264 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



For the New England Farmer. 

 WHY HONEY BEES DIE. 



BY JOHN M. WEEKS. 



Mr. Editor : — I observed in your March num- 

 ber of the present volume, some inquiry by a 

 subscriber for the cause of the death of bees in 

 the winter, at the same time leaving a plenty of 

 honey in the hive. Now as Mr. Stockwell has an- 

 swered the interrogatories of "Subscriber" so well, 

 it perhaps seems hardly needful that the subject 

 should be further discussed ; but it appears to me 

 that the whole ground is not covered by Mr. Stock- 

 well's answer. A subscriber asks the "cause of 

 death." Mr. S. assures in substance '''depopula- 

 tion, want of insect heat to expel the frost caused 

 by their vapor." Now if I understand "Subscrib- 

 er," it is to learn the whole cause, the answers, 

 depopulation &c, having been made by Mr. Stock- 

 well, the nest important inquiry is, what is the 

 cause of depopulation ? I answer to wit : 1st, bar- 

 renness of the queen in the months of August and 

 September. 



The population of the hive in the winter is com- 

 posed chiefly of bees that are hatched in those two 

 months and in the early part of October when the 

 season is favorable ; very few, if any of the bees 

 that are born before the middle of July, live to see 

 the end of November ; hence, we must depend 

 much on the good bee season for raising the young 

 in August and September, in order to supply the 

 hive with a sufficient number of people to keep up 

 the insect heat, so as to keep the honey warm aud 

 nutritive and enable the bees to move when the 

 honey is exhausted where they first locate at the 

 commencement of cold weather. 



Every close observer of bees must have noticed 

 that second and third swarms out of a hive the 

 same season, especially when standing near other 

 hives, gradually leave and join their neighbors, and 

 the moths finish up what they have left behind. 

 (Most bee owners think the moths destroyed them, 

 which is a great mistake.) The cause of these de- 

 sertions of the hive is usually barreness of the 

 queen. She is not often twenty -four hours from 

 the cradle before she stands at the head of the 

 family and leads out a swarm, and is incapable of 

 laying eggs until she is at least eight days old. 

 Now as the bees must remain at least seven days 

 in their new tenement before they are sure of 

 propagating their species, and add to their already 

 diminishing numbers, they gradually leave until 

 all are gone into the hives of their nearest neigh- 

 bors ; leaving at the same time what little they 

 have done, to the merciless grasp of their enemies. 

 It is believed the queen does not often become 

 barren in August and September, though eggs are 

 not laid by them at this season of the year in so 

 great quantity as in the early months of the sea- 

 son. But there is another cause of depopulation 

 of the hive ; it is this : There is some inefficiency 

 in the pollen, or bee bread that is collected by the 

 bees to feed the young in August and September, 

 and the larva or chrysalis die in their cells after 

 they are covered over by the bees, and these are 

 not removed, and the hive dwindles away, and in 

 the course of a year or two die out for want of 

 animal heat in winter, or an intolerable stencl 

 caused by this rot in summer. I published some 

 thoughts on this subject in the N. E. Farmer, Vol 

 I., No. 1, several years since, requesting others, 

 lovers of the apiary to communicate on the same 



subject ; but I have seen nothing published since, 

 touching this point. I then attributed it to at- 

 mospheric influence, or the same cause that pro- 

 duced rot in potatoes. I have seen nothing to al- 

 ter my opinions there expressed, unless it may be 

 the bees, for want of blossoms in good and health- 

 ful plants, are compelled to take the pollen from 

 poisonous plants in the swamps to feed the young 

 at the season referred to. 



It has been supposed that the bee moth was 

 one of the chief causes of the depopulation and 

 destruction of the hive. I thought so for a great 

 many years, and have published much on the sub- 

 ject. I am not disposed to exonerate this pest to 

 the apiary, but would lay no more to his charge 

 than he merits. Who ever saw a healthful, well- 

 populated hive of bees infested and injured by 

 moths? I never did! Depopulation, or other cas- 

 ualties are always first, and the moths are always 

 secondary, and finish up the whole as the worms 

 do the carcass of animals after the principle of 

 life is destroyed, though they are more greedy and 

 commence earlier, often and usually before the life 

 of the hive is entirely extinct. But there are ma- 

 ny other causes of depopulation of the hive. Bees 

 have a great many admirers. Toads, frogs, water- 

 insects, as for instance, the spindles, and a great 

 variety of birds that are constantly swallowing 

 them by dozens. I have taken about forty bees 

 from the stomach of a single toad at one time. I 

 have seen five toads and frogs lurking around a 

 single bee-hive in the edge of the evening ready to 

 take the bees as they came in heavy laden from 

 the fields, where they chanced to drop down about 

 the hive, or stopped to rest a moment before they 

 entered their tenements ; the same evening, in 

 walking around my apiary with a candle in my 

 hand, I counted about twenty of these reptiles, or 

 bee eaters. But the most prolific of all causes is 

 occasioned by allowing hives of bees to stand too 

 near each other during their working season ; bees 

 standing close by each other were so liable to 

 blunder into the wrong door, that it soon becomes 

 a matter of indifference with them which hive they 

 enter, and no hive will fight a bee that comes laden 

 with honey and pollen and offers to make a depos- 

 it. Thus the contiguous hives soon acquire the 

 same scent, and the bees of each mingle chiefly as 

 one swarm. 



Bees do the best to stand from one to three or 

 four rods apart during the working season, but 

 should by no means be moved a single foot after 

 they are settled in work. Let all the hives be 

 carried into a perfectly dark room, with no bottom 

 boards on the hives, suspend them so as to let all 

 accumulations of filth and dead bees drop from 

 the hive during winter, and set every stock pre- 

 cisely where it stood the year previous, by the mid- 

 dle of March in Mass., a little later in Vermont, 

 as the climate indicates. But the length of this 

 article reminds me that it is time to lay down my 

 pen. Respectfully yours, J. m. w. 



West Farm, near Middlebury, Vt., March, 1852. 



Amount of Food Required by Animals. — Of 

 hay, an ox requires two per cent, a day of his 

 live weight. That is, if the ox weighs 2000 lbs., 

 he requires 40 lbs. of hay. If he is working, he 

 will take two and a half per cent. A milch cow 

 should have three per cent, of her weight, as she 

 is proportionably lighter than the ox, and part of 



