in a very good condition for the winter. Beekeepers should be encouraged, as the future never looked more promising. The most important thing now is for the beekeepers to talk more honey to the consuming public, and place honey where it should be on every table, as nature's best food.

Bees are mostly packed for winter, and colonies are strong in bees and well supplied with stores. I am looking for quite a winter loss among careless beekeepers, as colonies that were not supplied with extra stores will certainly not survive the winter. Our 700 colonies have been carefully packed and are in the best condition to withstand the rigors of winter.

I recently visited quite a number of beekeepers and find some very careless, leaving inner covers, queen-excluders, covers, and bottom-boards lying around the apiary. Bee equipment will not last long with such careless methods; but if kept in the dry and well painted it will last nearly a life time.

Honey sales to date have been slow, although quite a number of inquiries have been received. Several cars have been moved at 9 cents f. o. b. shipping point. I believe that, with the coming of colder weather, sales will be considerably increased.

The honey crop in this section of Ohio has been very spotted, some beekeepers reporting a good crop, while others report a failure; but the beekeeper who keeps his bees and equipment in good condition will be able to come back and make up for lost crops in a remarkably short time when conditions again become normal.

At a recent meeting of the Tri-County Beekeepers' Association the following resolution was adopted: "We, the TriCounty Beekeepers' Association, emphatically condemn the practice of putting up and selling to consumers a five-ounce glass of honey by beekeepers and bottlers."

This is a very progressive organization, and any action taken always represents due consideration of the subject. We should be pleased to hear from others along this line.

According to present plans, before these lines are read the writer will be on his way to Florida, where we intend to spend the winter and forget the bees for a little while. Fred Leininger.

Delphos, Ohio.

In Western New York The secretary and board of directors of the Western New York Honey Producers' Association believe that the coming meeting on December 1 and 2 at the natural science room of the library building, Buffalo, will be one of the most important ever held by

this association. All members and others interested in the welfare of the industry are urged to attend, as very important new policies are to be discussed.

Following the very heavy but short honey flow of August, the weather here has been very cool and wet, resulting in no honey from goldenrod, asters, and Hubam clover, all of which were very abundant near our home yards. At the close of the August honey flow all supers were full of honey and the brood-chambers were full of brood. Brood-rearing ceased early in September, and consequently bees going into winter are old in days but young in amount of work they have performed.

Brood-chambers were practically empty and we have put tons of sealed stores from the supers into the brood-chambers for winter. In our own practice we very seldom feed sugar stores. Personally I question whether it is good business to do so. The occasional losses from poorquality natural stores do not amount to enough to pay for the added cost of labor of feeding sugar every year as a preventive. Probably this does not hold true in every locality. But in my 25 years' experience I can lay losses in only two seasons to the account of poor stores. And we are sure that the prevention of losses for these two years would nowhere near pay for the labor of feeding for the 25 years.

Then there are also other angles to the feeding of sugar. It is a rather embarrassing and difficult matter to explain to the average consumer why sugar is a better food for bees and honey for humans. Every pound of sugar fed to bees releases that much more honey to an already depressed market.

The wet weather has brought on the clover from last spring's seeding remarkably well. While earlier in the season there was no clover at all to be seen there

is now an average of probably nearly

50 per cent of normal.

The November market page reveals a wide variance in carlot prices being offered throughout the country, California reporting highest at 17 cents and Florida lowest at 72 cents, a difference of 91⁄21⁄2 cents, with other states reporting all the way between. Variation in quality undoubtedly accounts for some of it, there being a difference of 32 cents in the reports from our own state. The writer reported the lowest, 8 cents, which was on buckwheat honey, this being the only kind available in carlots in this part of the state, while the others were probably reporting on white honey. I wonder if it would not be possible and a good thing for the market reports to designate the general color grade of the honey being

reported by letters as W. (white), L. A. (light amber), and A. (amber). Ransomville, N. Y.

In Ontario

H M. Myers.

Weather

conditions throughout Ontario during the month of October were very bad for all kinds of outdoor work, including the feeding and packing of bees for winter. The amount of rainfall was unusually heavy and during the last week in the month the thermometer fell to ten above zero three mornings in succession.

While such unseasonable weather was bad for the beekeeper, other branches of agriculture suffered much more, as it meant actual loss of valuable products in many cases. Tens of thousands of barrels of the best apples, such as Spies, Greenings, and Baldwins, were frozen on the trees and are absolutely useless for any purpose. So, instead of the heaviest apple crop on record for Ontario, unseasonably cold weather has reduced the crop far below the average and apples have taken a big jump in price since the freeze. Many potatoes were also frozen in the ground, and other root crops injured in many places. So if the beekeeper did have to do his fall work under unpleasant conditions, his actual loss was nothing as compared to those engaged in other rural occupations.

