58 Advanced Bee Culture 



and the bees have settled down to steady work. If newly hived swarms 

 begin swarming out when I am using the new Heddon hive, I use a 

 full-size brood-nest for three days, and then shake the bees from the 

 lower section of the hive, and use this section for the upper section of the 

 next hive into which I put a swarm. 



It has been urged against contraction that it results in small colonies 

 at the end of the season. If it is carried to too great an extent, and 

 too long continued, it certainly does. If a man wishes to turn bees into 

 honey, so to speak, contraction of the brood-nest will enable him to 

 accomplish his object. If colonies are too weak in the fall as the result 

 of severe contraction, they must be united ; but the course pursued by 

 nearly all who practice contraction is to enlarge the brood-nest again in 

 time for the colony to build up sufficiently for a fall flow of honey, if 

 there is one, or to become strong enough for winter. When bees are 

 wintered in a repository of the proper temperature, I have never found 

 that unusually populous colonies were any more desirable than smaller 

 ones. This is one advantage of cellar wintering ; the population may be 

 reduced to the minimum during the consumptive, non-productive part of 

 the year. 



