1879 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



393 



Wintering; Continued from Sept. Number. 



REMOVING THE BEES FROM THE CELLAR. 



If they do not get too restless. I would al- 

 low them to remain until the soft maples, or 

 willow and alder, begin to furnish pollen. 

 Put them out very early, in the morning of 

 a warm pleasant day, if you can tell what 

 morning will develop into a pleasant day. 

 Set each hive out so quietly that none of the 

 rest will be disturbed, if you can. I would 

 a little prefer that each stock be placed on 

 on its usual summer stand, if it be practica- 

 ble, but, if not, it may make but little differ- 

 ence. Colonies often get badly mixed when 

 first carried out. and queens are sometimes 

 lost. Giving each one its old stand will do 

 much to avoid this. If you doubt that the 

 bees remember their old location, just set a 

 single hive on a new stand, and see where 

 the bees will go, when suddenly disturbed 

 and allowed to fly. 



After they are all out, and nicely fixed as 

 they were the fall before, keep a close watch 

 that the weak ones do not swarm out. as 

 they are quite prone to do. after their long 

 confinement. I do not know but I may dis- 

 gust you with indoor wintering, by the 

 many difficulties I have been mentioning ; I 

 want you to know what you have to contend 

 with, even though I do discourage you. 



AD VANTAGES OF CELLAR WINTERING. 



L. C. Root estimates that bees wintered 

 in-doors probably save as much as -3 lbs. of 

 honey per colony. This would be quite an 

 item, in an apiary of 100 hives. In contrast 

 with the method of wintering out-doors with- 

 out protection. I think he may be light ; 

 but, with a properly prepared chaff hive. 1 

 think there will be little, if any, more hon- 

 ey consumed, unless it is used in rearing 

 brood which will add to the strength of the 

 colony. A colony may be so wintered as to 

 consume scarcely any stores, but it may 

 take them all the fore part of the honey 

 season to recover strength enough to be of 

 any value. 



NUMBER OF COLONIES TO BE PUT INTO ONE 

 ROOM OK (ELLA!;. 



Unless you have as many as 40 or 50, 1 

 would not think of wintering them in-doors ; 

 for a few colonies would not be able to keep 

 up the temperature of the room, and it 

 would be liable to get very cold. Many fail- 

 ures have been reported from trying to win- 

 ter a dozen or more in a small room. 



StMMIXG UP THE MATTER 01 WINTERING. 



Taking all things into consideration, my 

 advice to the A B C class, and to all others ! 



who have not large apiaries and large ex- 

 perience, is to winter in chaff packed hives, 

 in the open air, on their summer stands. If 

 it were as pleasant and convenient to handle 

 bees in the house apiary as in the open air. I 

 should say. have a house apiary. 



SPUING DWINDLING. 



I do not know whether to style this a dis- 

 ease, or a condition of things that comes 

 about naturally during cold and backward 

 springs. I should incline to the latter, were 

 not its ravages so uncertain; that is, it 

 seems to affect a part of an apiary and not 

 another part; and. at times, it will go all 

 through one apiary, while another, a few 

 miles away, will be entirely free from it. It 

 is very certain that it afflicts weak colonies. 

 as a general thing, more than strong ones, 

 but there are exceptions even to this. It is 

 much worse after a long, hard winter, and 

 it disappears always at the approach of set- 

 tled warm Aveather and new honey. Al- 

 though it does not generally seem to affect 

 stocks before March, I have seen them af- 

 fected by it from Feb. until June. I have 

 even known colonies to be listless and life- 

 less from its effects, until others in the api- 

 ary were sending out rousing swarms. 

 Strong colonies that are raising brood vig- 

 orously seldom seem affected by it, but I 

 suspect they are affected more or less by it, 

 or by the condition of things, but have suf- 

 ficient vigor and strength— animal heat, if 

 you please— to pull through until there is 

 plenty of warm weather, new pollen, and 

 new honey. 



CURE FOB SPRING DWINDLING i. 



As I have said before, I know of no posi- 

 tive cure except warm weather, and this 

 always does away with it entirely ; were this 

 not the case, I should hardly be willing to 

 class this great drawback to successful bee 

 culture, under the head of wintering. The 

 question now arises, can we not. by the use 

 of artificial heat, bring about such a state 

 of affairs as is produced by warm weather? 

 In other words, can we not, by going to the 

 necessary expense and trouble, save our 

 bees and queens, even though seasonable 

 weather does not come V Many experiments 

 have been made in the matter, and some of 

 them, apparently, have succeeded; but, on 

 the other hand, many of them have signally 

 failed. I have started healthy brood rearing 

 in every month in the year, by means of ar- 

 tificial heat, but to take a whole apiary that 

 is running down, in the month of April, and 

 build it up. prevent the colonies from 

 swarming out. and the queens from desert- 



