WINTERING BEES. 387 



singular if it Was not effectual. I have no dOubt but 

 some have taken the natural discharge of fseces, that 

 always takes place in spring when the bees leave the 

 hive, for a disease. Others, when looking for a cause 

 for diseased brood, and found the combs and hive 

 somewhat besmeared, have assigned this as sufScient; 

 but according to my view, have reversed it, giving 

 the effect before the cause. 



THE author's remedy. 



Por a time, I supposed that this moisture on the 

 combs gradually mixed with the honey, making it 

 thin, and that the bees easing so much water with 

 their food, would affect them as described. Some ex- 

 periments that followed, induced me to assign cold as 

 the cause, as I always found, when I put them where 

 it was sufficiently warm, that an immediate cure was 

 the result, or at least, it enabled them to retain their 

 fseces till set out in the spring. 



BURYING BEES. 



Burying bees in the earth below the frost, has been 

 recommended as a superior method of wintering, for 

 small families. I have known it confidently asserted, 

 that they would lose nothing in weight, and no bees 

 would die. I found, in testing it, that a medium quan- 

 tity of honey snf&ced, and but very few were lost, per- 

 haps less than by any other method. Yet the comba 

 were mouldy, and unfit for further use. There was 

 no escape for the. vapor and dampness of the earth, 

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