Cottager and Smallholder 33 
XII.—FEEDERS AND FEEDING. 
It is sometimes necessary to feed bees. At times 
they place all the honey gathered in the supers, leaving the 
brood chamber with very little stored in it. As it 
is possible to actually see the amount of food stored in movable 
combs, instead of having to guess at the weightas was the 
case under old-fashioned conditions—many colonies, which 
would otherwise perish, 
can be saved by supplying 
a little extra food. 
Feeding can be done at 
all seasons if necessary. 
In the early spring 
stimulative feeding is 
carried out by means of 
the regulation bottle- 
feeder, Fig. 43, or by 
giving about one-quarter 
of a pint of syrup every 
third night, in a wide- 
necked jam jar, with a 
double thickness of 
muslin tied over the top, 
Fig. 44. A feed-hole is 
made in the calico quilt 
by cutting on three sides Fie. 43. 
of a square about three 
inches, so that a flap is made to turn down to prevent the bees 
escaping when a feeder is not in use. The jar is inverted 
‘over the feed-hole, and the bees suck the syrup through the 
muslin. 1 
The food should be given at night, and should be new milk 
warm. It is also made thin, as bees require a lot of water 
in the spring for rearing brood, which is the object of slow 
feeding. If there is a continual slow supply of food coming 
in, the queen lays more continuously. If the food is given too 
rapidly it does harm instead of good, as they store it in 
those cells which should be left for the queen to lay in. It 
is also harmful to give syrup when there is an abundant 
supply of natural food in the combs. In such a case for 
stimulation it is only necessary to bruise the cappings of the 
honey just round the brood nest. Artificial pollen should be 
supplied by putting Symington’s Pea Flour on hay chaff, 
sheltered from the wet in a box in the garden. 
