1908 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE, 



573 



satisfactorily as it did during the hot dry 

 ilusty ilays untler the iollueneo of a very 

 moderate amount of feeding during the 

 night." 



And then, again, on page 77, he says, "And 

 after feeding perhaps a ton of the grape su- 

 gar I am prepared to say that it is a decided 

 success for stimulating brood-rearing, for 

 rearing queens, and building up colonies." 



VVe will now take the late Henry Alley's 

 IJee-keeper's Handy Book and see on p. 107 

 what he said in regard to stimulative feeding: 



"When a colony is being fed. the queen 

 commences to deposit eggs more vigorously, 

 and the colony exhibits greater activity than 

 its neighbors that are not stimulated. Feed- 

 ing for this purpose should not be resorted 

 to until the bees commence to carry in pollen 

 as the effect of the increased activity prior 

 to this time would be injurious. The proper 

 time is to feed at night, and not over half a 

 pound of food should be given at any one 

 time unless the bees are short of stores, and 

 it should be discontinued when honey can be 

 gathered from natural sources. Food for 

 stimulating should be made quite thin with 

 water, say six pounds of sugar and five pints 

 of water, and a small amount of honey to 

 llavor. The water will be utilized by the 

 hees in brood-rearing." 



I should advise making the syrup more 

 than half water. I should like also to call 

 your attention to the latest edition of the A 

 B C and X Y Z of Bee Culture, and see what 

 is there said on this subject; and right here 

 let me say that this edition to our bee litera- 

 ture is worth far more than its cost, and 

 should be in the hands of every honey-pro- 

 ducer in the land. On page 200 the authors 

 say: 



"In getting colonies up to good strength 

 to gather the honey harvest, or induce nuclei, 

 or full colonies for that matter, to cells for 

 the purpose of queen-rearing, the daily feed- 

 ing of half a pint of syrup should be prac- 

 ticed." 



They also say on page 203, in speaking of 

 H. R. Boardman, of East Townsend, Ohio, 

 that he practices a plan which often insures 

 a crop of honey even during poor seasons. 

 "In brief it is this: He feeds all his colonies 

 as soon as it becomes settled warm weather, 

 whether they need stores or not. The syrup 

 is given them slowly to stimulate broodrear- 

 ing This feeding is continued clear on to 

 the honey-How, when, of course, it is discon- 

 tinued. The result is that the hives are over- 

 llowing with bees and brood." 



'Jhen still further on the author says, 

 "While it costs considerable to feed bees in 

 this way I believe Mr. Boardman's experi- 

 ence has been such that he feels warranted 

 in continuing it; and then if the year proves 

 to be a good one he will get a tremendous 

 crop of honey. One year when I visited him 

 he had secured a fair-sized yield from each 

 colony, and a poor year at that, while his 

 neighbors round about him did not get any 

 surplus, and all they did get was brood-nest- 

 fuls of honey and nothing more " 



Father Quinbv and his son-in-law, L. C. 



Root, many years ago wei"o the first to call 

 my attention to the value of stimulative feed- 

 ing in the spring. They were very enthusi- 

 astic on the subject, and advised me to prac- 

 tice it every spring if I expected to make an 

 early increase or secure a nice surplus of 

 clover honey. I think you will find in Quin- 

 by's book, "Mysteries of Bee-keeping Ex- 

 plained," something on this subject. I have 

 lost the copy I once had, and therefore can 

 not quote his words. And now while I am 

 in company with these shining lights of api- 

 culture that I have just quoted above, I wish 

 to be put on record as saying that I have 

 practiced spring feeding for over 30 years, 

 and during that period I have fed at least 

 5000 colonies for the purpose of promoting 

 brood-rearing during the spring, and I am 

 sure that, all things considered, it has been 

 one of the most useful and profitable things 

 I have ever done in the apiary. 



As the defendant in this case, I now sub- 

 mit it to the 50,000 readers of Gleanings as 

 a jury to decide whether I have or have not 

 produced sufficient evidence to sustain the 

 position I have always taken. I might con- 

 tinue, and produce volumes of testimony to 

 prove that 1 am in the right on this subject 



Delanson, N. Y. 



[We are not sure that our correspondent 

 has quite undestood the point of view of his 

 critics; and in a like manner we may assume 

 that they may not have understood him. As 

 we understand it, they are not arguing that 

 bees should never be fed in the spring to 

 stimulate brood-rearing; but they are con- 

 tending that, if feeding is necessary some 

 time wilhin the year the bees should l)e fed 

 in the fall, and enough so they will have 

 plenty of stores clear up to and during settled 

 warm weather. Or, to put it another way, 

 it is not a question with them whether bees 

 need to be fed in localities where natural 

 supplies are deficient, but the time when feed 

 should be given. 



The text book authorities referred to, s<> 

 far as we can see, were not arguing that bees 

 should be fed in the spring rather than in 

 the fall, or that they should be fed in the 

 fall sufficient to bring them to early spring 

 feeding, bu*"; to show^o?^; to stimulate brood- 

 rearing in early spring when the colonies are 

 weak or short of stores. It is true some of 

 them advise spring feeding; but a text-book 

 can never quite keep up with modern teach- 

 ings in a journal; the old editions of works 

 of ten or twenty years ago much less so. 



Mr. H. R. Boardman's method of feeding 

 before the honey-flow, as we understand it, 

 had in view the jamming of the brood-nest 

 with brood and honey, in warm weather and 

 just before the honey-flow began, so there 

 would be no place for the storage of the nectar 

 except in the supers. His plan would not nec- 

 essarily be out of harmony with the notions 

 of the opponents of spring feeding, for it was 

 for a different object -leaving no room for 

 honey except in the supers. 



It is perhaps well to bear in mind that 

 they were speaking from the standpoint of 



