1907 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



1563 



bee-keeping as your vocation; but if you can 

 not put on the coat, better stay where you 

 are with your 31 to 50 colonies as a side is- 

 sue, together with your chickens and teaming, 

 or use bee-keeping as an avocation." 



CONSUMPTION OF WINTER STORES. 



A Study of the Conditions Governing the 

 Amounts of Honey Used by Various Col- 

 onies During the Winter; Some Outdoor 

 Colonies that Consumed but a Small 

 Amount of Stores. 



BY ALLEN LATHAM. 



How many bee-keepers know by actual 

 trial how much their colonies consume of 

 winter stores in the four months of inactiv- 

 ity? For one I had allowed the matter to 

 rest upon guesswork till I had kept bees 

 over twenty years. But during the fall of 

 1905 I determined to find out the actual 

 truth, not that one season will tell the story 

 of all seasons, but that I might have at least 

 some data upon which I could rely. So I 

 weighed thirty colonies December 1, 1905, 

 and on April 2, 1906. These four months are 

 the actual months of confinement in this 

 locality, since the bees have frequent flights 

 well up to the close of November, and by 

 April 1st are starting in to breed, again being 

 able to fly every few days. 



These data will not, of course, cover the six 

 weeks of consumption of stores immediately 

 subsequent to the last fall gathering, nor do 

 they bring into account the great drain upon 

 the stores by the early brood-rearing previ- 

 ous to the first honey-flows of spring 



The table given shows the actual weights 

 of these colonies before and after. 



Permit me to call your attention to certain 

 details in this table. It will be noticed at 

 once how frequently the loss in weight ap- 

 proximates 7 pounds, and the actual average 

 is a little under 8 for the 30 colonies. The 

 time being four months, it follows that, under 

 the conditions to which my apiary is sub- 

 jected, an average colony consumes about 

 2 pounds of honey per month during the 

 quiescent period. 



Numbers 2 and 12 consumed 10 pounds or 

 over, while several consumed 9 pounds. I 

 believe that, in every case of large consump- 

 tion, it was a strong colony, or else a colony 

 which had started to breed strongly before 

 April 1. No. 12 was an especially strong 

 colony, yet there were instances of strong 

 colonies which, came under the average. 



These were quiet colonies which did not 

 breed till the warmth of April brought new 

 pollen. 



Numbers 6 and 17 are noteworthy. Each 

 of these was a weak colony, and had its en- 

 trance much diminished. Thus weakness in 

 numbers and smallness of entrance econ- 

 omize on stores— on stores, I say, not on the 

 balance-sheet. 



No. 20 offers a most abnormal loss — one 

 pound only. This colony took upon itself 

 the robbing-out of a nucleus dviring the last 

 week in March, and so actually came out in 

 April with as much honey as it had in the 

 fall: for at the time of the weighing it was 

 strong in brood and young bees. 



Lest some may be puzzled at the large 

 weight of my hives right through, I will 

 state that these colonies were all in my air- 

 spaced double-walled hives with paroid cov- 

 ering. 



The chief motive that prompted me to go 

 to the trouble of weighing my hives thus was 

 the frequent statements in our bee-papers 

 to the effect that out-of-door wintering and 

 large entrances were very costly in stores. 

 I was wondering how much I lost by winter- 

 ing my bees as I do I have even seen it 

 stated that colonies consumed 17 pounds of 

 stores outside against 8 inside. 



These 30 colonies, with the exception of 6 

 and 17, were all with full entrances— one 

 inch deep by the width of the hive, 13 inches 

 — entrances offering 13 square inches of open 

 doorway. It will be seen that, in spite of 

 these large entrances, and in spite of the out- 

 of-door winfering, these colonies consumed 

 an average of less than 8 pounds in the four 

 months of December, January, February, 

 and March. It is almost fair to say that out- 

 of-door wintering and cellar-wintering are 

 on a par with the first of December, and after 

 the first of April, at least here. In this lo- 

 cality we put our colonies into the cellar 

 about November 26 and take them out the 

 last week in March, rarely later than April 1. 



