DECEMBER 15, 1S14 



987 



(anything that will keep the bees from sink- 

 ing in the feed). Now place the hive con- 

 taining the colony to be fed upon the pre- 

 pared super. The warmth and scent of the 

 feed will lead the bees to loosen and length- 

 en their cluster to the feed, and in a few 

 hours the contents of the pan will be trans- 

 ferred to the brood-nest, and the bees will 

 settle down for their long winter sleep. 



For the benefit of beginners I will add, 

 while the bees are feeding keep the cellar 

 dark to prevent bees flying out. But what 

 about those that are wintered outside, whose 

 case is doubtful? Any pleasant calm day 

 remove the top packing; raise the burlap 

 that is over the bees; place two pieces of 

 lath across the top of the frames, and upon 

 these invert a 10-lb. pail of grained honey. 

 Drop the burlap in front of the pail ; place 

 more burlap and soft paper behind and at 

 the sides of the pail to protect the bees. 

 Fill in the chaff, put on the cover, and your 

 bees are safe. 



Last fall, in packing I found several 

 stocks that had been breeding after they 

 had been fed up for winter, and that were 

 near the danger line. As we had plenty of 

 sweet-clover honey in 5 and 10 lb. pails, and 

 I had experimented in this way the winter 

 before, I fed up the questionable ones as I 

 have described, and every one wintered 

 finely, though it was the coldest winter we 

 have had for years. When combs of honey 

 have not been reserved, or when the supply 

 of these is exhausted, I have found that 

 granulated honey aiul warm packing will fit 

 the bees to answer the roll-call on the first 

 of May. 



Call this "emergency feeding," Mr. Editor 

 — not to be desired, I fully grant, but it is 

 much to be preferred to empty hives next 

 spring. Bees around Toronto have not 

 gathered their winter stores this season, and 

 the zeal of many has got cold. 



Toronto, Canada. 



SPRAYING VERSUS BEES 



BY C. W, WOODWORTH 



Ever since spraying has been recommend- 

 ed for the prevention of the codling-moth 

 injury there has been more or less insistence 

 upon the filling of the blossom-cui3 of the 

 apple with the spray; and from the first 

 there has been more or less fear expressed 

 as to danger that might follow from the 

 use of the poison. By carefully conducted 

 tests and experiments this was early allayed 

 so far as concerns the danger from the 

 consumjjtion of the fruit ; but there remains 

 a very prevalent belief that this practice is 

 fatal to bees, and liable to poison people 

 consuming honey if the spray is applied 

 before the blossoms have ceased to produce 

 nectar. For this reason the published direc- 

 tions for si^raying almost universally insist 

 on the delay of spraying till the petals have 

 fallen, and in several States the spraying of 

 trees in bloom is a penal offense. It appears 

 that this general fear is not based on 

 experimental data. 



We i^ointed out ten years ago that in the 

 Pajaro Valley the fruit that sets may be 

 wholly that from the first blossoms, and 

 that this fruit may be already as large as' 

 cherries before the larger part of the blos- 

 soms fall, and that, to poison the blossom- 

 cups of the fruit, the spray would have to 

 be applied before full bloom. It was not 

 necessary at that time to take up the ques- 

 tion of the possible danger to bees, since 

 the most satisfactoiy spraying practice was 

 found not to require early treatment. Recent 



studies by Mr. W. H. Volck, of this Depart- 

 ment, have shown the desirability of a spray 

 during blossoming for other purposes, and 

 thus raises this question, though there have 

 never been many bees in the Valley. 



A colony was shipped from the Univer- 

 sity apiary at Berkeley to Watsonville, and 

 placed in a tree in the center of a forty-acre 

 apple-orchard just before spraying, with an 

 unusually heavy dose of arsenicals as the 

 trees were just coming into full bloom. The 

 colony was selected by Mr. R. W. Brown, 

 assistant in apiculture, and carefully ex- 

 amined by him before and after shipment 

 to Watsonville, and he was unable to find 

 any evidence of the poisoning of bees or 

 brood. On the return trip the hive was kept 

 closed until enough dead bees had accumu- 

 lated for analysis, and samples of pollen 

 and of newly stored honey were also anal- 

 yzed by Mr. G. P. Gray, with negative 

 results in the case of the latter. An amount 

 of arsenic was recovered from the dead 

 bees, nearly approaching a toxic dose — all 

 clearly showing that, even under the severe 

 conditions of the excessive dose, and a local- 

 ity where practically all the food was from 

 sprayed trees, there was no appreciable 

 danger to man from poisoned honey. 



In order to determine more definitely the 

 danger to adult bees, a large number of the 

 dead bees were dissected by my assistant, 

 Mr. E. Ralph Ong, and the internal organs 

 analyzed by Mr. Gray, showing that none of 



