542 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



September, 1918 



c 



lU 



SIDE liners 

 who happen 

 not to live 

 i n Dixie m a y 

 well skip this 

 Department this 

 month — there 

 are eomi)ensa-^ 

 tions, it seems, 

 for living north 



of the Line! This is all about wintering — 

 wintering in the South. Yet, after all, what 

 can I say ]iartif'ularly different from what 

 I have said before"? ' And that, summariz- 

 ing, is about this. 



Bees Wintered Outdoors Without Packing. 



There are in this section of the middle 



South many successful beekeepers, honey 



Beekeeping as a Side Line 



1 



Grace Allen 



almost to the 

 ]>roportions of a 

 contrOA'ersy, o f 

 course it is not 

 of a personal na- 

 ture, but one of 

 the controversies 

 that, in almost 

 any field of en- 

 d e a V r , must 

 necessarily attend either the establishment 

 of modern progressive jjractices or the de- 

 fense of old dependable ones against mere 

 novelties and innovations. 

 Abundant Stores and Young Queens and 

 Young Bees Considered Sufficient 

 by Some. 

 If I have referred often to the decisive 



producers, and queen-rearers both, some of opinions, based on the results of experience. 



them having been in this work for more 

 than a score of years. And these men, al- 

 most without exception, leave their bees 

 thruout the winter on their summer stands, 

 in single-walled hives, with no packing of 

 any sort — either around, below, or above. 

 Most of them contract entrances. And they 

 do, most of them, lose some colonies every 

 winter. And those that they do not lose 

 come thru with varying degrees of strength 

 ■ — varying from hive to hive — varying from 

 beekeeper to beekeeper. And many of them, 

 inertia being one of the common human 

 qualities, say, "We prefer to do it this 

 way — we are used to it — this is good 

 enough." And others, more progressive, 

 have made one time or another, one way 

 or another, some slight attempts to pack 

 their bees for winter, and have discontinued 

 the practice, saying, "It does not pay in 

 the only way that can justify it — in dollars 

 and cents." And still others have said, 

 "We lose practically no colonies; and our 

 bees come out so strong in the spring that 

 any increase of early strength would em- 

 barrass us with swarming tendencies before 

 the honey flow." 



Government Experts Favor Packing. 

 Meantime, up in Washington, there are 

 earnest, scientific men giving their entire 

 time and their trained faculties to a better- 

 ment of this industry, and they have made 

 careful painstaking experiments that have 

 convinced them of the A^alue of packed 

 hives in any locality where the temperature 

 may often dro}) to freezing. That, of course, 

 includes Tennessee. So there we are — right 

 there. Shall we pack, or shall we not ? Per- 

 sonally I have times of regretting not be- 

 ing able to line up energetically behind 

 either one side or the other of this ques- 

 tion — for so somebody would have approved 

 of me! As it is, the earnest desire to be 

 open-minded to the intelligent claims of 

 both sides has of course resulted in criti- 

 cism from both. Yet, after all, this is quite 

 unimportant. What is important is the right 

 answer to the question; Will it pay, in dol- 

 lars and cents, to provide jsacked winter 

 cases for bees in, say, Tennessee and North 

 Carolina'? While this matter has grown 



of J. M. Buchanan of Franklin, Tenn.. and 

 L. E. Webb of Morgantown, N. C, it is be- 

 cause I am impressed with the reasonable- 

 ness of them and others like them. More 

 than once I have quoted their statements 

 and it may seem unnecessary to do so again, 

 yet, as this is an endeavor once more to 

 review the whole situation to date, there 

 may be some justification to do so. Mr. 

 Buchanan is an enthusiastic advocate of 

 wintering in two stories, with a wealth of 

 stores. ' ' I pack my bees, ' ' he has often 

 remarked, "only on the inside, with solid 

 slabs of honey." During locust bloom, usu- 

 ally late April, he customarily finds 15 to 18 

 combs of brood, and would only have to con- 

 tend with an early swarming tendency, if 

 colonies were stronger. Mr. Webb also ad- 

 vocates extra room, using himself either 

 Jumbo hives or a story-and-a-half standard 

 brood-chamber thruout the year. He, too, 

 insists on unstinted stores, and with good 

 hives, young queens and young bees, he 

 defies the winter weather — successfully. 

 Then there is W. E. Lee of White's Creek, 

 Tenn. His colonies also are of the big, 

 vigorous spring type that is in danger of 

 being crowded out of all bounds in April. 

 (I might remark in passing that I am not 

 in that class myself. In late April, we sel- 

 dom have more than seven or eight combs 

 of brood per hive, with many colonies hav- 

 ing less.) 



Winter Losses Common. 



On the other hand, op^sosed to these rec- 

 ords, we do have in this section, repeatedly, 

 heavy winter losses. And we are only too 

 often judged thereby. But we have, too, 

 many careless beekeepers, unread men of , 

 the mountains or uninformed backwoods 

 farmers. And it is a question if it is so 

 much winter packing that they need as ordi- 

 narily good beekeeping practices, with par- 

 ticular care on the points stressed by these 

 men just referred to — plenty of room, plen- 

 ty of young bees in that room, plenty of 

 stores for the young bees, and a vigorous 

 young queen presiding over the destinies of 

 the colony. 



Now it may be tliat these cases where 

 the bees; come out so especially strong are 



