136 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



April 



mouth. The bee is taken in by his long 

 tongue, and I should judge that he is capa- 

 ble of striking one with it, when as much as 

 two inches distant. I do not know how 

 many bees it takes to make a meal, but I do 

 know that toads will often become surpri- 

 singly thick about the hives during the hon- 

 ey season, if they are not driven away by 

 some means. I have been in the habit of 

 killing them, but I must confess, my feel- 

 ings revolt at such severe measures, and I 

 much prefer the plan a pleasant friend gives 

 on page 145 of this No.; viz., carrying them 

 off to some distance, where they may live 

 without doing anybody or anything any 

 harm, if such a place there be. 



WINTERING. The following are 

 the extracts spoken of by Mr. L.,last month, 

 from his first edition of The Hive and Honey 

 Bee, published in 1853. 



I specially invite a careful perusal of this chapter, 

 as the subject, though of the very first importance 

 in the management of bees, is one to which but lit- 

 tle attention has been given by the majority of cul- 

 tivators. 



In our climate of great and sudden extremes, 

 many colonies are annually injured or destroyed by 

 undue exposure to heat or cold. In summer, thin 

 hives are often exposed to the direct heat of the 

 sun, so that the combs melt, and the bees are 

 drowned in their own sweets. Even if they escape 

 utter ruin, they cannot work to advantage in the al- 

 most suffocating heat of their hives. 



******** 



As soon as the temperature of the hives falls too 

 low for their comfort, the bees gather themselves 

 into a more compact body, to preserve to the ut- 

 most, their animal heat; and if the cold becomes so 

 great that this will not suffice, they keep up an in- 

 cessant, tremulous motion, accompanied by a loud 

 humming noise; in other words, they take active 

 exercise in order to keep warm ! If a thermometer 

 is pushed up among them, it will indicate a high 

 temperature, even when the external atmosphere 

 is many degrees below zero. When the bees are un- 

 able to maintain the necessary amount of animal 

 heat, an occurrence which is very common with 

 small colonies in badly protected hives, then, as a 

 matter of course, they must perish. 



Extreme cold, when of long continuance, very fre- 

 quently destroys colonies in thin hives, even when 

 they are strong both in bees and honey. The inside 

 of such hives is often filled with frost, and the bees, 

 after eating all the food in the combs in which they 

 are clustered, are unable to enter the frosty combs, 

 and thus starve in the midst of plenty. The unskill- 

 ful bee-keeper who finds an abundance of honey in 

 the hives, cannot conjecture the cause of their 

 death. 



********* 



I must notice another exceedingly injurious effect 

 of insufficient protection, in causing the moisture to 

 settle upon the cold top and sides of the interior of 

 the hive, from whence it drips upon the bees. In 

 this way, many of their number are chilled and de- 

 stroyed, and often the whole colony is infected with 

 dysentery. Not unfrequently, large portions of the 

 comb are covered with mold, and the whole hive is 

 rendered very offensive. 



******** 



When bees, in unsuitable hives, are exposed to all 

 the variations of the external atmosphere, they are 

 frequently tempted to fly abroad if the weather be- 

 comes unseasonably warm, and multitudes are lost 

 on the snow, at a season when no young are bred to 

 replenish their number, and when the loss is most 

 injurious to the colony. 



Erom these remarks, it will be obvious to the in- 

 telligent cultivator, that protection against ex- 

 treme! of heat and cold, is a point of the very first 



importance ; and yet this is the very point, which, in 

 proportion to its importance, has been most over- 

 looked. We have discarded, and very wisely, the 

 straw hives of our ancestors; but such hives, with 

 all their faults, were comparatively warm in winter, 

 and cool in summer. We have undertaken to keep 

 bees, where the cold of winter, and the heat of sum- 

 mer are alike intense; and where sudden and severe 

 changes are often fatal to the brood; and yet we 

 blindly persist in expecting success under circum- 

 stances in which any marked success is well nigh 

 impossible. 



******** 



It will not be without profit, to consider briefly 

 under what circumstances wild colonies ttourisb, 

 and how they are protected against sudden and ex- 

 treme changes of temperature. 



S-nugly housed in the hollow of a tree whose thick- 

 ness and decayed interior are such admirable ma- 

 terials for excluding atmospheric changes, the bees 

 in winter are in a state of almost absolute repose. 

 The entrance to their abode is generally very small 

 in proportion to the space within; and let the 

 weather out of doors vary as it may, the inside tem- 

 perature is very uniform. These natural hives are 

 dry, because the moisture finds no cold or icy top, 

 or sides, on which to condense, and from which it 

 must drip upon the bees, destroying their lives, or 

 enfeebling their health, by filling the interior of 

 their dwelling with mould and dampness. 



As they are very quiet, they eat but little, and 

 hence their bodies are not distended and diseased 

 by accumulated faeces. Often they do not stir from 

 their hollows, from November until March or April; 

 and yet they come forth in the spring, strong in 

 numbers, and vigorous in health. If at any time in 

 the winter season, the warmth is so great as to pen- 

 etrate their comfortable abodes, and to tempt them 

 to fly, when they venture out, they And a balmy at- 

 mosphere in which they may disport with impunity. 

 In the summer, they are protected from the heat, 

 not merely by the thickness of the hollow tree, but 

 by the leafy shade of overarching branches, and the 

 refreshing coolness of a forest home. 



The Russian and Polish bee-keepers, living in a 

 climate whose winters are much more severe than 

 our own, are among the largest and most successful 

 cultivators of bees, many of them numbering their 

 colonies by hundreds, and some even by thousands! 



They have, with great practical sagacity, imitated 

 as closely as possible, the conditions under which 

 bees are found to flourish so admirably in a state of 

 nature. We are informed by Mr. Dohiogost, a Polish 

 writer, that his countrymen make their hives of the 

 best plank, and never less than an inch and a half 

 in thickness. The shape is that of an old-fashioned 

 churn, and the hive is covered on the outside, half- 

 way down, with twisted rope cordage, to give it 

 greater protection against extremes of heat and 

 cold. The hives are placed in a dry situation, direct- 

 ly upon the hard earth, which is first covered with 

 an inch or two of clean, dry sand, ('hips are then 

 heaped up all around them, and covered with earth 

 banked up in a sloping direction to carry off the 

 rain. The entrance is at some distance above the 

 bottom, and is a triangle, whose sides are only one 

 inch long. In the winter season, this entrance is 

 contracted so that only one bee can pass at a time. 

 ******** 



We are now prepared to discuss the question of 

 protection in its relations to the construction of 

 hives. We have seen how it is furnished to the bees 

 in the Polish hives, and in the decayed hollows of 

 trees. If the apiarian chooses, he can imitate this 

 plan by constructing his hives of very thick plank; 

 but such hives would be clumsy, and with us, ex- 

 pensive. Or he may much more effectually reach 

 the same end, by making his hives double, so as to 

 enclose an air space all around, which in winter may 

 be filled with charcoal, plaster of Paris, straw, or 

 any good non-conductor, to enable the bees to pre- 

 serve with the least waste, their animal heat. 

 *■*-*#**#■* 



I have been thus particular on the subject of pro- 

 tection, in order to convince every bee-keeper who 

 exercises common sense, that thin hives ought to be 

 given up, if either pleasure or profit is sought from 

 his bees. Such hives an enlightened apiarian could 

 not be persuaded to purchase, and he would con- 

 sider them too expensive in their waste of honey 

 and bees, to be worth accepting, even as a gift. 

 Many strong colonies which are lodged in badly pro- 

 tected hives, often consume in extra food, in a sin- 



