8o BEE-FJRMING. 



"Times" Bee-Master strongly urges bee-keepers to use 

 nothing but sugar mixed with beer ; if anything is liable 

 to sour this is, and I would not recommend anyone to use 

 beer-food. Langstroth states he has for several years used 

 West Indian honey. To remove its impurities, and pre- 

 vent it from either souring or candying in the cells, it 

 should have a little water added to it, then be boiled for a 

 few minutes, and set to cool; the scum on the top should 

 then be removed. He also mixes three pounds of honey, 

 two of brown sugar, and one pound of water. The latter 

 would be both an excellent and cheap food. 



The Rev. M. Kleine says in the Bienenzeitung, " The 

 use of sugar-candy for feeding bees gives to bee-keeping a 

 security which it did not possess before. Still, we must 

 not base over-sanguine expectations on it, or attempt to 

 winter very weak stocks, which a prudent apiarian should 

 at once unite with a stronger colony. I have used sugar- 

 candy for feeding for the last five years, and made many 

 experiments with it, which satisfy me that it cannot be 

 too strongly recommended, especially after unfavourable 

 summers. It is prepared by dissolving two pounds of 

 candy in a quart of water and evaporating by boiling 

 about two gills of the solution, then skimming and strain- 

 ing through a hair sieve. Three quarts of this solution 

 fed in autumn will carry a colony safely through the 

 winter in an ordinary season." 



Grape sugar for correcting sour wines is now exten- 

 sively made from potato starch in various places on the 

 Rhine, and has been highly recommended for bee-food. 

 It can be obtained at a much lower price than cane sugar, 

 and is better adapted to the constitution of the bee, as it 

 contains the saccharine matter of honey, and hence is 

 frequently termed honey-sugar. 



It may be used either diluted with boiling water, or in 

 its raw state, moist, as it comes from the factory. In the 



