188 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Mar. 1 



ed that they were in just as nice order as 

 before. I now paid no further attention to 

 ventilators; and when the cellar was new- 

 13^ roofed no provision was made for venti- 

 lation whatever. Nor have I seen any rea- 

 son since for ventilators, so far as the bees 

 were concerned, for they come out in the 

 spring- much better since I use no ventila- 

 tion than they did when I was fussing with 

 ventilators as some are now doing. 



If 3^ou will turn to page 333 of A B C, 

 1899 edition, you will see that my upper 

 ventilator was not the little one "thirtieth." 

 or "three and four inch ventilator" you 

 speak of in your footnote, but a 6X8 inch 

 ventilator, or one nearly one-fifth as large 

 as your 16-inch-square one you are now 

 recommending. This, together with the 

 large sub-earth ventilator (100 feet long, 

 and at an average of 3 feet under ground) 

 would change all the air in the cellar in 

 less than five minutes. Then you must 

 have forgotten how, with those dry cellars 

 of years ago, the bees got uneasy and nois3s 

 coming out of their hives and running about 

 the entrance till some one found out that 

 the giving of water in a sponge quieted 

 them. And I have often wondered if those 

 having noisy bees, and who opened their 

 cellar doors at night, and shut them in the 

 morning to quiet them, could not do this 

 quieting more quickly by giving a little 

 water in a sponge. My idea is that it is 

 the damp night air which is let in that 

 should have the credit of quieting the bees, 

 more than a change of air. This damp air, 

 together with a cooling of the cellar, slakes 

 their thirst and makes them happy. Away 

 back in the seventies, with my dry cellar 

 and pure air I have given water to restless 

 colonies at night, and found them as quiet 

 as ' ' lambs ' ' the next morning. I have been 

 watching this ventilation matter through 

 the "eyes" of the past, and can only see 

 in it a revival of those days; and as long 

 as my bees winter very nicely, without even 

 one single thought, on my part, as regards 

 ventilation, from the 10th of November to 

 the 20th of April — no, not so much as the 

 opening or the shutting of a door (notwith- 

 standing Mr. Bingham thinks I do this, ac- 

 cording to his letter found on page 934 of 

 Gleanings for 1901), I do not see any rea- 

 son for adopting that great big ventilator, 

 nor worrying my head over the matter, and 

 much less of running back and forth to the 

 cellar all winter to see that the ventilation 

 is properly regulated to suit ever3' change 

 of wind and temperature. If the bee-keep- 

 er can gain nothing by all of this trouble 

 in looking after ventilators, his time can be 

 much more profitably spent in preparing 

 for the next season, or b3^ reading, recrea- 

 tion, and rest. 



And to Bro. Bingham I will say, I would 

 prefer my hives dr3', and would prefer less 

 mold on the cellar walls; but if m3' bees 

 winter as well as his, can he say that his 

 dry sweet air is any better for the safe win- 

 tering of bees than the dampness which 

 mine enjo3'? The experience of the past 



has led me to believe that, where a cellar 

 is not overstocked, an eve7i temperature of 

 from 44 to 46 degrees, together with a moist 

 atmosphere, is one of the happy environ- 

 ments, very enjoyable to the bees, and one 

 tending toward their coming out nice and 

 healthy in the spring. At any rate, it win- 

 ters well with me, and gives ;«i? a "happy " 

 winter, free from any care whatever in the 

 matter, and at present I am satisfied to let 

 "well enough" alone. 



I had thought to close here; but I have 

 been reading the proof of Bro. Bingham's 

 article over again, and feel that I should 

 say a few words regarding this sentence of 

 his : "A hundred colonies of bees consum- 

 ing 400 pounds of honey per month, would 

 liberate not less than 35 to 40 lbs. of water 

 per week." I wonder if Bro. B. meant just 

 what that sentence conve3's to the mind of 

 the average reader. Or was it put in as a 

 sort of "filling" to make his side appear 

 the nearer right? But whichever way he 

 intended it, this sentence speaks the loss of 

 1500 pounds of honey, or its equivalent, 

 during the five months the 100 colonies are 

 in his gellar, over and above what mine 

 consume, just for the sake of that dry air 

 and his extra work with that big ventilator. 

 Bless your heart, friend B., if bees must 

 consume stores at the rate of four pounds of 

 honey per month, per colon3', for the privi- 

 lege of being in a dry, well-ventilaled cel- 

 lar, then I have an additional reason for 

 sticking to my moist, no-ventilation one; for 

 it is a rare thing that any colony consumes 

 more than one pound a month while in this 

 cellar; and on several winters I have had 

 colonies which did not consume more than 

 from 3'2 to 4 lbs. of honey during the five 

 to five and a half months the3' were in this 

 repositor3'. This saving of honey will far 

 more than overcome all disagreeableness 

 which arises from moisture, and leave a 

 large amount on the credit side of the bal- 

 ance-sheet besides. 



Borodino, N. Y., Feb. 7. 



[This question of ventilation seems to be 

 a rather perplexing one. Our experience 

 is emphatically in favor of ventilation. 

 Our out-yard cellar was not ventilated, and 

 Mr. Warden has reported it as not doing 

 well, while the bees in our home-3'ard cel- 

 lar — that is, the one under the machine-shop 

 — are doing finely. In the former the air 

 is very damp and the ventilation is limited, 

 because I did not notice that Mr. Bingham 

 recommended a 16-inch ventilating-flue, un- 

 til after we had put in the 6-inch ventilator, 

 and the bees were in the cellar. 



Regarding the consumption of honey as 

 reported by Mr. Bingham, it appears that 

 our friend must have made a mistake. Con- 

 servative estimates have shown that indoor- 

 wintered bees consume about half of the 

 amount of stores consumed b3' bees outdoors. 

 In some cases the figures are down as low 

 as one-fourth, so that from 5 to 10 lbs. per 

 colony during the five months would be 

 more nearly correct. Mr. Doolittle puts the 



