11 



For every volume of honey consumed, the bees give off an amount of moisture 

 that, if condensed, would make an approximately equal volume of water. If the air 

 of the cellar is already laden with moisture, the moisture produced by the bees will 

 condense in the hive, a condition that if it occurs to any great extent and is long 

 continued is liable to do great injury to the bees. 



Very dry conditions are also unfavourable, especially towards the end of a long 

 winter when more or less dysentery has developed. The stores may lose so much 

 water that the bees are unable to remove them from the cells and the colony may die 

 in consequence. This condition occurs most frequently in connection with granu- 

 lated stores, but it sometimes takes place with stores that do not granulate, such as 

 buckwheat honey and sugar syrup. Soft candy given to a colony suffering from this 

 trouble will harden, and thus it, too, becomes unavailable for food, and the colony may 

 starve. 



In Canada, ventilated cellars are liable to become very dry in cold weather 

 because of the small amount of water contained in the outside air that is drawn in. 

 Air at zero can hold only one-sixth of the weight of water that air at 45° can hold. 

 The increase in moisture that occurs in a very dry cellar towards spring, as the out- 

 side temperature rises, is beneficial to the bees. In a dry cellar, an earth floor may be 

 better than a cement floor. 



Some cellars are fitted with an air intake from outside entering the cellar at or 

 near the floor in addition to the chimney outlet. There is no question that by this 

 means excellent ventilation may be obtained, and the cellar may be made dry, but 

 these things are secured at the expense of making the temperature of the cellar too 

 cold and changeable. The trouble with such a system of ventilation is that, contrary 

 to the furnace, which regulates itself automatically, it acts least when most wanted 

 and most when least required. In cold weather when warm, moist air is needed, cold 

 dry air is drawn in strongly through the Smallest opening, while in mild weather 

 when cool, dry air is desirable, very little air will enter through the largest opening, 

 and this is comparatively warm and moist. Therefore the ventilators need to be kept 

 almost closed in cold weather, and opened wide in mild weather, and thus they need 

 frequent adjusting in regions where mild weather alternates with cold during the 

 winter. But in a region where it stays cold through the winter, the ventilators do 

 not need much attention. Indeed, such a region provides us with two ways in which 

 the draught may be, in a rough measure, automatically reduced in winter and 

 increased in spring. These are the reduction or even closing of the mouth of the 

 cellar chimney by hoar frost from the condensed moisture from the cellar in the 

 winter, and the heating of the chimney or of the building containing it (provided 

 this has a chimney) by the warm sunshine in spring, because by the time the cold 

 weather ceases, the sun is high and powerful. 



The necessity for frequently adjusting the ventilators in a region where cold 

 alternates with mild weather, especially in cellars not deep in the ground, constitutes 

 a serious disadvantage to wintering in such cellars in southern Ontario and in 

 southern Alberta. In southern Ontario, cellar wintering has therefore been largely 

 replaced by outside wintering, and in southern Alberta, where the temperature 

 changes are very great and sudden, and the ground is dry, good results have been 

 obtained at the Experimental Farm at Lethbridge by wintering in a dug-out. 



For convenience, we have spoken of the temperature and humidity of the bee 

 cellar. The temperature and humidity, however, that we need to consider are those oi 

 the air in the hive surrounding the bee cluster. This air may be warmed and moist- 

 ened to some extent by reducing the size of the entrance of the hive, and by placing a 

 warm impervious cover over the hive. 



