160 



THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW. 



moves and the others are a success, then let 

 us move. 



Feeding from the upper story without un- 

 capping is bad advice unless qualified. If 

 the hive is provided with a queen-excluding 

 honey-board it can safely be performed. If 

 there is no honey-board and the second story 

 is filled with brood combs you are liable to 

 find the whole colony established up stairs 

 upon the next examination, and this necessi- 

 tates the vexatious process of putting down, 

 which is not done in a minute in a loose 

 frame hive in cool weather. 



The more we handle bees the more we 

 believe in making them pay their way. In 

 fact if you are making a specialty of bee 

 keeping, this must lie your governing rule, 

 if it is not you will soon fail in business, as 

 surely as the merchant who spends more for 

 goods than he can sell them for. If the bee 

 keeper has another paying pursuit, and 

 plenty of money for fancy bee keeping, 

 there is no rule to prevent his paying large 

 sums of money upon his apiary. 



Resp'y, 



Rambleb. 



Bees May Need Feeding or Uniting Even if 



the Season has Been Good — How the 



Work Should be Done. 



DB. O. C. MILLEB. 



""ES, indeed, I've had experience in 

 deciding what to do with bees after 

 failure of honey harvest. I'm having 

 some this year ; for, this 26th of 

 August, I've less than ten pounds per colony, 

 and I don't know that I'll get any more fin- 

 ished. The worst failure I ever had left me 

 with 300 pounds of surplus and a lot of col- 

 onies with empty combs. I fed 2,iS00 pounds 

 of granulated sugar, and wished for a better 

 crop the next year. 



Well, now, what difference does it make 

 whether the harvest has been a failure or 

 not ? What is there to decide, anyway ? 

 After a (jo<kI harvest the question of how 

 shall I get my bees in best shape for winter, 

 must be settled ; and is not the same ques- 

 tion to be settled, and settled just the same 

 way, after a season of failure 'i Unless, in- 

 deed, the question arises. Is it best to con- 

 tinue in the business V 



The year that I fed the 2,800 pounds of 

 sugar, I just went to work with the Miller- 

 Warner feeder — the most satisfactory feeder 

 I know of to feed twenty-five pounds in a 

 night — and fed each colony till I thought it 

 had twenty pounds or more — this for cellar 

 wintering. I should do nothing different 

 again, unless it would be to feed earlier. 

 •Just as soon as you decide the bees will store 

 no more in surplus apartments it is time to 

 feed. A little too much is just right, and if 

 you should give a colony enough to take it 

 through the winter, and then it should get 

 five pounds additional later from fall liowers, 

 there would be no trouble in packing away 

 that extra five i)ouuds, and it would help the 

 next spring. I suspect a colony winters bet- 

 ter with combs well filled, having less air to 

 keep warm, and I suspect it will breed fjister 



in the spring with a heavy reserve supply in 

 sight. 



Feeding or uniting, which ? Well, I'd set- 

 tle that by deciding whether I have any more 

 bees than I want to keep for the next harvest, 

 always taking into account the likelihood of 

 loss in winter, at the same time having a 

 bearing toward uniting enough so that all 

 will be sure to be strong. Failure or no fail- 

 ure, I want every colony to go into winter 

 quarters with plenty of l)ees and plenty of 

 stores. There is such a thing as getting too 

 many bees in a hive, but I don't know that 

 you can get in too many stores. 



Two mistakes are common — at least they 

 have been too common with me. One is to 

 attempt to winter over weak colonies, think- 

 ing you will be so much ahead the next sea- 

 son ; and the other is to think of a colony, 

 "Weill guess it has enough stores to pull 

 through." Better unite two weak colonies 

 with a fair prospect of having one good one 

 the next spring, than to attempt to winter 

 both with a pretty sure prospect of losing 

 both. Better make sure that a colony has 

 so much stores on hand that a surplus will 

 be left in spring that is not needed, rather 

 than run the least risk of having nothing in 

 the hive the next spring but empty combs 

 and dead bees. 



You say, friend Hutchinson, that a man 

 can buy sugar in spring with better " heart." 

 But don't you think the bees are in " better 

 heart" in the spring if they have had that 

 sugar in sight all winter ? 



Your leader is good, friend H., but when 

 you want the bees to empty out combs will 

 they not do it sooner and better if the combs 

 are under rather than over their hive ? You 

 seem, too, to take it for granted that a colony 

 that has stored nothing in supers is scarce of 

 winter stox-es and vice veraa. Such is not 

 always the case, for bees do nothing invari- 

 ably. 



But I have used too many words, and now 

 I'll commence all over again. " ^V'hat shall 

 be done with the bees after a failure of the 

 honey harvest?" My answer is comprised 

 in ten words : Just the same as if there had 

 been no failure, 



Mabengo, III., Aug. 20, 1890. 



Setting Aside Certain Colonies to Furnish 

 Winter Stores. 



ABTHUE C. MILLEB. 



ERIEND HUTCHINSON, I want to 

 take you to task a little about tlie time 

 of publishing the various topics. In 



many cases you are a month or two 

 too late for the current season's use. 



Take this topic of preparing "short " col- 

 onies for winter, for me it is more than' two 

 months late, as my preparations for winter 

 (and also si>ring) were commenced long ago. 

 The beginning of my apicultural year 

 might well be placed at May l.'ith, as it is 

 about then that I really commence the prep- 

 erations for the next season's crop. 



At that time colonies are divided into 

 three classes. 



The first is composed of those to be worked 



