. 
Foul brood was found in many hives this 
yoar. 1 remember no season in which it was so 
prevalent. The cause of I he origin and progress 
of this malady is still veiled from the most 
advanced aud enlightened apiarian. Every 
attempt to investigate and explain the mystery 
of foul brood has beeu unsuccessful and unsatis¬ 
factory. The host that lias been done by way of 
explanation lias consisted merely of guess work 
only. My own guessing has gone in the direction 
of imperfect feeding or improper food. One 
thing is certain—there is no cure for the plague 
of foul brood but the removal from the hives 
of the diseased combs (plague spots), or. better 
still, the removal of tho bees wholly from their 
lsz.'ir houses into clean hives. Hives affected 
with this malady never prosper, but invariably 
become worse and worse by the multiplication 
of diseased cells, the stench of which becomes 
unbearable, often causing tho bees to abandon ■ 
their hives in utter despair and go off aB swarms ; 
and sometimes they leave the foul combs and 
cluster on the outsides of their hives or under¬ 
neath tho hoards and there build combs. The 
existence of foul brood iu hives may he dis- i 
covered by the shape of tho cell lids covering 
it, by its smell, aud by the conduct of the bees. 
■ - - 
PROFITS OF BEE KEEPING. 
frame hives, just a box of my own make. 
When a new swarm comes out I shako them 
down into a new hive, set them under a tree or 
hush in my garden, and they go to work. When 
the hive is pretty well filled, I put a smaller box 
on top of it aud tho bees fill that with surplus 
honey. 
1 believe that it pays to keep bees, or rather to 
lot them keep themselves. Scientific bee keep¬ 
ers will doubtless laugh at my way of keeping 
bees. A bee-keeping friend in another town, and 
the inventor of a patent hive, keeps bees for 
profit. He claims to havo taken from one hive ; 
in one season over 300 pounds of extracted 
honey, leaving tho bees enough to winter on be¬ 
sides. He says I might just as well put my Lees 
have been oiled aud another pair “ shined ” with 
the best“ Day & Martin." 
I made several inquir ies as to the mode adopted 
in polishing potatoes. “ Oh 1 it’s the soil they 
are grown in." says one—he was a canny Scotch¬ 
man. But others wero less reticent, and from 
one who had assisted in polishing I gathered 
that tlio tubers after being well washed are 
smartly rubbed with a coarse cloth, aro then 
doctored with new milk, and are again smoothed 
with the hand or some soft material. My infor¬ 
mant also said that occasionally butter was used, 
hut ho regarded now milk as the host “potato 
polish.” Certain it is that many of the prize 
tubers had been operated upon with something 
besides pure water, and I can further say that 
after 1 tying the recipe above given, it produced 
tho same appearance on the potatoes as that 
borne by so many tubers at the exhibition in 
question. In thus polixliing their produce the 
exhibitors infringe no rules ; the only stipula¬ 
tion was that the tubers must he washed, and 
the polishers havo the justification that the 
judges in most instances award them the prizes. 
How far the practice is worthy of encourage¬ 
ment is another question. If it is legitimate to 
impart an artificial gloss by the application of a 
snbstunoe foreign to the nattiro of the potato, is 
it not equally permissible to “dress" a flower 
or add a tint to an upplo or pear? A short time 
ago I rend that u lino collection of fpiUIed asters 
into decent hives, and make something out of was disqualified because they had been dressed 
them as to be fooling with them as I do. I do 
not doubt his word for ho talks at bee-keepers’ 
Conventions and writes for bee journals, still I 
go on iu the same old way believing that any 
farmer who has an average share of “gump¬ 
tion ” can keep a few swarms of bees and make 
thorn pay every time. 
If T. B. Miner takes exceptions to anything 
T have said, just tell him to call on me and I wall 
set before him a plate of nice white clover 
honey, and try to prove true all tho statements I 
havo made. John Rubticus, 
Outagamie Co., Wls, 
- 4 - 4-4 - 
“DO BEES MAKE HONEY V’ 
This question comes up once in three or four 
years, from some “Professor” generally, who 
imagines that he has made a great discovery— 
not by practical bee-culture and experience— 
but out of false teachings perhaps in some 
entomological history. But thcro is nothing 
like facts to upset erroneous theories; aud I 
challenge any man to prove that lumey beea 
“make ” honey in any sense,manner or degree. 
If wg feed bees sugar sirup, and they store it in 
their cells, it is nothing hut tho same sirup that 
was fed to them. Tf they gather honey from 
flowers, each kind comes into tho hives as 
found, and with no change of flavor whatever. 
White clover, basswood, buckwheat, etc., each 
has its own peculiar honey; and the bees are 
mere gatherers of it. 
Home 25 years ago, ft Mr. Gilmore established 
a large apiary in Brooklyn, N. Y., claiming 
that he had a “patent bee-feed,” which cost 
hut, a few cents per pound; and that the bees 
would make it into honey. This “ bco-feed ” 
was composed of a little West India honey, 
mixed with white sugar; and tho result was, 
that the “ honey ” thus made, though tho 
combs were white and handsome, proved to be 
nothing but the original mixture, and the apiary 
“ exploded,” and Gilmore disappeared. 1 havo 
a hundred times examined tho combs of my 
bees, when I fed them ; and in no case could I 
detect any difference in the feed, after being j 
stored up, from what it was when I mixed it. 
