298 JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. [ September 29 , issi 
be grown on in a stove temperature, potted off singly when showing 
the second leaf, and as the pots are filled with roots transfer to a 
larger size, but avoid overpotting, and if well attended to the plants 
will flower the winter following, being very effective in 5-inch pots 
for decorative purposes. Plants from seed sown in spring are now 
neat little specimens in 3-inch pots, and should be transferred to 
5-inch pots when they have filled the smaller size with roots, pro¬ 
viding good drainage, and place them near the light in a house where 
growth will be encouraged. 
rr ] 1 '-1— | - p —• ~\ N 
111 
IE BEE-KEEPER .} 
PREPARATIONS FOR WINTER. 
“Your bees have butchered all the bees of one of my stocks 
and have taken all its honey,” recently said one of our Bowdon 
bee-keepers to another. This is not a very common occurrence, 
but it occasionally happens. The bees of weak hives are sometimes 
over-mastered and killed by robbers more bent on plunder than 
war. September is a month of fighting and robbing amongst bees. 
The weather during this month is generally warm enough to 
induce them to fly abroad ; and, as flowers so late in the season 
do not yield much honey, bees will have it elsewhere if they 
can obtain it. Hence their constant attempts to rob other 
hives, and to enter those not well defended. The fine weather 
of September, it may be safely said, is spent by bees in seeking 
and defending hoarded wealth. In this work there is a great loss 
of hives. Hives are often greatly reduced in strength, and the 
slain may be seen in heaps near the doors of hives which have been 
persistently attacked. Artificial feeding is the cause of many 
destructive battles, and therefore the administration of syrup in 
mild weather is not unattended with risk. Whatever feeding is 
necessary in September should be given as speedily as possible 
in order that it may be stored up and the bees settle down into 
the quiet of winter life. Continuous feeding now would keep the 
bees in a constant state of excitement, and cause them to eat the 
food given to them instead of storing it up. During the last six 
or eight weeks bees here have gathered no honey, and have had to 
live on what was stored up in July. During this time there has 
been an enormous consumption of honey. Hives that were well 
filled with honey and heavy at the beginning of August had lost 
much of their weight by the beginning of September, and during 
the last two or three weeks the consumption of honey has been 
great. 
An examination of hives, minute and thorough, was sug¬ 
gested in a late issue of this Journal. Those who have not ex¬ 
amined their hives should do so as soon as they conveniently 
can, and see that the hives are clean and cosy, also well stored 
with bees and honey. