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THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



For the American Bee Journal. 



Packing Bees for Winter. 



Dear Editor: — As I and a friend of 

 of mine bad excellent success last winter 

 in keeping our bees, we will here give the 

 plan we adopted. Suppose you get a box 

 for each liive, four inches larger each 

 \Tay than the hive and 20 in. deep ; have 

 a bottom in the large box. Before nail- 

 ing ou the bottom, make an entrance for 

 the bees to fly out, when weather permits. 

 This we call the front of hive. Now on 

 the back, exactly over the entrance, cut a 

 A shape, one inch long, and just small 

 enough to keep out mice. Now put in a 

 long box a false bottom, leaving a crack 

 1 in. wide, from front to rear. Now put 

 in your hive, and by looking through the 

 entrance, you have a passage 1 in. wide 

 from front to rear. Now put a strip of 

 board over this passage, front and back, 

 to prevent packing from closing it up. 

 Then put on quilt, mat, carpet, or any- 

 thing woolen to keep the bees in, and 

 pack the 4 in. space between outer hive 

 and hive proper, with chaft", stuff" it well 

 and till the box until full; now put on 

 cover to keep out all storms, and keep 

 l)erfectly dry. Arrange a door step and 

 the job is done. 



The bees wintered in those boxes to 

 l)erfection, and did not dwindle down 

 like those wintered in cellars, but came 

 through the bad weather in May and 

 April without loss, and eacli one of them 

 contained double the number of bees in 

 April and May, that those did that came 

 out of the cellar. All those swarms were 

 nearly a month earlier than those from 

 the cellar. The reason we think was this : 

 the packing in the large Ikjx prevented 

 every little change of weather from being 

 felt by the bees, and consequently the 

 bees never left the hive until it was warm 

 enough for them to fly and regain the 

 liive again; but those wintered in the cel- 

 lar every time the sun came out and struck 

 it, the hive would be on the wing, and not 

 one-fourth of them ever returned to their 

 lilves again. 



Probably a great many beekeepers 

 may thiid< this too much trouble. But 

 when we remember that some swarms 

 will pay us a net profit of $40 in one sea- 

 son, we think we can well afi'ord about 

 40 cents for a box, and an half an hour's 

 lime to pack them for winter. "VVe manu- 

 facture a straw mat for each hive, ou 

 the plan recommended in Gleanings. 

 We put on next to the bees a woolen 

 blanket and the mat ou top. We think 

 the mats O K. 



Do not remove tlie outer box until all 



bad spring weather is past. Brother 

 Townley wintered 50 swarms last winter 

 in this way to perfection ; he did not use 

 the mats, but woolen and cotton cloths ; 

 but the mats I am delighted with. 



The past season was a fair one, al- 

 though we got but little white clover 

 honey ; we got plenty of basswood and 

 fall flowers. We started the season with 

 33 colonies ; 30 good, and 13 quite weak 

 ones. We have at this date 54 swarms 

 and 3,200 lbs. of honey in glass boxes, 

 and about 350 lbs. of extracted, besides a 

 considerable amount in large frames, not 

 in marketable shape ; but it will come in 

 play next spring in pushing colonies along 

 and starting new ones. J. Butler. 



Jackson, Mich. 



For the American Bee Journal. 



This Year's Honey Season. 



Friend Editors: — I wonder what some 

 of your correspondents that report such 

 long honey seasons and large yields of 

 honey would say if they had my location 

 and season ? I used my extractor for the 

 first time this year on the 12th of June 

 and on the 24th of June I used it the last 

 time. I took over 200 pounds from ten 

 hives in that short time; one hive giving 

 me sixty pounds. My principal pasturage 

 is white clover, and the extremely dry 

 weather this summer cut that so short, 

 that from the 1st of July till the 1st of 

 August, the bees did not make enough 

 honey to live on. About the first week 

 of August the smart weed, of which there 

 was an abundance, and the buckwheat 

 commenced blooming, and by the middle 

 of the month the bees had so far recruit- 

 ed their hives, that some few in the ueigh- 

 borh' ofl cast swarms, but as flowers can't 

 secret honey out of sunshine, Ad especi- 

 ally as hot as it was about that time, all 

 hopes of surplus honey, and an increase 

 of stock, had to be abandoned. 



I am -using the two story Langstroth 

 hive, and Winder's new Queen City ex- 

 tractor; two things that arc as essential to 

 success in the bee business, as plenty of 

 flowers, and a favorable season. 



I found very good sales for my extract- 

 ed honey at 40 and 75 cts., when put up 

 in one and two pound jars. To put in 

 the corks I used a lever that was fastened 

 to the wall just the higlit of the jar. Af- 

 ter pressing tlie tin foil cap on with my 

 hand, as well as I could, I fastened one 

 end of a twine string to the wall and tied 

 the other end around my body; then by 

 sitting down on a chair I could lean for- 

 ward to give slack enough to the string 

 to give one turn around the neck of the 



