THE BEE-KEEPERS* REVIEW. 



263 



when I wish them to fly, and thus avoid 

 night work and risk of adverse weather. 

 I wish to say here that I reduced my 

 bees last fall from 180 colonies to 101. 

 They were sorted out and united so as to 

 be reasonably equal in numbers, with 

 about 35 lbs. of hone^' per hive. My 

 largest colonies dwindled the least, and 

 used about the same amount of honey as 

 did those having a few less bees. The 

 net consumption of honey, in the almost 

 five months of confinment, was about 20 

 lbs. per colony, on an average. They 

 were all weighed and supplied with sealed 

 honey in October, and re-weighed again 

 one day after taken out in april. 



PLENTY OF BEES AND FOOD IS THE 

 PRIME REQUISITE. 



A great deal has been said about the 

 amount of honey bees consume in winter, 

 and my experiments demonstrate that a 

 few bees in a hive, or a little honey, are 

 neither of them reasonably sufficient in 

 quantity to be relied upon for safe win- 

 tering, in doors or out. More bees on 

 hand to meet the natural death rate, and 

 honey to meet unusual conditions, consti- 

 tute the most valuable means, combined 

 with other best known methods, for the 

 safe wintering of bees. 



And it is well right here to remark that 

 their safe wintering in our climate, wheth- 

 er North or South, hinges on these. Bees 

 do not eat more honey in Michigan than 

 in Tennesee or Missouri, and a small colo- 

 ny with a little honey is about as help- 

 less in one State as in the other. The 

 short period of confinment in the South- 

 ern States favois early breeding, but the 

 same waste by natural death, and the 

 same consumption of honey, takes place. 

 It is absolutely necessary to have a large 

 colony to die, and an ample supply of 

 honey, in order to have enough of both 

 left in the spring. 



THE CEI,I.AR IS NICE TO COOI, DOWN OB- 

 STREPROUS SWARMS IN SWARM- 

 ING-TIME 

 Now let me describe another use to 

 which this cellar may be put in summer. 

 In the top of each gable end is a wire 

 screen, three feet square, covered with 

 tight fitting doors. This gable, or room 

 above the cellar, is dark unless the screen 

 doors are opened, or the entrance doors, 

 one at each end are left open. I find this 

 dark cool cellar a very handy thing when 

 a lot of swarms cluster. It is a very easy 

 matter to run in a hive full of bees, and 

 take it to the cellar, and then another, 

 until one at a time, all are hived as you 

 desire, except that you are not sure that 

 all have queens. In the cellar they soon 

 show which are queenless; but, as they 

 can't fly in the cool, dark place, they 

 accept the conditions, and give you ample 

 time to go down with a lantern and sup- 

 ply the needed queens, and restore quiet. 

 This season has been, with me, unusual 

 for swarming. One day I had eleven in 

 my cellar at onetime; all taken within an 

 hour from one decoy bush. Luckily all 

 except three of the hives secured queens. 

 The others were at once supplied, and 

 after the day's hurry was over all were 

 taken out and located as desired; all as 

 cool and happy as could be. The eleven 

 hives contained fifteen prime swarms. 

 It was a great comfort to be able to hive 

 a swarm in five minutes, take it into the 

 cellar before another came out and mixed 

 in with it, and feel that they could stay 

 in the cellar as well as not until their 

 heat was over. 



W. Z. — You ought to see those trees 

 and hedges, now in full leaf. 



No wonder no bees go to the woods to 

 alight. Nothing could resist the tempta- 

 tion to plunge into such a cedar hedge as 

 the one on the north side. 



FarweIvL, Mich., July 26, 1902. 



