FEEDING. 123 



also be fed at this season to promote early swarming and 

 storing of surplus honey. 



In feeding, the utmost care is requisite, and hut few 

 know how to manage it properly. Honey fed to bees, is 

 almost certain to excite quarreling. Strong colonies 

 sometimes scent the honey given to weak ones, and carry 

 it off as fast as supplied. It is possible that feeding a 

 stock of bees in spring, may cause them to starve ; where- 

 as, if let alone, they would survive. Notwithstanding this 

 seems contradictory, it may be made to appear reasonable. 

 Whenever the supply of honey is deficient, probably not 

 more than one egg in twenty will be matured, their means 

 not allowing the brood to be fed. In very small colonies 

 the queen usually confines herself to a small area of comb, 

 often depositing several eggs in one cell, but if the supply 

 of honey is increased, she will extend her labors over a 

 greater space. Suppose we give such a stock two or three 

 pounds of honey, encouraging them to feed a large brood, 

 and the supply fails before they are half grown. What 

 are they to do ? Destroy the brood and lose all they 

 have fed, or draw on their old stores, and trust to chance 

 for themselves ? The latter alternative will probably be 

 adopted, and then without timely intervention of favorable 

 weather, the bees will starve. The same effect is some- 

 times produced by the changes of the weather. A week 

 or two may be very fine and bring out the flowers in 

 abundance, and a sudden change, perhaps frost, may cut 

 them all off. This makes it necessary to exercise consid- 

 erable vigilance, as these spells of cold weather make it 

 unsafe to neglect them, till white clover appears, (10th or 

 15th of June in this section) but if the spring is favorable, 

 there is but little danger, unless they are robbed as fed. 

 If the necessary care be taken about moth-worms, the 