Linden, N. J. T. B. Miner. 
#flt) Crap, 
After reading up the pros and cons of bee 
keeping in late numbers of the Rural New- 
Yorker, I have concluded to give my experi¬ 
ence. 
Eight years ago this winter I bought a swarm 
of bees from a neighbor and brought them 
home. The hive containing them was a cut from 
ft hollow basswood log, with a hoard nailed on 
the top, (not patented). The next fall I had 
two strong swarms of bees and two boxes of 
nice honey, Since then wo have had plenty of 
honey to eat, aud more or less to sell every year 
POLISHED POTATOES, 
A visitor to a late great Potato Show in tho 
Alexandra Palace, undertakes to tell, in the Lon¬ 
don Journal of Horticulture, what he saw; but 
ho seems to havo been somewhat puzzled over 
the fair-skinned “Murphys.” 
I went to the Potato Show for tho purpose of 
gathering information, such as would enable me 
on some future occasion to stage collections to 
the best advantage. I wished to know whether I 
should select tubers largo or of medium size; 
also, whether they should bo simply washed, or 
whether they should he polished and buttered 
for tho judges’ inspection. I went at some cost 
and distance, and I went hopefully, but I havo 
returned perplexed and disappointed. To begin 
with the dressing of tubers. 1 am inclined to 
think that the Scotch polish found favor in the 
eyes of tho judges, and that had it not been for 
tho gloss—tho varnishing and burnishing which 
tho tubers had received in the premier-prize 
collection—that they would not have won their 
position. Now, there is as much difference be¬ 
tween potatoes which have been prepared by 
Scotch polish and others which have been simply 
washed as there is between a pair of hoots which 
with flour, and I further read the opinion of a 
good authority that the dressing of flowers is per¬ 
missible by removing from them anything which 
marred their beauty, but to add anything to them 
is culpable and should not 1 io tolerated by j edges. 
In the latest fashion of dressing potatoes for 
exhibition it is clear that something is added to 
them, and that the "gloss” which “catches the 
eye” is produced artificially, hut in future I 
cannot help thinking that for the sake of sim¬ 
plicity and uniformity, it would be well that the 
tubers should simply bo washed and that no 
grease or polish should be added to them. 
- — -- »♦» 
BEET-ROOT SUGAR IN FRANCE. 
It is w;ell known that Napoleon I. encouraged 
the cultivation of beets for the purpose of man¬ 
ufacturing sugar. The Saturday Review, in re¬ 
ferring to this, says that although the fall of 
Napoleon and the consequent opening up of the 
whole continent to British trade retarded tho 
growth of the new industry, still Napoleon’s pol¬ 
icy was pursued by the government that suc¬ 
ceeded him. Among other modes of protection, 
beet-ioot sugar was exempted from all taxation, 
while a heavy duty was imposed upon foreign 
sugar. By these means tho indigenous manufac¬ 
ture was fostered; aud, consequently, wc find 
that in 1832 about nine thousand tons of sugar 
were manufactured in France, which was about 
ona-seventh of the total consumption of the 
country. After this period a new cause came 
into play, which gave an extraordinary impetus 
to tho beet-root industry. Tho long agitation 
against slavery in England triumphed, aud 
negro emancipation was accomplished in the 
West Indies. The first result, as our readers aro 
aware, w as tho disorganization of the West In¬ 
dian labor market. Ami Franco took advantage 
so promptly of tho opportunity that in 1812 her 
production of indigenous sugar had risen to 35.- 
000 tons. It was an almost fourfold increase iu 
ton years, and was very nearly one-third of tho 
wholo consumption, instead of one*seventh, as it 
had been in 1832. From this time tho industry 
prospered so rapidly that a duty, less indeed 
than that on foreign sugar, hut still of apprecia¬ 
ble amount, was imposed on the beet-root pro¬ 
duct : and iu 1847 that duty was mado equal to 
tlio foreign duty. Still the industry attained 
greater proportions. In 1852 tho homo produc¬ 
tion somewhat exceeded tho foreign imports. 
And in 1874 it was four times greater. Hince 
thou the homo production has still further in¬ 
creased, until the foreign imports, compared 
with it, arc hut a small fraction. Last year, iu 
fact, the homo production exceeded 440,000 tons, 
nearly twice tho amount of 1871. During 1874 
and 1875 tho wholesale price of sugar at Paris 
averaged 140 francs per 100 kilogrammes. At 
that rate tho home production lust year amounted 
in value to over £25,000,000 sterling. Thus in 
less than seventy years an industry has been cre¬ 
ated which is worth this euormous annual sum 
to Franco. In the meantime Germany, Austria, 
Russia and Belgium followed tho example of 
France: aud the total production of beet-root 
sugar in Europe is now estimated considerably to 
exceed one million of tons. 
- 4 - 4-4 - 
THE CANADA ROOT SHOW. 
Our Canadian neighbors aro following in the 
wake of their brethren in England in holding 
root-shows, and hero is a brief account of what 
they are doing. 
At a root show held by Mr. William Rennie, 
seedsman, at Toronto, on Wednesday, November 
15th, 1876. the judges declared the following 
weights to have been attained by the successful 
• . 3 " 
