The Langstroth hive could be made deeper very easily without Mr. R.’s patchwork; but would it answer the purpose as well? I have found no other hive from which I can get the same results, in surplus honey, as from the “shallow” Langstroth. Last summer I tried the experiment with a hive with only six inches depth of comb, adding one more frame (_eleven_ instead of _ten_.) The result was that I got some six pounds more honey from that hive, than I did from the common Langstroth hive, sitting within four feet of it and the two colonies as near alike in numbers as I could get them. Without doubt the shallow form of hive is best for surplus honey. Now a few words about wintering bees in the Langstroth hive. Everything considered, I think bees do somewhat better when wintered in a cellar, provided they be arranged just right. But I have wintered bees very successfully in the Langstroth hive, on their summer stands, in northern Illinois and eastern Indiana. But young colonies that have new comb, should be protected, if wintered on their summer stands. I hope Mr. Rogers will explain the whys and wherefores, and tell us wherein the Langstroth hive is lacking. B. PUCKETT. _Winchester, Ind._, July 20, 1870. * * * * * [For the American Bee Journal.] Letter from Missouri. MR. EDITOR:--I send you a sample of something that seems to be troubling my bees very much. It is in small scales resembling the wing of some insect.[3] The bees come in with from three to five sticking to their mouths. It seems to trouble them greatly. I think I could pick up or rather scrape up a pint of it, on the bottom board of some hives. This section of country is too much subject to extremes for bees. Last year it rained all through May and June, so that the bees could not get out to work; and they did nothing but swarm after that until September. Pollen was plenty, but honey scarce. This spring commenced well, but most of May and up to the 15th of June the weather was too cold for bees to work. Nearly all the fruit blossoms were killed by cold. Wild plums and crab apples did not bloom. We have had no rain for several weeks, and very little since last fall. Everything is parched up, leaving nothing for the bees. I am feeding nearly fifty colonies, and will have to continue doing so until we have rain and flowers begin to bloom again. I could exchange one little farm here for fifteen hundred acres of mountain land in Pocahontas county, Virginia. Is that a good bee section?[4] Too much wind here, even if the pasturage were good. My Italians are doing much better than the native bees. I sowed the strap-leaved turnip last fall for early pasturage, but none came up this spring. Cold killed them. What kind is best to sow, or what is better? Would it do to sow ten acres in turnips, and mix Alsike clover seed with it? I have watched nearly every movement a bee can make for the last three years, and read all the bee books I could get.