334 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



October 



of its kind. At the time of my visit 

 there was an excellent prospect for 

 an average yield of 200 pounds per 

 colony of sweet clover honey, and I 

 was informed that such a yield is not 

 unusual with them. 



The Value of Winter Protection for 

 Bees 



By J. H. Merrill 



IT is not difficult to circulate and 

 have accepted a rumor such as 

 "A bee will not sting you if you 

 hold your breath," yet a fact which 

 may be applied to practical beekeep- 

 ing must be accompanied by abund- 

 ant proof. 



Dr. Phillips has given us, clearly, 

 the reasons why bees should be 

 given protection during the winter, 

 months. In spite of this, there are 

 always plenty of people who have 

 seen strong colonies in the spring 

 that have wintered in cracker boxes, 

 in hives large enough to thrust 

 your hand in, and with no winter 

 protection whatsoever. In fact, these 

 colonies were so strong that they 

 clearly proved to the satisfaction of 

 the beekeeper that there is no need 

 of taking any precautions for win- 

 tering bees in his locality. Another 

 bugbear, which is frequently heard, 

 is that there is "no need of winter 

 protection in our locality, because 

 we have such open winters." Some of 

 the figures which will be given later 

 deal directly with this point and 

 seem to tell a very clear story. 



Briefly summarized, the reasons 

 given by Dr. Phillips why bees need 

 winter protection are: (1) Bees are 

 like storage batteries, containing a 

 given amount of energy, which once 

 expended is gone. (2) The bee is a 

 cold-blooded animal and can raise 

 the temperature within the hive only 

 by consuming honey, thus transform- 

 ing energy into heat, and by muscu- 

 lar activities. (3) When the temper- 

 ature falls to 57 the bees form a 

 cluster, with those in the center 

 busily engaged in raising the temper- 

 ature by muscular exertion. (4) If 



wintering conditions are such that 

 bees can pass through the winter 

 with but a minimum expenditure of 

 energy in maintaining the high 

 temperature, then these bees will 

 have a maximum amount of energy 

 left in the spring to carry on brood- 

 rearing and t perform other duties 

 in the hive. 



(Contribution from the Entomolog- 

 ical Laboratory, Kansas State Agri- 

 cultural College, No. 47. This paper 

 embodies some of the results ob- 

 tained in the prosecution of project 

 No. 126 of the Kansas Experiment 

 Station.) 



A colony that may have gone into 

 winter quarters in good condition 

 and appears, early in the spring, to 

 be a strong colony, yet that has 

 passed the winter under adverse cir- 

 cumstances, consuming its energy in 

 maintaining a high temperature, will 

 have but little energy left to carry 

 on its spring duties. 



Acting upon the theory that the 

 best method of wintering was the 

 one that would produce the largest 

 number of bees at the time when the 

 honey-flow really began, experi- 

 ments have been conducted at the 

 Kansas State Agricultural College 

 to try to determine this point. 



For the purpose of this experiment 

 two sets of hives were used, one of 

 which was placed in a spot sheltered 

 by a fine natural windbreak com- 

 posed of dense shrubs. The other set 

 of hives was placed in the open 

 where it received no protection from 

 any windbreak. The queens in all of 

 these hives were of the same age, 

 produced from the same stock, and 

 introduced the same day. As nearly 

 as possible, the strength of these 

 colonies was about equal in the fall 

 of 1917. The amount of stores in 

 each hive varied from thirty-five to 

 forty pounds. In the fall, at the 

 time when the bees were prepared 

 for winter, a rather complicated sys- 

 tem of weighing, which it is not 

 necessary to explain here, was made 

 to determine the exact amount of 

 honey and the exact number of bees 

 in each hive. For the purpose of this 



Honey house built 



experiment it is estimated that there 

 are 5,000 bees in every pound. 

 This seems as fair to one hive as to 

 another, in carrying on this work. 



In each set of hives there was one 

 1-story hive, one 2-story hive, and a 

 hive in packing case, with 4 inches of 

 packing on the bottom, six on the 

 sides and eight on the top, with the 

 entrance contracted to a l|^-inch 

 augur hole. The 1-story and 2-story 

 hives had no packing whatsoever. 

 Each of these hives was placed on a 

 scale and daily readings of the 

 weights were taken throughout each 

 winter. In the spring of the year 

 when the honey-flow had really be- 

 gun, another complicated system of 

 weighing was made to determine un- 

 der which condition the strongest 

 colonies were produced. 



It is the intention to carry on this 

 work over a number of years, and 

 it is admitted that a larger number 

 of hives would be preferable to the 

 small number which are used. How- 

 ever, the general trend of results 

 has been the same over each of the 

 two years, and so marked as to indi- 

 cate strongly what are the best win- 

 tering conditions for such a climate 

 as is found in this locality. 



During the winter of 1917-18, the 

 average daily consumption of honey 

 for the six hives for a period of 139 

 days, was half an ounce. During the 

 winter of 1918-19, the average daily 

 consumption of honey for the six 

 hives for a period of 150 days was 

 one-eighth of an ounce. During the 

 early part of the winter of 1917-18, 

 the consumption of honey was not 

 very great. However, in January the 

 amount of honey consumed was 

 greatly increased, which showed that 

 some brood-rearing began in Janu- 

 ary, and, throughout that month and 

 the months of February and March, 

 the average consumption per colony 

 was about four or five pounds per 

 month. The winter of 1918-19 in 

 Kansas was known as an open win- 

 ter, and in January, 1919, the packed 

 hives consumed five pounds more 

 honey than they did in December, 

 1918. In February the consumption 

 remained about the same, but during 

 March and April the amount of 

 honey consumed was greatly in- 

 creased, so that in one of the packed 

 hives there was a loss in weight of 

 11^ pounds. As will be seen later, 

 this honey was consumed in brood- 

 rearing, as the colony which con- 

 sumed the 11^6 pounds was the 

 strongest colony of the six. During 

 the open winter, the packed hives 

 consumed considerable more honey 

 than did the unpacked hives. The 

 average daily consumption of the 1- 

 story unpacked hive, protected by a 

 windbreak, was 1 6-10 unces. In 1- 

 story hive, not protected by a wind- 

 break, the average daily consump- 

 tion was 2 ounces. In the packed 

 hives, the protected and unprotected, 

 the average daily consumption wis 

 2 6-18 and 2 9-10 ounces, respectively. 

 The result was what would be 

 expected, because when the bees 

 are rearing brood they have to 

 consume honey. The total consump- 

 tion of honey in the packed hives for 

 151 days was 37^ pounds, which in- 



