Tbe (Dee-f\eepeps 



A MONTHLY JOURNAL 



Devoted to ii\e Iqterests of Hoqey Producers. 



$L00 A YEAR. 



W. Z, HUTCHINSON, Editor and Proprietor. 



e 



VOL. XII. FLINT. MICHIGAN, NOVEMBER 10, 1899, NO II 



BEE CELLARS. 



Their Construction and Managcmtnl, 

 W. Z. HUTCHINSON. 





mLmm 



TN my Wiscon- 

 i sin trip last 

 .summer I visited 

 a large number of 

 extensive b e e- 

 keepers, and, with 

 two exceptions, 

 they wintered 

 their bees in cel- 

 lars or special re- 

 positories. Mr. 

 R. H. Schmidt, of 

 Sheboygan, winters his bees quite suc- 

 cessfully in his Champion, double wall- 

 ed, chafF-packed hives, in which the walls 

 are filled with three inches of packing. 

 Mr. N. E. France winters his bees in 

 quadruple, or tenement hives, the out-side 

 walls of which are chaff-packed. For the 

 wintering of bees out of doors this seems 

 to me an excellent arrangement, as there 

 is the benefit of the combined warmth of 

 four colonies. I presmne, of course, that 

 there are other bee-keepers in Wisconsin, 

 aside from these two, who winter their 

 bees in the open air; in fact, I received a 



letter yesterday from a Mr. H. P. Miner 

 of that State who says that he has 300 

 colonies in chaflf hives. In my talks with 

 the members of the Ontario bee-keepers' 

 association, when I go over to their con- 

 vention, I find that most of them winter 

 their bees in cellars. I won't take the 

 space to discuss the meritsof in-door win- 

 tering as compared with wintering in the 

 open air, as the hard logic of facts has 

 proved to the majority of bee-keepers in 

 Northern climates, where the cold may 

 hold the bees close prisoners four or five 

 months, that the most successful method 

 of wintering them is by the cellar method. 

 Instead of surrounding 'each individual 

 colony by some material that is a poor 

 conductor of heat, it is cheaper to gather 

 the hives close together and surround all 

 of them by one great chaff-hive, or its 

 equivalent, walls of earth, by means of 

 which a higher and more even tempera- 

 ture can be secured. Of course, the use 

 of a cellar is to be able to control the tem- 

 perature. Of itself, a cellar does not r;r- 

 aie warmth. If we build a cellar above 

 ground, it makes no difference how thick 

 the walls, nor of what material they are 

 constructed, it is only a question of time 

 when the inside will be of the same tem- 

 perature as that outside. Such a cellar 

 would be a ])oor place in which to try to 



