and its Economic Management 389 



Thus we see the reason why a district capable of producing 

 400 or 500 pounds of honey annually per colony, seldom 

 gives as much as 200, more frequently considerably less. 



Under these circumstances, nothing but a judicious 

 system of combined swarming and re-uniting — keeping up 

 the brood supply with the young bees and young queen — 

 will ever give results fully equal to the resources of the 

 district. (See Chapter on " Swarming.) 



Let it be considered that during cold weather the combs 

 are really unnecessary except as the store cupboards. 

 Under normal conditions, during late autumn, at the 

 central lower portion of the combs the cells are all empty 

 just as vacated by the later batches of brood. As the cold 

 weather comes on the bees form upon that portion of the 

 combs, the nearest possible approach to a perfectly 

 unbroken cluster. Some of them occupy the empty cells 

 and rest head to head on opposite sides of the centre 

 wall of the combs, while others crowd between. 



Thus they make the best of the situation as they find it ; 

 but careful experiments, conducted over a series of years, 

 have always shewn me that the bees prefer to cluster in 

 winter where there are no combs at all to intersect them, 

 and in this situation have less difficulty in maintaining 

 that animal heat so necessary for the preservation of life. 



We can therefore meet them half-way as it were, and 

 while not removing the stores can alternate heavy combs 

 with empty frames, thus bringing the cluster into a more 

 compact mass, and entirely avoiding the frequent destruc- 

 tion of the unfortunate outer seams of bees. 



The perfect winter cluster is to be seen in the author's 

 method of wintering with the Conqueror Hive. (See 

 Fig- 13)- 



