THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



585 



no disease, and had been undisturbed. 

 This treatment, which is simple, 

 cheap, and easily and rapidly applied, 

 seems to be efflcacious in the most 

 virulent forms of foul brood, and 

 seemingly furnishes immunity from 

 the dreaded scourge. 

 Aurora, 5 Ills. 



vor tbe Amencan Bee Journal. 



Sprifl£ Management of Bees, 



"W. H. STEWART. 



In this locality we have cold weather 

 about JSIov. 20, and I put my bees into 

 the cellar at that time. I carry them 

 in after dark. My reasons fordoing 

 so are given on page 424 of the Bee 

 Journal for 1885. I have also given 

 a description of my bee-cellar, but as 

 it has become unreliable, I will tell iu 

 what respect, and also how I have it 

 now prepared. 



I at tirst made an excavation in the 

 side of a dry sand-bank, then walled 

 it up with oak logs. I placed also oak 

 timbers over the top, and then put on 

 2 feet of straw, next 2 feet of sand, 

 then 2 feet of straw, and finished with 

 2 feet more of sand. On the lower 

 side I made the entrance. I walled 

 up on the sides and covered it with 

 plank, and banked up and covered 6 

 feet thick with sand. I hung one 

 door even with the wall of the cellar, 

 and another at the outer end of this 

 entrance-room, thus making a dead- 

 air space between the two doors. I 

 put a 4-inch pipe through the cover- 

 ing, and left it open all winter for 

 upward ventilation. By hanging a 

 thermometer in this pipe with a cord 

 reaching down to the centre of the 

 cellar, I could draw it up at any time, 

 and as I did so, I found that after the 

 bees were in the temperature was 

 generally 45° above zero. 



This state of things continued for 

 three years, and the fourth winter 

 the mercury was never found above 

 40"-. The reason of this change was 

 that at first the two layers of straw 

 made a kind of dead-air space be- 

 tween each layer of sand, and the 

 under side of the roof never became 

 cold ; but the straw decayed, and 

 allowed the sand to form a solid mass 

 top to bottom ; and as the roof was 

 elevated like a mound, about 6 feet 

 above the natural surface, the wind 

 kept the snow off, and the roof froze 

 through, and kept the cellar cold. 



I have now built a large stack of 

 wild hay on the cellar over the 4 feet 

 of sand, and built out the entrance 

 room so as to admit of the third door, 

 which, I think, will hold the tempera- 

 ture again at 45°. 



About March 20, or a little later, 

 the weather in this locality becomes 

 warm enough to make it safe to put 

 the hives on the summer stands. As 

 I examine them I generally find a 

 little brood in 2 or 3 combs. In the 

 fall I so manage them as to have the 

 upper portion of the combs built out 

 thick, and filled with winter stores ; 

 thus it is that what brood they now 

 have is in the lower part of the combs; 

 and although the upper portion has 

 been emptied of most of the stores. 



yet the cells are too deep for breeding 

 purposes, and also the lower portions 

 of the combs (where the brood is 

 found) are too far apart for breeding 

 at this season of the year. 



I then place a tent over the hive to 

 prevent robbing, and have with me 

 the honey-knife and the coffee-pot of 

 hot water. I open the hive (smoke 

 the bees a little) and then lift out the 

 combs that contain the brood ; care- 

 fully brush the bees down into the 

 hive, and then trim the upper portion 

 of the combs down to a J^-inch thick- 

 ness, and on returning them to the 

 hive, I leave only %-inch bee-space 

 between them. I then place a comb 

 containing honey next to the brood. 

 When thus prepared, the queen will 

 occupy nearly the whole of the sur- 

 face of these combs before passing 

 over to others that are yet spread 

 apart. This keeps the early brood in 

 a compact shape until the weather 

 gets warmer ; and as I open the hive 

 later, and find that the queen needs 

 more room, I trim other combs, and 

 move them closer together until the 

 hive is thus snugged up and filled with 

 brood. It is sometimes, when not too 

 cold, a good plan to part the combs of 

 brood, and hang an empty one be- 

 tween them ; but if this is done indis- 

 creetly, the brood thus separated and 

 not well covered with bees, is apt to 

 be chilled. It will do when the 

 weather is quite warm. 



