998 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



sugar in water, the ratio being one part 

 sugar to one of water; and I have been 

 civing each colony half a gallon every other 

 day by the Boardman-feeder process. At 



present, Sept. 10, they seem to be doing 

 finely in rearing larood, pulling comb, and 

 laj'ing up stores. 

 Hiawatha, W. Va. 



WINTERING ABOVE EMPTY COMBS 



BY H. E. CROWTHER 



The plan of wintering bees over extra 

 combs of honey or empty combs has been 

 practiced with good results by Messrs. At- 

 water, Coffin, and others for many years. 

 The main consideration is to have the 

 brood-nest heavy above, and the combs with 

 some honey in them, underneath. This 

 should be done when the bees are not hunt- 

 ing honey too strongly, for in large yards 

 it has been known to start robbing. Also 

 it should be done early enough to prevent 

 loss of anj^ bees in the fall. 



A winter like that of 1914 in Idaho em- 

 phasizes the necessity of a solidly filled 

 brood-nest, as the continued cold makes it 

 impossible for the bees to move sidewise 

 or downward to the honey. Many colonies 

 starved outright with plenty of honey at the 

 sides of the brood-nest, but out of reach 

 of the cluster. The bees seem to be able to 

 move down the length of the combs well 

 enough; but when the back end of the hive 

 is reached, it is quite a different proposition 

 for them to get around the ends of the 

 frames. 



Wintering over empty or partly filled 

 combs applies mostly to colonies run for 

 extracted honey. In case of comb-honey 

 production there are but few extra bodies 

 of honey to be set under; but anyway, the 

 plan is not as badly needed as with colonies 

 run for extracted honey, for the reason that 

 the comb-honey colonies are much heavier, 

 due to the extra crowding that was neces- 

 sary. 



Great cai'e should be used to keep the 

 mice from eating the combs. We reduce 

 the entrance to 5/16 of an inch. We are 

 now using a great many unwired, shallow 

 (six-inch) frames which are not so much of 

 a loss if chewed a little, and are more easily 

 replaced. We have been using them suc- 

 cessfully in connection with eight-frame 

 Langstroth bodies for comb honey. The 

 idea is to winter with two of them for each 

 brood-nest — one of them if full enough on 

 top, and the other below. We leave the 

 colony so arranged until stimulation is nec- 

 essary in the spring. Then the two shallow 

 supers are reversed, the honey going below 

 and the empty combs above. This puts the 



bees up to the work of moving and working 

 over the honey, and stimulates brood-rear- 

 ing equal to or better than any other way I 

 know. If any of the honey is candied, it 

 is worked over, and there is no bother at 

 extracting time, if any happens to be left 

 in the combs. When comb-honey supers 

 are needed, the shallows can be assembled 

 on a few colonies to be extracted later, or 

 used on others for wintering. 



This plan was more fully explained bv 

 E. F. Atwater, p. 411, May 15, but it did 

 not get the attention it deserved. 



The longer we use these shallow extract- 

 ing-frames the better we like them. In the 

 extraeting-yards we have gradually worked 

 into them for several years back, and find 

 them very nicely taking the place of the 

 old deep supers. With them we need but 

 few excluders, and that is an advantage, for 

 I have come more and more to consider 

 excluders quite a hindrance. (I refer to 

 the old-style zinc and wood excluders.) The 

 new wire excluders which we have been 

 trying in yards where we still have a gi'eat 

 many of the deep "queen-attracting" combs, 

 seem to be a great improvement. I should 

 think there would be no more demand for 

 the old zinc pattern 



Parma, Idaho. 



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 Feeding Coal-oil Flavored Honey 



I notice in Gleanings a query in regard to feed- 

 ing- bees honey tainted with coal-oil flavor. In 1867 

 my grocer had some coal-oil-flavored sugar. As I 

 had bought sugar from him at times to feed my 

 bees, he offered me this injured lot cheap. I fed 

 some to a colony with no bad results. Then I took 

 one of my Italian colonies, and put it in an empty 

 hive full of frames. One frame was partly filled 

 for bees to cluster on. I fed the bees about thirty- 

 five pounds of sugar, 2 to 1, and then found the 

 hive nearly full of nice white comb sealed over. The 

 combs were full of syrup, and a good bit of brood 

 was in the hive. This was late in the fall after 

 all honeyflows had stopped. In the following winter 

 this was the only colony I had that did not have 

 dysentery. A good many others died. 



The next spring, to satisfy my curiosity, I took 

 a little of the comb left over and tasted it. It had 

 the same coal-oil flavor. After fifty years of ex- 

 perience I would not hesitate a minute to use such 

 coal-oil-flavored syrup. 



Luton, Mo. John M. Mohlke. 



