WINTERING BEES IN CANADA 
BY 
F. W. L. Sladen, Dominion Apiarist 
INTRODUCTION. 
This bulletin discusses a vital factor in the building up of the beekeeping industry 
in Canada—the preservation of the bees during the winter. There die in Canada 
every winter large numbers of colonies which a little care and forethought would have 
saved. Many more are seriously weakened, also for the want of timely and intelligent 
preparation. It is far better to exercise this care than to find empty and depleted 
hives in the spring, and make the bees that survive spend the best part of the summer 
filling them again. The remarkably high yields of honey in many places in Canada, 
and the.good price that honey now brings, offer a strong financial inducement to 
prepare the bees for winter with the most intelligent care. To put off the preparation 
of the bees for the winter until cold weather has arrived is to court disaster, because 
exposing the bees to cold early in winter and disturbing them during cold weather 
are injurious. 
The long and cold winter in many parts of Canada is not so hard on the bees 
as might be imagined, and in some respects wintering is easier than in a mild country 
like England, or in the Southern States. This is because the bees rest more com- 
pletely during the winter in Canada. Few conditions are more trying to bees than 
those encountered in the British Isles during February, March and April, when they 
wear themselves out and die by hundreds in raising a little brood and flying out to 
visit the early flowers in the chilly, changeable weather. The same conditions occur 
on Vancouver Island. In most parts of Canada, however, the winter rest continues 
until some time in April. Then come quickly the long warm days; the bees breed up 
fast, and the colony becomes strong in a remarkably short time. 
We have, however, learned several things about wintering bees in Canada, the 
neglect of any one of which will bring ruin and death to the colony. One of the 
most important of these requirements is strong, that is to say, populous colonies, 
consisting mainly of young bees; another is an abundant supply of wholesome stores 
in the combs; and a third is adequate protection from the cold. The sucessful winter- 
ing of bees in Canada depends mainly upon these three points. 
Bees do not hibernate in the true sense. When it grows cold, they form a com- 
pact cluster, and the bees in the heart of the cluster produce heat by muscular activity 
which is derived from the consumption of food. Those at the outside of the cluster 
act as insulators to prevent the escape of the heat, and are thereby warmed themselves. 
Phillips has shown that bees begin to cluster when the temperature in the hive falls 
to 57° F. The temperature of the air inside the hive during winter should therefore 
be below, but not far below 57 degrees. 
As a result of the consumption of food, waste matter collects in the intestine. 
Healthy bees discharge this waste matter only during flight, but in many parts of 
Canada the winter is too cold for bees to fly for four, five, or even six months. This 
long period makes it of the greatest importance that the bees be so well protected from 
the cold that they will not need to consume much food, also that the food be perfectly 
wholesome and as free as possible from indigestible matter. If the cluster is small, 
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