I generally find some colonies short 

 of stores, and others having more 

 than they need, and to make all equal, 

 I change combs over from hive to 

 hive until all are about alike. In 

 trimming the top edges of the combs, 

 it is sometimes necessary to cut 

 through some honey that has not yet 

 been used by the bees ; but if one is 

 careful not to drop any outside of the 

 hive, no robbing will be induced. I 

 have a dish with a cover to hold the 

 shavings of comb and honey, and I 

 do not allow robber bees to get a taste 

 of it. 



This explains why the combs in the 

 brood-chambers were too thin in the 

 fall to contain sufficient winter stores; 

 and it will be apparent to all that 

 combs thus thin, and cells so shallow, 

 would necessarily have to be filled 

 nearly to the bottom-bar to hold suf- 

 ficient stores for winter and spring. 

 Again, bees require empty combs to 

 cluster on in winter. Combs that are 

 full of honey, and so near together 

 that but few bees can cluster between 

 them, are too cold. If it becomes 

 necessary to feed in the spring, I pre- 

 fer to fill the combs with honey or 

 sugar syrup, and hang them in the 

 hive next to the brood. ' 



I sometimes find queenless colonies 

 in the spring, and some of them have 

 plenty of bees and stores, and seem to 

 lack nothing but a queen. (I do not 

 like the idea of holding combs in the 

 open air a long time in trying to look 

 up the queen. One can very quickly 

 ascertain whether there are eggs in 

 the combs, and during the breeding 

 season no eggs means no queen.) In 

 this climate the nights, and many of 

 the days are so cold that it is almost 

 impossible to get a queen from abroad 

 without her becoming chilled. I have 



found that if I give these queenless 

 colonies combs containing eggs, they 

 will rear a queen in due time, but at 

 this season tliere are no drones, and 

 we cannot get them flying before 

 about June 1, and thus this queen 

 would be so old before being mated 

 that she could not make a successful 

 mating ; and so I allow her to live 

 about ten days and then destroy her, 

 and two days afterward I give the 

 colony another frame of eggs and 

 brood, and they rear another queen 

 which will be in time for drones, and 

 the brood thus given will keep up the 

 colony. I have several times thus 

 reared the third queen before one 

 would be mated, and then the colony 

 would give a good surplus that 

 season. 



About June 1 some of the strongest 

 colonies begin to show plenty of bees 

 and brood. From these colonies I 

 sometimes take frames of hatching 

 brood, and exchange them with 

 weaker colonies for empty combs. 

 This very much assists the weaker 

 ones to get ready for the coming 

 honey-flow. It is best, however, to 

 be a little careful how we thus reduce 

 the strength of our best colonies ; for, 

 if the season is too far advanced for 

 this work, we may thus keep all so 

 weak that a goodly part of the early 

 flow will pass before we have any 

 colonies ready for the supers. It is 

 better to get surplus from apart of 

 the colonies than to lose it all. 



In early spring, and sometimes in 

 the fall, the strongest colonies will 

 begin to rob out the weaker ones. I 

 have tried many ways that have been 

 recommended to stop this robbing, 

 but I have tried nothing that proved 

 effectual after the work was well 

 under way, but to carry the one that 

 is being robbed to the cellar, and let 

 it remain there in the dark two days. 



Sometimes when bees are being 

 over-powered by robbers, they seem 

 to get confused and disorganized like 

 they do when they are alarmed by 

 smoke, and in that condition tliey arfe 

 able to make but a feeble resistance ; 

 but if they are placed in the dark 

 room for a short time they again 

 organize, repair damages, and are 

 again ready to defend their home. It 

 is well to keep tlie entrance of the 

 hives smaller in the spring than is 

 required later in the season, and I 

 prefer to have all hives face the south- 

 east; this gives them the morning 

 sun, and keeps out the northwest 

 winds that sometimes are very de- 

 structive to the young brood in this 

 northern climate in the springtime. 



Some think it best to keep chaff or 

 some other non-conductor around the 

 hive in the spring. I do not like it. 

 Hives thus protected do not get 

 warmed by the sun, and the tempera- 

 ture remains about the same day and 

 night, and " there is no let up," and 

 "long continued cold" "is a giant" 

 in the spring. When the hive has 

 only single walls, and a single board 

 for a cover, the sun will often so raise 

 the temperature in the hive that the 

 bees can safely break the cluster and 

 fix up matters to their advantage. I 

 never shade a hive in the spring. 



Orion,? Wis. 



