146 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



March 8, 1900. 



some 30 da3'S, they were tried, and releast, as I could not 

 prove which one went to the hive on this particular day ; 

 but the detention had the desired effect, however, and I have 

 had but little trouble along- this line since, save when Mr. 

 Bruin struck me pretty heavy on several occasions. 



By Feb. 25 the snow was all gone, and we had genuine 

 spring- weather. ' Wharton Co., Tex. 



Temperature of Cellars in Wintering Bees. 



BY C. P. DADANT. 



SOME time ago an article from me was publisht in the 

 American Bee Journal, in which I mentioned the proper 

 temperature, in my estimation, for the safe wintering 

 of bees in cellars, and placed it at 40 to 45 degrees. I also 

 stated that T had, years ago, met a bee-keeper who held that 

 bees could be wintered successfully at a temperature as 

 high as 90 degrees, but that I had ascertained at the time 

 that he was only guessing at the temperature, and did not 

 use a thermometer. ^ 



This article of mine was reproduced in the Bee-Keepers 

 Review for November, and at the same time an article was 

 publisht from Ira Barber, of New York, who says that he 

 has done this very thing, and that he did use a thermome- 

 ter. I quote a passage from his article : 



"The highest temperature that was found whea a thermometer was 

 used was 90 degrees, aad all the colonies were clustered on the outside of 

 the hives but not in one mass all together. In the seven winters that I 

 had bees in this particular cellar, tests were made two or three times 

 each winter until the last winter, when I did not go there until March. 

 Then I was sent for to see what ailed the bees. Upon g-oing- there I 

 found the bees, 225 colonies, all in a solid mass on the hives, there 

 was no part of a hive to be seen, yet all the bees were as quiet as tho 

 clustered upon the outside of their hives on a damp, mug-gy morning lu 

 August." 



Mr. Barber goes on to report that these bees wintered 

 with the loss of only one queen, and in the best condition of 

 any lot that he ever wintered. He ascribes the success to 

 the damp condition of the cellar. I do not wish to find 

 fault with this statement, altho I can not help thinking 

 that in an Illinois cellar it would have been very diflficult 

 for the bees, which were clustered in one mass, to find their 

 respective hives again. Neither would I want to leave bees 

 from the beginning- of the season until March without 

 making an occasional examination of the conditions in 

 which thev were placed. 



But what I wish to do here is to warn the inexperi- 

 enced apiarist against experimenting with high tempera- 

 tures in the cellar. Aside from the fact that it would be 

 very difficult to obtain such a temperature— which is almost 

 to the point of blood heat, and higher than that of any sum- 

 mer night in our latitude— the statement that the bees in 

 such temperature have to lie outside of their hives shows 

 clearly that these were uncomfortable, which any one 

 would surely expect. When bees are uncomfortable and 

 clustering in this way, they will seize any opportunity that 

 offers to change their condition, and the least ray of light, 

 theleast jar, is bound to be noticed by them, and to cause 

 them to fly about. The exceptional instance mentioned 

 above serves only to emphasize the need of a low and equal 

 temperature which will keep them as quiet and as closely 

 confined a"s possible with the least expenditure of food, and 

 this is to be found without a doubt at the degree mentioned 

 in my previous article. This has been tested over and over 

 in different cellars, by different apiarists. 



A test may easily be made by any one who winters bees 

 in a cellar, and will settle this matter to the satisfaction of 

 the person himself. Let each cellar be provided with a 

 thermometer, then examine your instrument often, at each 

 time taking note of whether the bees are quiet or noisy. If 

 the temperature is right they will make such low hum that 

 nothing will be perceptible above a faint murmur in a cel- 

 lar containing even a hundred colonies. If it is too low or 

 too high the hum will be more perceptible. At too high a 

 temperature they will become restless, they will slowly 

 emerge from the hive-entrance, and will cluster on the front 

 board. They are then ready to take flight at the least dis- 

 turbance by light or jar. 



It is very difficult to write on a subject requiring as 

 much exactness and accuracy as bee-culture and its details 

 without meeting some one who is ready to contradict one's 

 assertions. But we must console ourselves with the 

 thought that not bee-culture alone is open to contradictory 

 views, and that he who would teach what he thinks he 

 knows well must be ready not only to discuss his views and 

 his reasons, but must be prepared for an occasional open 

 contradiction. 



