FEEDIKQ. 205 



stocks were filled with brood. So well were they occu- 

 pied, that there was no room for storing honey, except 

 in boxes, and the amount of surplus was large, consider- 

 ing the season. This result was largely due to the meas- 

 ures adopted, as given in the Chapter on Increase. Fall 

 forage entirely failed, and the consequence was, that 

 when the combs were vacated by the brood, there was no 

 honey to be gathered to fill them for winter, and the re- 

 quisite supplies had to be furnished by feeding. It often 

 happens that brood-rearing will progress finely during 

 the time of apple-blossoms, between which and clover, 

 etc., a period of scarcity will occur, when feeding will 

 be absolutely indispensable. During cold and stormy 

 days, when bees cannot go out for water or honey, feed- 

 ing is essential. 



WHAT TO FEED. 



A good quality of honey, is undoubtedly good enough. 

 Yet the continued experiments of our best bee-keepers, 

 have given abundant proof that good sugar is equally 

 suitable, and by some is claimed to be even better than 

 honey. I have used it largely, comparing the results 

 with honey fed at the same time, and find it to be satis- 

 factory. As feeding occurs when honey is scarce, sugar 

 is much less liable to induce robbing, making it in this 

 respect much more desirable to use. The poorer grades 

 of honey sell so low, that it is often cheaper to feed such 

 honey than to purchase sugar for the purpose. Besides, 

 the impurities and adulteration of sugar, at the present 

 day, are making it quite undesirable. 



We are tending more and more each year to the prac- 

 tice of feeding honey only, to our bees, and I shall wel- 

 come the day when this will be the exclusive practice, 

 thus avoiding the appearance, even, of any possibility of 

 fraud in the quahty of our surplus honey. 



Grape sugar and glucose have been advocated as a cheap 



