244 



THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW 



generated by the bees. 



The authors desire to state that 

 while the lower critical point, 57° 

 F., appears rather well established,, 

 the observations up to the present 

 do not justify too definite a state- 

 ment concerning the upper limit of 

 quiescence. It must be emphasized 

 that these conditions do not apply 

 when the colony has brood. The 

 rearing of brood in winter causes a 

 marked increase in heat produc- 

 tion and constitutes a condition 

 which may become one of the most 

 disastrous that can befall a con- 

 fined colony. This will be discussed 

 at a later time. 



When the heat production of the 

 colony is explained, we are able to 

 understand to some extent the di- 

 vergence in the records obtained by 

 other observers. It has, of course, 

 long been known that bees generate 

 heat and it has been pointed out 

 that during cold weather the tem- 



perature of the cluster is often 

 higher than during warmer weath- 

 er. While the temperatures pre- 

 viously recorded are in most cases 

 abnormal, due to disturbance, the 

 chief difficulty in understanding the 

 phenomena which takes place is 

 due to insufficient observations. 

 For example, if between noon No- 

 vember 13 and 2 p. m. November 

 15 only a half dozen temperature 

 records had been made for the 

 cluster (and perhaps without find 

 ing tlie warmest part of it) and 

 the outside air, it would have 

 been impossible to determine the 

 limits of heat production. Most ob- 

 servers have been satisfied with a 

 few observations, and seemingly 

 everyone who has inserted a ther- 

 mometer in a hive has felt called 

 upon to publish the results, thereby 

 only confusing the problem. 



(Concluded in the August Number) 



Management of Three Thousand Colonies of Bees 



in Fifty Yards 



By J. J. AVILBER, Cordele, Ga. 

 Off to Other Fields 



On the 2 6 th of October of the 

 year I reached the 1,200 colony 

 mark in 16 apiaries. I left for 

 Suwanee and Columbia counties, 

 Fla. for the sole purpose of estab- 

 lishing a large comb honey busi- 

 ness there. On a few previous 

 visits I had learned that this was 

 a good section for the production 

 of comb honey, in fact the best I 

 knew and as I could not produce 

 comb honey in one pound sections 

 at home as profitably as I could 

 chunk and extracted honey I was 

 compelled to hunt other fields 

 where conditions were almost to 

 the reverse. There was a great de- 

 mand everywhere for comb honey 

 in sections and my customers and 

 the trade demanded that I put out 

 honey in this form. 



I had a large bee business es- 

 tablished here and just as good 

 surrounding territory around me 

 as that I was . occupying but of 



course a little more remote, but I 

 was fully ready for other field 

 with ready capital to back the 

 business, but don't think that I 

 "shut down" here when I left the 

 work, for rapid increase has been 

 going on here ever since, which I 

 shall show with my last article when 

 I shall come back to this field. 



On reaching my new field I 

 learned that there were good many 

 bees scattered about over the 

 country in box hives and log gums, 

 and some few in modern hives and 

 that they could be bought at a 

 reasonable price and that by go- 

 ing out well over the surrounding 

 country a number could be bought 

 up. This was great encouragement 

 for I did not want to move bees 

 from here or buy elsewhere and 

 move them in cars into the new 

 territory, in fact this would have 

 brought on much more serious con- 

 sideration than I had given the 



