PRACTICAL PAPERS—C0MMUNICA1 IONS. 
361 
COMMUNICATIONS. 
BEE-CULTURE AT JEFFERSON., 
WM. wolff’s apiary. 
Dr. J. W. IIoyt, Secretary Wisconsin State Agricultural Society: 
Dear Sir: The season of 1870, like a number of its predecessors, was 
unfavorable for bees; still, for a season so poor, we made a fair profit, and 
feel assured that the raising of bees, both for stock and honey, can be 
made a good paying business in this state. I commenced to keep bees in 
the spring of 1863. My stock at that time consisted of one swarm of black 
bees, in a common box hive. The following season I bought about a dozen 
colonies, and commenced to use movable comb hives. I now use Long- 
stroth’s hive altogether, and think it is much the best, plainest and most 
practicable in its principle, but for northern latitudes I prefer greater depth 
of frame than he uses in his common hive. I make my frames twelve 
inches deep. 
The bees kept in this section are mostly Italian. My own stock is nearly 
all pure Italian. Where there are black or impure drones kept in sur¬ 
rounding apiaries it will sometimes happen that the queen bees will be¬ 
come fertilized by them, and where this is the case, although the queen 
may be a full bred Italian, her progeny will be a hybrid or Cross between 
the Italian and black bees. I regard the Italian as superior to others in 
every particular, and will warrant them to give entire satisfaction to every 
one, where they are rightly managed. A cross-breed would probably be 
more profitable for Wisconsin were it not for their quarrelsome disposition. 
The Italians are superior to common bees in that they are more active 
and industrious, and consequently will gather greater stores of honey. 
They work early and late, and will continue to gather in the fall when 
black bees have ceased to store. They breed earlier and faster in the 
spring, and will cast earlier and larger swarms. The workers live consid¬ 
erable longer than those of the black bee, and therefore they have a larger 
working force. Killing the drones oft' earlier in the season, and carrying a 
smaller stock of workers through the winter, they consume a smaller 
•amount of honey than the black bees; yet they are susceptible to the cold 
and need more protection from the severities of winter. They keep their 
hives cleaner, and consequently are generally more healthy. They do not 
let any worms grow up. My apiaries are almost free from bee-motlis, and 
I never heard of an Italian colony being destroyed by moth worms. They 
