1266 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Oct. 15 



10° above zero. This lasted for over a week. 

 During tills time I made it a practice to give 

 each colony a pint of hot sugar syrup each day. 

 The 41 well-packed colonies took theirs every 

 day, and would have taken more. The 13 with 

 only tarred paper would not take the syrup dur- 

 ing this cold spell; and every night I changed 

 hot syrup for cold, only to find it, next night, 

 cold and untouched. Following this cold spell 

 came a period of warm weather, and I took the 

 occasion to examine the bees and see how they 

 withstood the cold weather. The 41 newspaper- 

 packed colonies had, in the eight-frame colonies, 

 eight frames of brood or six frames of solid brood, 

 and were boiling over with bees; and of the Fer- 

 ris, or twelve-frame colonies, there were 12 frames 

 of brood or 10 frames of solid brood, and they 

 were hanging out at the time of examination with 

 the temperature at 78° in the shade. Of the 13 

 colonies packed only with tarred paper, eight 

 were dead — starved. Two absconded, and went 

 into other hives, and three were sticking out their 

 stings and shaking their wings at me when I took 

 off their cover; and by feeding and coaxing I was 

 able to build them up to be fairly good colonies 

 for wintering by fall. 



It might be of interest for me to say that the 

 41 colonies that were rearing brood during this 

 cold spell averaged 100 lbs. per colony in last 

 year's poor season. 



New Ulm, Minn. 



[The use of two pieces of tarred paper in place 

 of one will facilitate very materially the packing 

 and unpadding; but we would suppose that, at 

 the line where the top piece overlaps the bottom 

 one, wind and water would beat in; and if the 

 hive is tipped a little sidewise the water would 

 run down between the packing. Perhaps you 

 overcame this in some way. 



It is a little surprise to us that you secured as 

 good results after feeding in such cold weather, 

 even though the syrup was given them hot. It 

 would have been our opinion that this hot syrup 

 would have so stirred up the colony that bad re- 

 sults would have followed. At all events, we 

 would say that beginners should be cautioned; 

 for unless hives are well packed, and colonies 

 very strong, such feeding would be a very doubt- 

 ful proceeding. 



In a general way we observe that, where your 

 hives were packed with newspapers under tarred 

 paper, you not only secured excellent results in 

 winter, but increased materially the amount of 

 honey. We see no reason why hives well paper- 

 ed under caps should not winter their colonies 

 just as well as those having a wooden cap over 

 them. It was demonstrated last winter in our 

 own yard, and reports went to prove it, that a 

 mere paper cap without packing under it is hard- 

 ly sufficient protection for outdoor-wintered col- 

 onies in localities where the temperature goes 

 down to 10 or 20 above zero, occasionally hover- 

 ing around the zero point. There should be sev- 

 eral folds of newspaper, old carpeting, blankets, 

 or something under the cap to provide the neces- 

 sary insulation, for a cold atmosphere will pene- 

 trate a J^-inch board. If, however, such boards 

 be covered with several folds of newspaper, with 

 a good protecting cap, either of paper or wood, 

 good results will ordinarily follow. — Ed.] 



Heads of Grain 



From Different Fields 



DEEP SPACE UNDER BROOD-FRAMES; QUEEN-MAT- 

 ING EARLY IN SPRING. 



In experimenting on how much space should 

 be allowed under brood-frames I have used this 

 season the regular A or Danzenbaker bottom and 

 B style bottoms, Ij^, 3, and 4 inches deep The 

 Danzenbaker bottom gives traces of wax; the 

 1^-inch B bottom gave one inch of comb built 

 below the bottom-bars; 3 and 4 inches gave clean 

 bottom bars. I think these experiments tend to 

 prove it advisable to use a frame about 3 inches 

 deep between the brood-chamber and the bottom- 

 board. While this is true of summer I have no 

 doubt it is also true of winter, giving more ven- 

 tilation and protection from frost, especially if 

 arranged so bees and air must pass from front to 

 rear of hive before entering the brood-nest. Now 

 to prevent the increase in bee appliances I intend 



to place escape-boards, with the escapes removed, 

 between the three-inch frame and bottom-board, 

 giving the bees a central entrance and 3 inches 

 of space under the brood-combs, with a vestibule 

 of the bottom-board. See illustration. 



Bladen, Ohio. Chas. H. Cargo. 



[If the experience of Mr. C. P. Palmer, as re- 

 lated in our Sept. 15th issue, p. 1136, is any crite- 

 rion, it would seem as if your form of bottom- 

 board might not be very satisfactory for winter 

 use. We can hardly see what gain would be 

 accomplished for summer. Indeed, in a space so 

 deep the bees would be inclined some Feasons to 

 store comb if they did not last season. Bet er 

 not mike too many of them. — Ed.] 



