34 
HUE CULTURE. 
Butin September, as soon as his bees cease storing honey, ho 
should examine them, and should feed lavishly all such as 
have not sufficient to last them until the next honey-making 
season. I say feed lavishly for economy’s sake, for when 
bees are excited by feeding, they will eat freely. Suppose 
you feed a gill daily, the bees will be likely to consume 
nearly all of it, bu,t feed them a quart and they will eat but 
little more than the gill, and will store the remainder in their 
cells. So, feed them as rapidly as you cau get them to carry 
it away, and have done with the feeding as soon as possible 
and let them become quiet. If food is given warm they will 
work much more readily. If the bees are in a box hive and 
the top close, invert the hive and pour from a pint to a quart 
of honey over the bees and combs Leave the hive sitting 
bottom up until you have done feeding. Cover closely ex- 
cept a small entrance for the bees. l)o not fear drowning 
the bees, they will lick the honey all off from one another, 
and feel no more annoyed than a flock of geese would by be- 
ing dashed with a bucket of water. I have had colonies 
carry off a quart in three or four hours. Feed bees in the 
best possible manner, and they will not stow away all that is 
fed them. In the fall of '63, I selected for feeding thirty- 
three colonies which had almost no honey. I fed them each 
an average of thirty pounds of Cuba honey, by so doing the 
average increase in weight was twenty pounds. A little of 
this additional weight must be allowed for brood, although 
I caged the queens in some of the hives to prevent their 
laying. 
Feed early in the season that the honey may be stored 
whilst the weather is warm, so that the wax with which they 
cap their honey, may be soft, for they cannot seal it over in 
cold weather, and the uncapped honey is very apt to sour and 
disease the bees, besides they store much faster in warm than 
in cold weather. 
The advantages of fall feeding are, it can be done quicker, 
it takes less food, and is then put just where they will need 
it in cold weather when they cannot be safely fed. A good 
rule, given by an old author, runs thus: “In the spring feed 
sparingly ; in the fall feed bountifully ; in the winter feed 
none at all." 
Another object in feeding is to induce breeding in the 
spring so that bees may be very numerous when flowers ap- 
