352 WINTERING. 
then with a thick layer of straw, and another, of earth. 
Wooden pipes are placed at the bottom (fig. 114), and 
one in the shape of a chimney, at the top, for an air-draft. 
The requisites are the same as in cellar wintering, an equal 
temperature, sufficient ventilation, a fairly dry atmosphere, 
and quiet. 
G58. We must warn novices against the wintering of 
bees in any repository in which the temperature descends 
below the freezing point. In such places the bees consume 
a great deal of honey, and they soon become restless, for 
want of a flight. Their Summer stand even without shelter, 
is far safer than any such place, because they can at least 
take advantage of any warm Winter day to void their ex- 
crements. These facts are demonstrated beyond a doubt. 
Spring DwiInpDLinea. 
659. When the conditions necessary to the successful 
wintering of bees are not complied with, and they have 
suffered from diarrhea (784), many colonies may be lost 
by Spring dwindling, especially if the Spring is cold and 
backward. Even colonies, which appeared to have gone 
through the Winter strong in numbers, may slowly lose 
bee after bee till the queen alone remains in the hive. This 
is sometimes mistaken for desertion (407), as will be seen 
in the following paragraph, which we quote from The 
London Quarterly Review, and in which the author attrib- 
utes to lack of Joyalty in the bees, that which evidently 
must have been due only to Spring dwindling: 
“Bees, like men, have their different dispositions, so that even 
their loyalty will sometimes fail them. An instance not long 
“ago came to our knowledge, which probably few bee-keepers 
will credit. Itis that of a hive which, having early exhausted 
its store, was found, on being examined one morning, to be 