Personally, we had the bees all fed and about all packed for winter by November 1, but, as already intimated, much of this work was done under very unpleasant conditions. Twice we had quite a heavy snowfall, and handling hive covers with snow on them several inches deep is not conducive to comfort, especially when the snow is getting into one's shoes and filling the pockets of his coat. However, it is all past now and seemingly we are none the worse for our experiences. After all, it requires real cloudy weather and lots of it to make us appreciate the real beauty of the sunshine.

When my notes were sent in for the October issue we were busy feeding the bees, and at that time I intimated that our feeding bill would be heavy. Well, it is all over now, and we find that it is the heaviest we have ever had so far as the quantity of stores is concerned. But sugar was cheaper than usual, so the actual cash outlay has been heavier in some seasons when sugar was much higher in price. Colonies were light in stores and in many cases exceedingly strong in bees so strong, in fact, that I noticed clusters at the entrance in ten-frame Langstroth hives in the morning when the thermometer was within 12° of zero. Whether there are enough stores to carry

through so many bees remains to be seen, but colonies had all they could store in the combs, with no "'winter nest" on November 10.

In the last issue I stated that five tenpound pails of food is as much as colonies in ten-frame Langstroth hives will take, but after writing that I found a number that took six pails. No doubt the amount of pollen in combs accounts for the difference, as colonies were very populous in each case and the hive-capacity was the same.

According to a recent report in Toronto papers, it is estimated that the total honey crop for Canada this year will be around 21,000,000 pounds. As we have a population all told of less than ten mil lion, that means a production of a little over 2 pounds per capita. What is actualy consumed by this ten million can only be learned when export figures are available. At any rate, a large amount of this honey is being exported; and if it were not being sent out there is no question but that honey would be a drug on the markets, as thousands never taste honey, to say nothing of using around two pounds each per year. True, many families use large quantities of honey; but unfortunately many others scarcely ever buy honey; and even if they do so now and then, it is bought as a treat or medicine rather than as a staple food.

So far as I can learn, honey has been moving well all fall. As the quality is very good, as a rule, this is no doubt a powerful factor in helping along sales. Personally, all our honey was sold this year before a pound of it was produced, paradoxical as such a statement may sound. Purchasers report brisk demand and were anxious for delivery of the full quantity contracted for, and so far as I have learned they are satisfied with the product. While we appreciate the value of a large retail trade, unfortunately it seems impossible for us to give that trade justice as we are often too busy to attend to it properly. So of late years we make a practice of wholesaling practically all of our production.

I have not learned the exact dates of the Ontario Convention for this year, but presume that notice will soon be given and that it will be held in Toronto at Prince George Hotel as usual. No doubt there will be the usual large attendance as the crop was good this year and beekeepers will feel like spending a bit of their cash by way of showing their optimism. Good crops or poor crops, the convention is always well attended, and this vear will not likely prove an exception in that respect. J. L. Byer. Markham, Ont.

Advantages of My colonies with foodFood-Chamber chambers gave all the way from 30 to 75 pounds more than those without. When the foodchambers are on in the spring the colonies seem to refill them before those without food-chambers even start storing. They put the honey in the food-chamber, and the queen fills the brood-combs with eggs to the top-bars. Then when the honey flow starts I lift the food-chamber up and place my super on the broodchamber, then replace the food-chamber on the top. The bees have been used to going above with the honey and start at once on the super. Otherwise they don't like to go into the supers until the foodchamber becomes crowded, which often causes them to swarm. The food-chamber saves more work and worry than the extra cost amounts to. L. Lawrence.

Springfield, Minn.

The Friday before Labor Day a swarm of bees lodged in a small maple tree here. The bees were not hived and remained there in the open for 10 days, when I saw them again. They had drawn leaves together and were going to the field and evidently making comb. We then had heavy storms, cold nights, and other discouraging things. The bees, after 15 days of it, packed up and swarmed into a house that was being constructed near by. They got into an open attic window and into an open space up under the roof. There they parked themselves, with the fall flowers about gone and not a chance in the world to survive. They left behind in the cluster of maple leaves a bit of comb. The bees were nice vellow Italians and looked as if they had more sense than to swarm out in that way, in the face of on-coming fall. It all looked foolish, but of course we do not know what they fled from in the first place. George Gilbert.

Port Dickinson, N. Y.

Favors Bees We know that American on Combs foul brood is easier transmitted in combs than in artificial food for bees, and that the states that have become infected with this disease have gotten it by buying from states that did not furnish clean health certificates, or that have failed to adopt laws that properly control this disease. The most effective measure that has been taken in Louisiana is burning all contaminated material and bees. This is a state law and any Louisiana beekeeper violating this act is under penalty of law. We are for laws and strict regulations that protect us and others from American foul brood, but we are against laws prohibiting shipping bees on combs into other states when accompanied by clean health certificates, while there are no laws prohibiting the shipment into our state of honey that has nothing to show freedom from disease. Shipments of honey are made daily into our ports in damaged containers which of course are a source of disease to our bees, if the honey contains disease, and it is a recognized fact that disease can be spread by honey. The shipper, the express company, and the buyer find that bees shipped on natural food are more satisfactory on account of safer and better delivery, as indicated by the request of customers and expressions from carriers.

The beekeepers of some quarantined states evidently are not informed as to their laws. I have received orders for bees on combs from these states. Hamburg, La. Oscar Mayeux.

[According to information from the various state officials, the states which prohibit the importation of bees on combs are Alabama, Arizona, California, Montana, North Dakota, Texas, and Wyoming. Editor.]

Soaking Combs in In my first experiWarm Water ments with the waterformalin solution I placed the combs in cold water 24 hours before treatment to wash out the honey. Later I placed them, after the honey was extracted and brood-cells uncapped, in warm water at about 95° to 100° F., leaving them in this warm water for 20 to 30 minutes, or just long enough to warm up all honey. They were then taken out and shaken by hand, though they might be put into the extractor and this honey and water extracted. They were then placed in the cold water

24 hours before they were put into the sterilizing solution. I think there is where one great trouble is. Honey is left in the cells and cold water will not remove it, therefore the solution does not penetrate to the bottom of the cells, and the disease re-appears. There were two colonies which showed a very few cells of disease in the combs that were not first put into warm water, while the combs that were put through the hot water treatment before being sterilized have failed to show any reappearance of disease. I have 13 colonies that were treated in this way that are all free from disease. I have a complete record of my experimental work which covers over one year's time, which proves very interesting to me to read over from time to time. O. F. Fuller.

Blackstone, Mass.

Louisiana Fights Louisiana is free from Brood Diseases

disease except near Shreveport in the northern part of the state, where foul brood comes in from states to the north in shipments of bees on combs without health certificates, and at New Orleans, where it is shipped in with infected honey. During the unloading process, the honey from damaged containers is continually exposed to the bees, which literally swarm over it and carry it back to their hives. Every year colonies infected with foul-brood are found in this vicinity, and each and every one of them is burned-bees, honey, comb, and hives -without moving them from their stands. The following year the same thing occurs merely because foul-brood honey is shipped into New Orleans. was also shown that, since Louisiana has had a system of inspection, no cases of foul brood have been shipped out of the state with bees on combs accompanied by a health certificate. We think that no other state has a better record than this, and we feel that such a record is entitled to some consideration from the framers of quarantine laws against the shipment of bees on combs. Baton Rouge, La.

Henry A. Stabe.

It

Inducing Bees Two beekeepers have reto Requeen Themselves

cently mentioned to me the possibility of automatically requeening by the supersedure method, following the major honey flow, at a time when superseding would not interfere with securing the maximum crop of honey. This sounds interesting, because requeening, from the standpoint of labor and expense, is one

of the costliest operations in apiary management, and it is generally conceded that queens reared under the supersedure impulse are the most desirable. How, then, can the bees be induced to supersede old queens in late summer or early fall, when requeening is desired.

The theory advanced is that a foodchamber full of honey should be left on each colony after the surplus honey is removed. In many localities there is a dearth of nectar for a few weeks following the major honey flow, and if all of the honey is removed down to the broodchambers the queens will practically stop laying. When a full food-chamber is left with each colony after the surplus honey is removed, the queens that are not worn out continue laying, but the old queens that have lost their vitality slacken in their egg-laying. The bees are not slow to detect failing queens, therefore supersedure is likely to occur. Medina, Ohio. M. J. Deyell.

Handling of Although I come across Apis dorsata numbers of natural swarms of Apis dorsata in flight

for pastures new, I pass on with all due respect. About a month ago I rushed back to my bungalow for a camera to snap a large swarm located three feet from the ground, but they took flight just as I was getting ready. Many of the letters I have received suggest dealing with these bees in the ordinary standard hives, whereas an ordinary colony would fill two outside boxes of the the standard hive, not leaving any room for frames. I am afraid a special hive would have to be constructed to accommodate these giants of our forests. I took several swarms on my return from England and kept them but a little while in turnedover packing-cases. They were always a danger to approach without veil, etc., and although one colony did actually start building comb I was glad to see the last of them when a "Kada" (jungle tribe who file their teeth to points like a V) was put on to destroy them. I found they would persist in hanging around the little bees Apis indica, and not only rob them out of house and home, but try their same tricks on me in my home. These bees are migratory. Now that our monsoon rains are over they are migrating back to the southwest, and in another four months our jungle tribes will begin to prepare for their loot, by burning the colonies out on dark nights. They then crush the combs, together with brood and honey, hence their honey for sale.

Valpari P. O., India. P. E. Achard.