AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



147 



again from cover to cover. So that novi^ 

 there is scarcely a subject you bee-inen 

 over there have discussed, during the 

 past 15 months, that I am not conver- 

 sant with ; and my opinion is that with 

 our bees, and your appliances and bee- 

 books ; and our floral wealth, with Ital- 

 ian queens, we are destined to be the 

 foremost honey-producing country in 

 the world ! This, however, you may 

 deem Australian "blow," as Anthony 

 Trollope would say, so I will cease boast- 

 ing, and continue. 



I have spoken only of myself. There 

 is a neighbor here who has even got on 

 quicker than I have. Alderman John 

 Pollock is also a disciple of Gale's. At 

 the time of the lecture I spoke of, he 

 had 16 colonies in boxes, and he at once 

 got the " A B C of Bee-Culture, ind 

 enough hives, and transferred the whole 

 lot. Besides these, he also bought oO 

 colonies of bees and transferred them. 

 He then got enough Italian queens to 

 give each of his colonies one of them. 

 This was in January, and he got through 

 the winter with 34." Early in the spring 

 he broke up a number of them into 

 nuclei colonies for queen-rearing, sold 

 about five dozen queens, got a ton of 

 honey,and increased to 70 colonies, which 

 he has now set down for the winter. 



Wingham, N. S. W., April 12. 



Olil or YouM Bees for Winter. 



Written for the American Bee Journal 



BY J. F. MEKKILL. 



As before promised, I will give my ex- 

 perience in the wintering and springing 

 of my bees in 1893 and 1894. I 

 thought when I read Mr. B. Taylor's 

 article in the issue of the American Bee 

 Journal for May 24th, I would never 

 write one word of my experience, as it is 

 entirely in contradiction of his experi- 

 ence, but I have concluded to give it, 

 and let all who read it sift it and sand it 

 as they please. 



My bees went into winter quarters in 

 the fall of 1893 with the fewest young 

 bees that I ever saw in the number of 

 colonies that I had. No honey worth 

 mentioning was gathered after the mid- 

 dle of July, and the last of August found 

 almost all of my new colonies in a starv- 

 ing condition, and so reduced in bees 

 that I had to double them up to place 

 them in fair condition for winter as to 

 bees. 



We had no fall flow of honey at all, 

 and the middle of September found my 



36 colonies of bees with less than 100 

 pounds of honey in the whole number. I 

 always weigh every hive, so I know just 

 what they have. 



I fed every colony until each contained 

 30 pounds of stores from granulated 

 sugar syrup, in the proportion of two 

 parts of sugar to one of water. 



I packed them up snugly and warm, 

 and left them on the summer stands, 

 with all the horrors of despair, never 

 expecting such old bees could winter. 



Now for the result : On May 23, 

 1894, I was in possession of 36 as fine 

 colonies of bees as I ever saw at that 

 time of the year. In all my experience 

 in keeping bees, I never saw hives so 

 well filled with bees and brood as they 

 were the first of May this year. 



Now I am not going to say that I pre- 

 fer old bees for winter — oh, no ! another 

 winter might give altogether different 

 results, for we had a very warm winter 

 and a very early spring, and this may 

 account for their fine wintering. 



I believe with Mr. Taylor, that the 

 conditions exist in a hive in the fall for 

 their successful wintering. An ex- 

 tremely severe winter of course might 

 not bring bees through quite as strong 

 as a mild one. Mr. Taylor says that 

 plenty of young bees and plenty of nat- 

 ural stores are the conditions. I shall 

 disagree with him in only one point, viz. : 

 Give me the granulated sugar instead of 

 the honey, for this locality. 



I would not give anybody 10 cents per 

 colony to warrant my bees for winter 

 when fed on sugar. 



Sometime I will give my experience in 

 wintering bees on honey and granulated 

 sugar. 



Corinth, Vt. 



Feeiini Supr to Prolnce "Honey. 



The followiitg question was asked in 

 the National Stockman recently, and 

 answered by Dr. C. C. Miller : 



Question. — Would it be profitable for 

 me to feed sugar to my bees, as materi- 

 als for honey are scarce, and how much 

 should be given per day ? 



Answer. — It depends a little upon 

 just what you mean. Feeding for the 

 support of bees is one thing; feeding to 

 have the material fed stored by the bees, 

 quite another. During the cold, wet 

 weather in the first part of June, many 

 colonies run short of stores, some of 



