Entered at the PostoflSce, Fort Pierce, Fla., as second-class mail matter. 



Vol. XVII. 



MAY, 1907. 



No. 5. 



WINTER CONDITIONS WITHIN THE HIVE. 



A. C. MILLER. 



"B 



EES TUCKED up nice and 

 warm." What a safe and 

 comforting feeling those 

 , words im,part, and yet they are woefully 

 misleading. A hive with thick chaf?- 

 packed walls and a thick cushion over 

 the frames is but an ice house for the 

 poor bees. Chafif hives were devised 

 under the impression that they help 

 the bees to keep warm by shutting out 

 the cold. As regards a dweHing for 

 man such devices are all right but they 

 do not apply to a bee hive. Theories are 

 very nice as a basis for experiments but 

 it will not do to accept them as facts 

 until fully tested and proved, but theor- 

 ies have been accepted as facts in re- 

 gard to bee hives. Men with axes to 

 grind or enthusiasts with a hobby have 

 from time to time exploited some new 

 hive as the bestest-best and the only 

 "sure thing" for pro'fit^ — for the seller 

 any way. The relation of a few facts 

 may help to clear away some of the 

 mystery about hives, save dollars for 

 bee-keepers and incidentally deprive 

 the manufacturers of a few channels of 

 profit. 



In the winter bees in any hive keep 

 the temperajture within their cluster 



between 64 and 74 degrees, Farenheit, 

 rarely going below 60 degrees or up to 

 So degrees. But outside of the cluster 

 the temperature is nearly or quite the 

 same as that outside of the hive. 

 Cluster temperature varies about as 

 follows: From about 2 p. m. to about 

 9 a. m. — period of quiesence — the aver- 

 age is 66 degrees F. About 9 to 10 a. 

 m. the temperature begins to rise until 

 it reaches 70 degrees to 74 degrees. If 

 honey is poured in or if sealed honey 

 is bro'ken open at such time, the tem- 

 perature will rise rapidly even to 80 

 degrees or more and remain so until 

 all free honey is taken up and disposed 

 of. I have seen 80 degrees maintained 

 for 24 hours under such conditions. 

 The speed of the rise in temperature 

 when stores are broken open is aston- 

 ishing, 6 to 10 degrees rise in as many 

 minutes having been noted. The maxi- 

 mum cluster temperature is generally 

 reached about 11 a. m. By 2 p. m. it 

 usually reaches tihe minimum average 

 and stays with almost no variation un- 

 til the next day. These temperatures 

 are quite independent of the outer air. 

 The temperature within the hive and 

 outside the cluster varies as follows: 



