OUT-DOOR WINTERING. 347 



which eonimonly result from disturbing them when the weather 

 is so cold as to eonfiue them to their hives. 



If the colonies are to be wintered in the open air, they 

 should all be made populous, and rich in stores, even if to 

 do so requires their number to be reduced one-half or more. 

 The bee-keeper who has ten strong colonies in the Spring, 

 will, by judicious management with movable-frame hives, be 

 able to close the season with a larger apiary than one who 

 begins it with thirty, or more, feeble ones. 



638 (bis). Small colonies consume, proportionally, much 

 more food than large ones, and then perish from mability to 

 maintain sufficient heat. 



Fig. 128. 



EUROPEAN COMMON HIVES PROTECTED BY STRAW. 



(From Hamet.) 



Bees, in small or contracted hives, especially when deprived 

 of all the honey gathered in Spring, as stated before (629), 

 have too scanty a population for a successful wintering, espe- 

 cially out of doors; for, as it is by eating that bees generate 

 warmth, the abdomens of a small number are soon filled with 

 residues, and if the cold continues for weeks the bees get the 

 diarrhcea (YSi). We have often seen colonies in small hives 

 perishing side by side with large ones whose bees were very 

 healthy. 



