GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



CONVERSATIONS with DOOLITTLE 



At Borodino 



OUTDOOR VS. CELLAR WINTERING. 



Which is better— wintering the 

 bees on their summer stands or in 

 the cellar? A beekeeper of con- 

 siderable experience tells me that 

 bees winter well on the south side 

 of a building where the sun appar- 

 ently does double duty. Do you advise this? 

 Well, hardly. Bees have been known to 

 come out fairly well when left during winter 

 on the sunny side of a building, but more 

 often it results in a loss if not in weakened 

 colonies in the spring. Still, this would be 

 better than leaA ing the colonies on the north 

 side of a building where the sun does not 

 warm up the hives at all. On the sunny 

 side the bees fly at rather frequent intervals 

 during the winter. The heat produced by 

 the sun on the hive and building, together 

 with the bright light shining in at the en- 

 trance of the hive, causes the bees to fly 

 when the air is still, even with the mercury 

 in the shade as low as the freezing-point. 

 If the ground is bare about the hives this 

 bright sun makes it possible for the bees to 

 fly with little if any loss, as the dark ground 

 so absorbs the rays of the sun that the bees 

 can rise in a very low temperature. Bright 

 snow on the ground causes them to come out 

 more than the bare ground. 



I know it is claimed that bees wintered 

 on their summer stands come out with great- 

 er vitality in the spring than those wintered 

 in a cellar ; but after an experience covering 

 more than 40 years I have come to the con- 

 elusion that the loss in bees wintered out of 

 doors is more than can be compensated by 

 the extra vitality of those which come thru 

 nlive. With a loss several years that went 

 above 75 to 80 per cent of the colonies left 

 out, I have decided on cellar wintering for 

 central ISTew York, except three or four colo- 

 nies for experiment. 



The loss of colonies in outdoor wintering, 

 tho this may be of first importance, was not 

 all thitt led me to decide on cellar wintering. 

 The amount of stores necessarily consumed 

 when wintering on the summer stands above 

 that where the colonies are wintered in the 

 cellar has quite a little to do with the profit 

 or loss in beekeeping. By experiments made 

 by myself and other close observers it has 

 been proven that less than one-half the 

 stores are needed for cellar wintering than 

 will be eonsnmed during the average winter 

 when the bees are left out. This comes 

 from the amount of food that is necessary 

 to be used for fuel to keep up the same 

 warmth in the cluster in a freezing- or a tem- 



, New York 



perature 30 degrees below zero, which ob- 

 tains in the northern part of the United 

 States and Canada. By weighing a certain 

 number of hives in the fall, each hive con- 

 taining colonies of as near the same strength 

 as to bees as possible, then setting half of 

 that numUer in the cellar and leaving the 

 other lialf out, the difference as to the 

 amount of stores consumed can be ascer- 

 tained approximately' — near enough for all. 

 practical purposes. 



I made an experiment with ten colonies 

 one winter. November 20, at the time the 

 most of the bees were placed in the cellar, I 

 weighed ten colonies for the sake of making 

 a comparison of the amount of stores con- 

 sumed by bees wintered out of doors with 

 that consumed by those in the cellar. The 

 ^\e outdoors weighed as follows: 



The colonies were weighed — hives, combs, 

 frames, and all. It might have been a little 

 more accurate if the stores could have been 

 weighed separately; but for all practical 

 purposes I think the experiment very fair. 



Of the five put in the cellar, their weight 

 and consumption of stores were as follows: 



Wt. Nov. 20. Wt. Apr. 19. Loss in Wt. 



55 47% 7% 



58 48 % 9 % 



62 54% 7% 

 49 42 % 6 % 



63 55 8 



39 

 7 4-5 



Total consumption 

 Average 



This shows a consumption of less than 

 one-half by those wintered in the cellar as 

 compared with those wintered outside. 

 This, with the m.uch greater security afford- 

 ed, would seem a sutfieiently strong incentive 

 for the cellaring of bees during winter. 



In former years 1 paid strict attention as 

 to the temperature in the cellar, looking at 

 the thermometer once or tAvice a day, but of 

 late years the bees at the out-apiary are put 

 in the cellar under the farmer's dwelling, 

 and not once looked at or disturbed by my- 

 self during the whole winter. The cellar is 

 used just as it always was. The entrances 

 to the hives are turned toward the cellar 

 wall next to the sides which have no win- 

 dows and the windows are partially shaded. 

 This plan might not work in all cellars, but 

 has proven all right in this case for twenty- 

 five years. 



