58 THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW 



full pound of heavy sugar syrup a day during the "pinch" just 

 before the beginning of the harvest. 



Now it is easily seen that if brood rearing had been delayed till 

 the last week in April we should have been better off by the 15th 

 of June, and saved hundreds of pounds of sugar and honey. The 

 shortage of stores greatly discouraged breeding at a time when it 

 was of the highest importance. Again I find that unless brood is 

 advancing rapidly by the first week in April, so the young earlv 

 hatched bees will be abundant before the middle of May, the old 

 last year's bees disappear so fast that our colonies are apt to become 

 greatly depleted before the young bees hatch to take the place of 

 the old bees. There is another objection to excessive early breeding. 

 Old queens not infrequently exhaust themselves before the time for 

 swarming, or the time when brood is of the most value, and in this 

 way the brood is reduced when it should be at its best or in greatest 

 abundance. 



Yet. after all, I do not quite share your fear of colonies 

 becoming- over populous in early spring. The fact that some 

 smaller colonies in April or May will surpass them does not to my 

 mind count for much, as we know that some colonies are much 

 more vigorous and better honey gatherers than others. Not having 

 exhausted their stores early they may be stimulated by the large 

 amount of honey in their hives to breed very rapidly during '^lay, 

 and so have a large amount of brood at the beginning of the clover 

 bloom, even more than the very populous colony early in the season. 

 Two years ago I was invited to speak to the Connecticut bee- 

 keepers at Hartford. After the close of the morning session I was 

 talking with an old gentleman who told me he averaged more 

 pounds of comb honey to the hive than any other bee-keeper in the 

 state. "How do you manage?" I inquired. He said he owned a 

 block in the city (Winstead, I think), and kept all his bees in the 

 "attic" of this large building, with passages through the walls. 

 "But don't they bother you about sv/arming?" "Yes," he said, 

 "they swarm some," but he paid no attention to swarms, "as he 

 could get more than any one else without the swarms." Imagine 

 my surprise in overhearing the president, Mr. E. C. Britton, telling- 

 some bee-keepers that the time to put on supers was in April, 

 almost before we have looked into our hives here in V^ermont. He 

 said further that by his system of management he had secured 

 between 200 and 300 lbs. of comb honey from a single colony the 

 previous season. 



In January last, while attending a meeting of the same society, 

 Mr. Britton invited me down to his home in Canton and I had a 

 chance to see his bees and learn how such immense crops of honey 

 could be secured from a single hive in a rather poor section for 



