A YEAR AMONG THE BEES. 
19 
and sealed them over with a hot butcher-knife. I think this 
glucose meal is perhaps the poorest feed I have used. As to 
the rest I hardly know which is best, and I have of late used 
principally corn and oats ground together, partly because I 
was using that for horse and cow feed, and partly because I 
think it may be as good as any. 
When the feed-boxes are put in place, in the morning, (and 
I commence this feeding just as soon as the bees are out of 
the cellar), I put in each box at the raised end about four to 
six quarts, (the quantity is not very material), of the feed. 
The more compact, and the less scattered the feed the better. 
The bees will gradually dig it down till it is all settled in the 
lower end of the box, just the same as so much water would 
settle there. This may take an hour, or it may take six, 
according to circumstances. As often as they dig it down, I 
reverse the position of the box, just whirling it around if it 
stands on the edge of the ditch. This brings the meal again 
at the raised end of the box. When the bees have it dug 
down level there is little to be seen on the top except the 
hulls of the oats, and what fun it is to see the bees burrow 
in this, sometimes clear out of sight. 
It is always a source of amusement to see the bees working 
on this meal, and the young folks watch them by the half- 
hour. By night the oats, meal and finer parts of the corn are 
nearly all worked out, and after the bees have stopped work- 
ing, the boxes are emptied, piled up, one on top of another, 
and at the top, one placed upside down so that no dew or 
rain may affect them. If I think it is not worked out pretty 
clean, I may let them work it over next day, putting three or 
four times as much in a box. When the bees are done with 
it, there will be empty oat-hulls on top, and the coarse part 
of the corn on the bottom. It does not matter if it is not 
worked out clean, for it is fed to the horse and cows after- 
wards. 
After the first day’s feeding, the boxes must be filled in 
good season in the morning, or the bees annoy very much by 
being in the way, and throughout the day, while the bees are 
at work, if I go among the feed-boxes to turn them, or for 
