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THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



707 



aud mechanical geoliis and scholarly attainments of Father 

 Langstroth, if climatic severities compel us to adopt the 

 Quinby principle in the frame hive. 



Now, in a log or box hive all the combs are fastened to 

 the top of the hive abd sides, nearly to the buttom. Each 

 comb acts as a division ; the bees have only to keep the spaces 

 warm that they occupy. I have tipt them back and found 

 the piles of brown dust between the occupied spaces (iudicat- 

 iug breeding and pollen consumption), and ice in the corners 

 of the hives. They beat my hanRing-frame hives in winter- 

 ing. I have bought lots of hives where some of the old logs 

 did not have bees to fill one-halt of two spaces, and they 

 would breed up so as to be ready for clover when transferred. 



1 have been disgusted to see colonies of more than twice their 

 size in loose and hanging frame hives dwindle away to nothing. 



Now, what is the sensible conclusion ? When the heat 

 escapes over the tops of the frames and around the narrow/ 

 ends, the bees must keep the whole hive warm to be comfort- 

 able. A small colony with this style of frame cannot do it. A 

 large colony with old bees will exhaust their vitality and 

 dwindle away, unless the hive is well protected by packing. 

 With closed-end frames and tight top a quart of bees can breed 

 up. A cold snap will not chill their brood. Ten bees will 

 care for an inch square of brood in a box or log, or closed end 

 and top frame hives. One inch of brood will average 5U bees, 

 so they will increase in a geometrical ratio of 5 every 2L 

 days, and more than that, after the first three crops of young 

 bees. Now bees begin to breed in February, often earlier, 

 March 1 you have many old and a few young bees ; March 



2 1 the old bees are dying fast, and your young bees are hatch- 

 ing equally fast, if in a box or light frame hive. April 10 

 your bees are five limes as strong, and nearly all young bees. 

 May 11 they are 5x5, or 25 times as strong, and are ready 

 for fruit and dandelion bloom. 



I am so thoroughly convinced that the closed-end frame 

 with tight top cover and deep hive is right for our climate 

 that I am going to adopt it. Cook Co., III. 



Rearing Brood in Winter — Paralysis, Etc. 



BY TIIOS. THITRLOW. 



Since I wrote my last, I have had considerable experience 

 in bee-matters that has been very interesting to me, and may 

 be of some interest to the readers of the Bee Journal. 



Winter Brood- Re akixg. — There was no surplus honey 

 in this vicinity last year, and fall came with very little honey 

 in the hives, and, naturally, none too many bees; but I 

 thought I would try to make them go through the winter, 

 dividing what honey they had amongst them by keeping a 

 sharp watch of them. So when the queens ceast laying, each 

 one of 22 colonies was contracted to six Langs troth frames, 

 standing on end In an Inside case and packt between the case 

 and two 10-frame bodies with ground cork, then a section- 

 case on top with a cork cushion in it. There was not more 

 than an average of 8 or 10 pounds of honey for each of them 

 to winter on, and they were left to themselves until Feb. 16, 

 IS'JT, when, after a violent two days' snow-storm, I had a 

 chance to look at them — it was warm enough for them to fly 

 a little. All were in the top of the frames against the cush- 

 ion, and two colonies were dead — starved to death with honey 

 below them. I saw that the rest must be fed — just as I ex- 

 pected to do when they were packt in the fall. 



Shallow tin pans were made to set on the top of the 

 frames ; and wood covers for the inside case, of ?3 inch thick 

 stuff with a IK inch hole, covered with wire-cloth in the mid- 

 dle ; and five ounces of sugar syrup (one pound of sugar to 

 one pound of water), as hot as I could bear my finger in, was 

 poured through the wire screen into the tin pan every night, 



just as late as I could see to do It, until about March 20, 

 when there was another chance to look and see what '.hey 

 were doing. It was a disappointnient ; my expectations were 

 to see brood-rearing going on extensively, but only a few had 

 capt brood at all, and mo>t of them only eggs. Instead of 

 rearing brood they had stored the food in the tops of the 

 combs, and even lengthened out the cells with new wax to do 

 It. Still, feeding was kept up until the apricot bloom, about 

 three ounces a day. 



The utmost care was used not to jar the hives or to dis- 

 turb the bees in the least — the covers came off easily, and the 

 cushions were turned back just far enough to pour the food 

 through the wire screen. After the first few days, it was 

 amusing to see them boll over into the shallow pan and on the 

 under side of the screen, and lap the liquid as it came in. I 

 certainly thought that meant brood, but it didn't, the egg- 

 layer wasn't in it. My conclusion was this : It's folly to feed 

 hees to induce hrood-rcarimj in tlie winter moiitlis. 



The last spring was a good one for bees, and they bred 

 up fast after the weather began to get warm. There was 

 more honey gathered from fruit-bloom than I ever knew o£ 

 before, and June came in with white clover In full bloom, but 

 there was not more than enough honey in it to keep up brood- 

 learing unpil about the 20th, when the nights got warm and 

 honey came in with a rush, and also fearfully hot. dry weather, 

 so that the clover was burnt brown as a walnut by July 3. I 

 never saw it go so quick in my \it-. Since then there have 

 been heavy rains, and white clover has revived and is bloom- 

 ing yet (Sept. 16), but not enough to do much good. The past 

 wet weather has given the fall flowers a splendid start, and 

 the bees are working with a vim, and I may get some dark 

 honey yet — what a lot of bxits a bee-keeper has to use here to 

 cover " blasted hope-:! !" 



Bek Par.^lysis. — The Florida man is on the right track 

 to cure it. Several years ago a case of it occurred in one of 

 my colonies, and, after trying salt and sulphur without any 

 results, I killed the queen, and the next day gave a frame of 

 brood with the adhering bees and capt queen-cells, and in a 

 few weeks the disease was gone. This year one of my colonies 

 got it bad, so bad that the swollen bees got in under the ends 

 of the frames on the tin rabbets and died there. The queeo 

 was killed, and a frame of brood and bees with capt queen-cells 

 given them, and in a few weeks the disease was gone. It 

 seems to me that the disease is in the queeu, and is inherited 

 by some of the young, as I took notice that all the swollen and 

 dying bees were young bees that had probably never been out 

 of the hive, at least I could not find any frayed wings amongst 

 them ; and I will give a guess at the cause of the disease : It 

 is a weak constitution, caused by in-breeUiug to keep the stock 

 pure and get as yellow bees as possible ; and that accounts for 

 the disease being more prevalent now than in former years, 

 when the black bees were in the majority, and there was more 

 crossing than now. 



Hives for Winter. — For the last three winters my bees 

 have wintered on five or six Langstroth frames, standing on 

 end and packt around with ground cork. They winter per- 

 fectly in that shape, consume very little food, and very few 

 die; but there are several objections to that plan, one is the- 

 extra amount of work in changing the frames from one posi- 

 tion to the other twice a year, and another, the most serious- 

 one, some of the best have to be changed to give more roomi 

 before the weather is warm enough. So I have built 10 hives 

 on an entirely new plan : The brood department Is a cube In- 

 side of about the capacity of nine Langstroth frames, and is 

 made of two parts horizontally (it is not the Heddon plan); 

 the frames are placed in the body in such a manner that there 

 are nc outside frames (for a bunch of bees to starve and freeze 

 on through inability to get into the cluster), that Is, the clus- 



