February, litl5. 



American Bee Journalj 



of 1914 of Hector Girouard, of St. Hy- 

 acinthe, vouched correct by several 

 of his neighbors wlio were also pres- 

 ent, was 6221 pounds from 15 colonies, 

 spring count. Of this 4950 pounds was 

 white clover and sweet clover, the 

 rest buckwheat. He used 13 frame 

 Langstroth hives. Mr. J. F. Prud- 

 homme, one of the new Board of Di- 

 rectors of the Association and a very 

 active apiarist, has kept a [strong 

 colony on scales during the season 

 and has ascertained an increase in 

 weight of 20% pounds in 24 hours. 



The Honorable Mr. Caron. Minister 

 of Agriculture of the Province, In a 

 verbal report which he made at the 

 meeting, promised the co-operation 

 of his Department in every possible 

 way. But he complained that the sta- 

 tistics furnished by the beekeepers 

 of the Province to the census were al- 

 together inadequate, as the entire 

 amount of honey shown in the Domin- 

 ion census report for this Province 

 was only 1500 pounds. He begged the 

 beekeepers for more accurate statis- 

 tics. Regarding this, several apiarists 

 privately told me afterwards that they 

 were not to blame, and that it must 

 have been an oversight on the part of 

 the Census officials as one beekeeper 

 alone had reported a crop of 33,000 

 pounds. But such is the polite defer- 

 ence of the Canadians for their offi- 

 cials that no one had seen fit to make 

 a reply to the Minister, by referring 

 the error to the fault of the Census 

 people. 



An evidence of the interest taken by 

 the Quebec government and legisla- 

 ture in the business of beekeeping is 

 shown in several laws now in exis- 

 tence. The first concerns the inspec- 

 tion of apiaries. Inspectors are paid 

 at the rate of $5 per diem and ex- 

 penses and the funds are supplied out 

 of a $55,000 appropriation set apart 

 for agricultural organizations. There 



is also a law forbidding the spraying 

 of fruit blossoms with poisonous 

 compounds, so as not to imperil the 

 bees which work upon them. Another 

 regulation requires the fencing of 

 apiary grounds which are within 30 

 feet of a house or a public road, wiiii 

 an 8-foot board fence, extending at 

 least 15 feet beyond the limit of the 

 apiary. The beekeepers consider this 

 regulation as a protection to their in- 

 terests, since they may keep bees 

 anywhere provided they comply with 

 the law. Upon the whole I believe 



that we of the States can learn fully 

 as much from Canadian apiarists as 

 they may learn from us, by compar- 

 ing methods. 



However much we would have liked 

 to visit also the Ontario beekeepers 

 d\iring this trip, we had to forego 

 that pleasure. We had allowed too 

 little time for the trip and I needed 

 to be back home by the l.'jth. Toronto 

 is but a short distance from Illinois, 

 when compared with Quebec and we 

 will have numerous opportunities of 

 attending their future meetings. 



Contributed 



Articles^ 



Wintering Bees 



BY LEWIS POST. 

 '.Read at the Wisconsin Meeting.) 



MY plan of wintering has been to 

 prepare for the strength and en- 

 durance of my bees as much as 

 I can from early .spring until I have 

 them provided with all needed stores 

 in October for the coming winter. 



The successful wintering of bees de- 

 pends primarily upon good and suffi- 

 cient stores in the hive to last until 

 honey comes again, and when I say 

 that, I don't mean sugar syrup. Of 

 course, sugar syrup is better than 

 " bug juice" (honey-dew), but I affirm 

 it is not to be compared to good 

 honey. Shame, I say, on the beekeeper 

 who will rob his bees of their good 

 honey for the questionable profit he 

 thinks there is in it, and then till the 

 hives with sugar syrup " dope " for 

 them to live on through the winter. 



I have always, with one or two ex- 



ceptions, wintered my bees in the cel- 

 lar. The cellar in which I winter them 

 is under the house. It is 18x2G feet, 

 with cement floor; the bee cellar 

 proper is 12x18 feet. In that space I 

 have at the present time 92 colonies. 

 The remaining 11 are in the other part 

 of the space. 



All is ventilated with a G-inch stove 

 pipe entering the top of the wall on 

 the south side connected with two 

 elbows extending to the bottom of the 

 cellar on the inside, and by a window 

 under the vestibule and porch on the 

 east side. That admits of a free circu- 

 lation of fresh air without any undue 

 exposure to the bees. 



I have the 8 and 10 frame Langstroth 

 portico hives and a few dovetailed 

 ones, but for various reasons I like the 

 Langstroth better. 



The hives are ventilated by two ^i- 

 inch holes in the back of the lid and 

 the open entrance. I have tried put- 

 ting two thicknesses of gunny sack 

 over the frames, thinking the draft 

 might be too stron -• through the back 

 and front of the hive, but I have not 

 been able to discover any difference 

 in the result. 



As to the temperature of the cellar I 

 have never given it any very serious 

 thought, but try to keep it cool enough 

 so that the bees are not uneasy. But 

 to keep a thermometer in the cellar 

 and then try to keep an even tempera- 

 ture is only subjecting the beekeeper 

 to unnecessary trouble without any 

 material benefit to the bees. 



Madison, Wis. 



STRONQ COLONIES IN A COUNTRY OF SHORT SUMMERS, CHARLESBOURG, 



QUEBEC 



Sugar Syrup Feeding 



BY .1. E. IIANU. 



CREDIT is due to Editor Dadant, 

 for compiling so much valuable 

 information in the October Ameri- 

 can Bee Journal relative to the ortho- 

 dox density of sugar syrup for feeding 

 bees, for this is a matter of vital inter- 

 est to beekeepers. It is gratifying to 

 note that the majority favor a solution 

 of two sugar to one of water; while 

 adding my testimony in favor of this 

 solution, I wish to sound a timely 

 warning against the inordinate feeding 

 of sugar syrup of any density and for 



