a thousand dollars per acre. Such re- 

 sults, however, do not occur often, and 

 are almost as frequent as a yield of 

 300 lbs. of honey from one colony of bees. 



I feel safe in making the statement 

 that good apiarists can find locations in 

 this county where they can secure a 

 support from apiculture" and at the 

 same time engage in semi-tropical fruit 

 culture — the leading fruits being 

 oranges, lemons, pineapples and ba- 

 nanas—to the extent of having at the 

 end of 5 years an independent income 

 from them alone. 



Clifton Springs, Florida. 



For the American Bee Journal. 



My Experience in Wintering. 



D. RIDER. 



Much against my judgment and 

 will, my bees were left out of their 

 winter-quarters until late in December, 

 1878. The mild winter of 1877 had its 

 influence upon the persons who had that 

 dutv to perform and as I had made them 

 co-partners in half the apiary, they 

 thought it best to leave the bees on their 

 summer stands as long as possible, and 

 it was not until December 13, 1878, that 

 the extreme cold weather and a violent 

 snow storm, persuaded them to comply 

 with my request. Ten colonies were 

 then put into the bee-house ; as snow 

 fell very fast and nearly blinded the 

 men, the work was abandoned, and 

 snow, for 12 inches deep, covered the 

 remaining colonies. In my anxiety to 

 save the bees and keep them from 

 freezing, with a large grain shovel I 

 packed the snow around and on the top 

 of the hiVes, leaving the front and en- 

 trances open. 



On the 17th, the thermometer stand- 

 ing at 8° above zero, I dug the well- 

 packed snow away from 48 hives and 

 put them into the bee-cellar. On 23d 

 and 25th of December I finished storing 

 them into winter quarters, all but 2 

 large Simons' patent hives that had been 

 packed in inches of dry maple-sugar 

 tree leaves, and left them on their sum- 

 mer stands packed in snow with front 

 open, facing the east. In all 169 hives 

 containing in appearance living bees. 

 The thermometer having fallen to 8° 

 below zero, during a number of nights, 

 I began to fear that many colonies were 

 ruined entirely. 



In the spring of 1879, the weather be- 

 coming warm and feeling anxious to 

 give the bees a fly, we took out of 

 the cellar on the 4th of March, 120 colo- 

 nies and put them on their summer 

 stands and they had a good fly ; only 3 



colonies exhibiting any signs of disease. 

 The weather continuing warm, on the 

 7th we carried out the balance ; the bees 

 flying freely and cleaning their hives. 

 On the 9th some of the bees commenced 

 robbing, convincing me that some had 

 lost their queens and that others were 

 short of stores, hence I resorted to my 

 old plan of feeding to break it up, which 

 it did, very quickly. I fed in an ordinary 

 feed trough, placed several rods in the 

 rear of the hives. On the 11th the 

 bees were flying strong and I fed them 

 all the unbolted rye flour that they would 

 carry home, and they took it freely. 



The City of Fairfield having passed an 

 ordinance against keeping bees in the 

 city, I was compelled to remove a large 

 apiary outside of its limits. This cir- 

 cumstance influenced some people to 

 object to the location of my apiary, as 

 it was only about 100 feet from the pub- 

 lic road, where it had stood for 32 years. 

 Hearing this, I resolved to change to a 

 new location, although much against 

 my will, believing that I had a great 

 risk to run, should the weather again 

 become cold. I took the first cold day 

 to remove them to the new location. 

 On March 14th, the thermometer fell to 

 7° above zero, with a strong cold wind ; 

 the bees were quiet. I moved 75 colo- 

 , nies 15 rods from the public road, to a 

 cherry orchard and on March 17th, I 

 removed the remainder— the thermome- 

 ter standing at 13° above zero ; it was 

 cold but calm, and the bees were quiet. 

 I feared for the safety of the bees, know- 

 ing that 'many of the honey-boards were 

 rather shaky, while some of the caps 

 did not fit very closely on the hives ; be- 

 sides, every colony had been more or 

 less disturbed, which would cause them 

 to break from the cluster and scatter 

 over the combs, where they would be 

 liable to chill and probably freeze to 

 death, if the cold continued long. 



March 20th was a bright, warm day, 

 and the bees were out flying and seek- 

 ing for their old quarters ; bushels of 

 them settling and clustering on the 

 ground near their former abode, but 

 finding no hives, some of them rose and 

 went to their new home, but in the 

 afternoon the wind arose and shifted to 

 the northwest, which soon chilled the 

 bees yet clustering on the ground. I 

 covered them with carpets, blankets, 

 coverlids, woolen cloths and hay, but all 

 this did not save them from freezing to 

 death. The 25th was also warm; some 

 colonies were busily cleaning out the 

 dead brood which had perished during 

 the past cold spell. From some colo- 

 nies none are flying, and they are very 

 likely dead ; yet the number is less than 

 I expected. 



