Found a queen of a nucleus dead before her hive! In setting out nuclei yesterday from cellar put
one on wrong stand - changed in a few minutes - noticed some bees were seized! Cannot
be too careful - It would seem as though Italian queens were much more liable than black ones
to be thus summarily dealt with by their bees (26th) 48 degrees 58 degrees - Dense fog - birds singing
like Spring - Sun showing at intervals - P. M. some rain - Bees have had a
splendid chance to clean out their hives - (27th) 35 degrees 42 degrees - Cloudy - quite heavy rain
last night - (28th) 32 degrees 29th -23 degrees 35 degrees (30th) 23 degrees 30 degrees - Splendid P. M. - bees flew a little
 (31st) 32 degrees 35 degrees - Sour - a few snowflakes - January 1st 1866 - 30 degrees 35 degrees Cloudy
 (2nd) 20 degrees 34 degrees (3rd) 19 degrees 36 degrees Splendid winter day (4th) 12 degrees 18 degrees Clear (5th) 4 degrees 22 degrees
 (6th) 14 degrees 45 degrees - Clear - strong southerly wind (7th) 24 degrees 25 degrees 10 degrees - Clear but very windy NE
 (8th) 1 degree 16 degrees - Very windy last night (9th) 2 degrees 21 degrees 14 degrees - Clear - beautiful winter day
 (10th) 22 degrees (See forward 7 leaves - Journal for 1868 - Continued) May 28th - Find
very little trouble in setting new style of honey boxes on strips 1/4 inch thick laid over
the frames and resting on rabbets in sides of hive - bees are very easily kept out of the
way - more so than in boxes placed with usual broad bearings on the honey board - Today
put a double set of boxes on a strong stock - small ones under tall ones to see how it
will work - Shall try a triple pile of small boxes on one strong stock - also the back
arrangement for small boxes on one strong stock � also boxes with shallow chamber by 1/4 inch strips
on one or more honey boards - A half dozen ripe strawberries today - Never saw good
stocks of bees so nearly exhausted of honey as this season - Colonies with six or more of their
ten frames well filled with brood until today when opened would gobble up all or
nearly all their honey! If I had fed more after the failure of the apple blossom
crop my stocks would have been still stronger - but I did not see need of it quite
soon enough - With Spring stimulative feeding of flour and honey - and condensing
plan so as to make stocks relied on for honey extra strong - this a very good location
for honey (29th) 64 degrees 72 degrees - Slight dash of rain last night - Very clear at sunrise
bees getting much honey - wind sprung up with clouds - honey ceased to come in - all
smell gone from the locusts! About 4 PM smell came back and honey came in!
stocks just get enough to encourage breeding - If honey at last comes in abundantly
there will be a great force of bees to gather it - Before the locusts pass out of bloom the
good stocks ought to have parts of comb not filled with brood well filled with honey. 
Bees considerably on white clover - In a number of the l3 frame hives where I have not full
complement of combs shall give empty frames with my [illegible] guides. Am convinced that bees
raise more young in new combs than in old ones - Queens are more anxious to lay in them. 
 (30th) 49 degrees 72 degrees - Bees began early on locust - clouds came up - did not work very long. 
By noon quite hot sun - bees very active on clover, raspberries - Later in P. M. - Locusts very
sweet - best day for honey since apple blossoms - Tied drones and queens with fine silken
thread around narrow part of body - they flew well. Cannot small rubber bands be passed around
them? held together and allowed to fly with string attached! Feel more confident that artificial
impregnation is effected by having drone and queen fly confined together. If Mr. [illegible] got