_Charlestown, Ill._, Sept. 5, 1870.
[For the American Bee Journal.]
Bee-keeping Advancing.
MR. EDITOR:--We are doing a fine thing in the bee business here this
season. We (my brother and I) are creating quite an interest in
bee-culture around here, by the use of our Hruschka. The way we sling
the honey out is a caution. We have obtained six hundred and twenty-five
(625) pounds of extracted honey, and six hundred and fifty (650) pounds
of box honey from eight colonies of bees, and have increased them to
twenty-two; and all the hives are full of honey now--the result of
scientific bee-culture.
Old fogy bee-keepers begin to open their eyes, and think that
bee-keeping is not all mere _luck_. The light begins to shine, and
bee-keeping is advancing.
The Italian bees are more and more approved, and taking the place of
the black bees; and I am in hopes we shall in a short time have none but
Italians around here.
We have tried friend Alley’s plan of introducing queens with tobacco
smoke, and failed several times, simply because we did not smoke the
bees enough. We introduce now successfully with tobacco by smoking them
till they are nearly stupefied, and then they will receive the queen
without fail. We find the Italians will receive a queen quicker or more
readily than the black bees, without any smoking. The Italians are
better every way than the blacks. They are as much in advance of the
latter as the mowing machine is in advance of the scythe.