178 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



flow of nectar for several hours preced- 

 ing the storm, especially from andromeda 

 and saw palmetto. 



Thunder storms must not be con- 

 founded with warm, mild rains, or, more 

 properly, showers, as the latter rather 

 tend to increase, than diminish a flow of 

 nectar, and the bees work just as well a 

 half hour after the shower as they did 

 before. I have had them gather as 

 much honey on a cloudy day, when there 

 were several showers during the day, as 

 they would on bright, pleasant days. 



My experience has ■ been gained by 

 keeping a record of a colony on the 

 scales ; noting conditions of the weather, 

 etc. 



I also think we have about as heavy 

 and severe thunder storms, here in the 

 South, as in most other sections. Our 

 thunder storms are of two classes : Those 

 that come up and pass within an hour, 

 when the sun is out again as bright as 

 ever ; and others that are several hours 

 in forming, and last two or three hours, 

 followed by heavy rains. The latter are 

 the ones that tell on a flow of nectar. 



We have only about one-fourth of a 

 crop in this locality, which is due to two or 

 three weeks of cold, rainy weather dur- 

 ing the orange bloom, and forest fires 

 destroying most of the saw palmetto ; 

 these two sources, being our main reli- 

 ance for surplus. We have only the 

 Fall flowers to depend upon now, and 

 these are not ceriain. 



In other sections of the State, and 

 especially in the black mangrove belt, 

 I understand they are having good yields. 



Huntington, Fla. 



Wliat to do Willi DiiMslieil Sections, 



S. L. WATKINS. 



Almost every season after the honey- 

 flow has ended, we have on hand a num- 

 ber of unfinished sections. We generally 

 extract the honey they contain, and save 

 these sections for starters, in surplus 

 cases, for another season. 



Some bee-keepers practice feeding this 

 honey back to the heaviest colonies, 

 where they have placed all the best sec- 

 tions not quite finished. They are gen- 

 erally successful in securing well-capped, 

 filled-out sections, which pays for all 

 time and trouble. 



Great care should be exercised in 

 choosing the colonies that are to do this 

 work. Bees with good, young, prolific 

 queens, where the hives are full to over- 

 flowing, are the ones to select. 



Place two section cases upon each hive; 

 have the lower case filled with the most 

 finished sections, and the top case with 

 the half and quarter finished ones ; next 

 add a top story to the hive, and inside of 

 it place your feeder. The honey that 

 you have extracted, and which you in- 

 tend feeding should be thinned by adding 

 water, so that the bees may work and 

 carry it away more rapidly; one quart 

 of water to ten pounds of honey is about 

 right (boiling water is best). Feed as 

 fast as the bees can take it up; take off 

 the sections as fast as finished, and add 

 more unfinished ones. When your stock 

 of unfinished sections runs short, reduce 

 the number of colonies that you are 

 feeding; until you have one colony finish 

 what is left. 



Contraction is sometimes practiced 

 when feeding back to obtain finished 

 sections. If you use the Langstroth 

 hive, contract to five frames. The time 

 to commence feeding back would be after 

 the last heavy honey-flow, which in some 

 parts of California would be the latter 

 part of June, and in other parts the first 

 of November. 



A Chico bee-keeper tells me that he 

 once fed out 1,500 pounds of honey by 

 sprinkling it on the marsh grass near his 

 apiary. He says it was the most satis- 

 factory feeding of bees that he ever did. 

 (He did not feed to obtain finished sec- 

 tions, but simply to supply them with 

 Winter food, as it was an unfavorable 

 honey season.) 



SWAKMING. 



Bees swarm more in a mountainous 

 country than in the valleys. 



Of this statement I have had abundant 

 proof. In the Sacramento Valley, along 

 the river bottoms, bees will build up 

 and stay in immense colonies, and finish 

 every section before swarming ; and 

 sometimes after their sections are fin- 

 ished, they will commence building comb 

 on the outside of the hive. 



But in a mountain location it is entirely 

 different. (I now speak of the Sierra 

 Nevada mountains. I do not know 

 whether it is the same in the mountain 

 ranges in Southern California or not.) 

 When a colony here has the sections 

 about three-fourths finished, out they go; 

 and if the queen-cells are not cut out of 

 the old colony they will swarm them- 

 selves to death. • 



This accounts for the fact that so many 

 farmers who keep bees and do not know 

 much about them, think that the moths 

 cleaned all the bees out, while in reality 

 the bees swarmed too much, and after 

 they were through swarming there were 