In another article I spoke of the common error of fruit- 

 growers who think they know that bees can and do injure 

 sound grapes, and incidentally I remarkt that there were 

 many who thought that cheat could grow from wheat. No 

 one has seen fit to oppose me on the first proposition, prob- 

 ably because they have felt that I was too sure of my sub- 

 ject ; but I have had half a dozen encounters with well-in- 

 formed farmers who positively know that wheat does turn 

 to cheat under certain circumstances. Gentlemen, I per- 

 emptorily decline to furnish proofs of my own on this sub- 

 ject, and will respectfully retire behind Gray's Botany, our 

 best text-book, in which wheat is described as " Triticum 

 vulgare," while cheat is listed as " Bromus secalinus," two 

 entirely different tribes of the gramin;*?, and which cannot 

 even mix in their bloom and form a mongrel, as between 

 the melon and the cucumber. If someone positively knows 

 better, and can adduce proofs, it is time that our text-books 

 were corrected to agree with the facts. But superficial ob- 

 servations will not do either in botany or in bee-culture. 



Hancock Co., 111. 



" The Best Hive for Northern Illinois." 



BY EDWIN BBVINS. 



I NOTICE on page 5 that at the Chicago Bee-Keepers' 

 Convention a paper was read by W. C. Eyman, on " The 

 Best Hive for Northern Illinois." Mr. Eyman said some 

 good things on the subject, but not all that might have 

 been said, and I feel like protesting against the removal of 

 the viands before the appetites of the guests are half satis- 

 fied. 



He says that the hive for Northern Illinois should have 

 a brood-chamber large enough to contain honey to carry the 

 bees thru the winter and spring without having to feed, 

 and thinks one of 10-Langstroth-frame capacity will fill 

 the bill, but would like a hive of that capacity taking only 

 8 frames. 



I have proven by long experience that for safe winter- 

 ing of bees vertical expansion of the brood-chamber is bet- 

 ter than lateral, and I agree with Mr. Lyman that the 

 supers of an 8-frame Langstroth hive are large enough for 

 best results in comb honey production when the hives as 

 deep or deeper than the Langstroth are used. When wider 

 and shallower brood-chambers are used a wider super to 

 correspond may give as good results — I do not know, hav- 

 ing never tried them. 



While Mr. Lyman thinks he would like these deep 8- 

 frame hives for wintering bees, he at the same time seems 

 to think he would not like them to hive swarms in when 

 working for white comb honey. The swarms that issue 

 from these deep hives he would hive in brood-chambers of 

 al*3ut half the depth of those from which they issued. This 

 parctice, it seems to me, would be attended with a good 

 many difficulties and no adequate compensating advan- 

 tages. 



My experience with the deep 8-frame hives has not been 

 so unsatisfactory in comb-honey results as to lead me to 

 the use of a shallower hive for swarms while using the 

 deeper hives for colonies. 



Anybody who has read what I have written in the 

 American Bee Journal knows that I have no great reverence 

 for the standard, but adherence to the standard would be 

 preferable to the use of hives of different depths in the 

 same apiary, unless the hives of similar length and depth 

 were workt as a small apiary by themselves. If I thought 

 it imperative to have shallow brood-chambers to hive 

 swarms in, I would use the sectional brood-chamber hive — 

 using one section until the end of the white honey harvest, 

 and then putting on another section for extracted honey or 

 winter stores. In fact, I am using some with brood-cham- 

 bers 7j 8 inches deep, that take supers of the 8-frame Lang-- 

 stroth hive. With queen-excluders these do reasonably 

 well, but somehow I have a preference for brood-chambers 

 that are not divisible. The hives in sections are just as 

 good for wintering bees as the deep 8 and 10 frame hives, 

 and it may probably be conceded that somewhat more white 

 comb honey can be secured fro.m bees working in brood- 

 chambers having as much again capacity. But, as to gen- 

 eral results, I am compelled to say with Dr. Miller, " I don't 

 know." 



There may be seasons in which there will not be much 

 honey gathered after the white honey harvest, and then 

 one might wish that some, or all, of the white honey sur- 

 plus was in the brood-chamber, and that the brood-chamber 

 was a little large. To be sure, one could resort to feeding-, 

 but feeding is something Mr. Lyman would avoid. 



