THE AMERICAN APICULTURIST. 



287 



flow ; put stocks into a warm cellar un- 

 der a cl welling, about Novembers, and 

 let them severehj alone until April 15 to 

 "20 the following spring. 



8. A ventilator in the exit pipe. 



9. Five and a half months. Amount 

 of food consumed I cannot say; I do 

 not weigh them in spring, xim too 

 busy. 



Woodstock, Ontario, Nov. 14, 1884. 



ANSWimS BY G. W. DKMAREK. 



1. Wlien all orders for breeding 

 queens are filled, and bees united, I 

 sliall put into winter quarters about 100 

 colouies. 



2. Pure Italians with the exception 

 of a few colonies of cross-bred bees 

 kept for experiment. I use Jones' per- 

 forated zinc to control the drones. 



3. I use the standard Langstroth 

 frame 9i by ITg. 



4. On the summer stands. " Sum- 

 mer stand " is a phrase not often used 

 by southern apiarists. Our bees re- 

 main in the apiary yard winter and sum- 

 mer, all the same. I give my bees no 

 extra attention as a general thing in 

 tlie winter months, except perhaps to 

 add an extra quilt, and to see that they 

 have plenty of stores to winter them. 



5. About 20 lbs. on the average, 

 mostly white clover honey. We had no 

 fail honey worth mentioning tills season. 

 We had some light showers of rain 

 during the ftiU months which gave 

 plenty of pollen, and this I regard as 

 being favorable to safe wintering, and 

 strong colouies in the spring. Of course 

 these views are at variance witli the 

 "pollen fraud" so strongly urged by 

 "Boss" novices wlio have no other 

 way to make themselves prominent be- 

 fore the public. 



6. I never lose any bees in winter 

 except by starvation or queenlessness. 

 Sometimes a colony is overlooked and 

 lost in tills way. My loss has not ex- 

 ceeded two per cent, in the past eigut 

 years. 



. 7. When speaking for our climate I 

 would say plenty of stores — including 

 pollen — wilh dry quarters. 



8. As a scientific question I regard 

 this of much importance, and if I lived 

 in a cold climate where cellar winter- 

 ing is necessary I should certainly try 

 by artificial means to keep the air in 

 the cellar as nearly like that in the open 

 air in time of pleasant weather as pos- 

 sible. Of course it would require ex- 

 perience to do this. 



9. Our bees fly when the weather 

 will permit. Our bees consume but 

 little during the early part of the win- 

 ter, but their stores disappear rapidly 

 after breeding begins in the spring. 



It requires about 25 pounds of honey 

 to carry a strong colony throuah the 

 winter and till the tenth of May, at 

 which time the locust bloom gives the 

 bees the first chance to store honey. 

 Fruit trees bloom so early wilh us, and 

 during rainy weather, our bees get but 

 little help from that source. 



ANSWERS BY E. E. HASTY. 



1. About 130. 



2. Hybrids between the German 

 and Italian. 



3. Double walled chaff'-packed hives. 

 About one-half of the apiary is on Gal- 

 lup frames and the rest Langstroth. 



4. Wholly on summer stands. My 

 method is to put in a central partition 

 of enamel cloth, and place two colonies 

 in each hive. Each colony is given four 

 frames of honey ; the other frames be- 

 ing stored in the coinb closet. A fold- 

 ed cushion of chaff occupies the upper 

 story, beneath which is an enamel 

 cloth cover to suppress upward ventil- 

 ation as much as possible. A tray of 

 sawdust is put under each hive, in 

 which each colony has its own open ves- 

 tibule and a vertical entrance. But last 

 winter, which was a trying one, I left 

 ten colonies just as the bees had sealed 

 themselves up. They did so nearly as 

 well as those carefully packed that I 

 shall let alone a much larger number 

 this year. Saving of honey seems to 

 be the principal advantage of my 

 method. 



.5. When packed as above I let my 

 colonies go into the winter with nine 

 pounds of honey each. Those having 

 twelve poinids I consider splendidlv 

 provisioned. Of course I hold myself 



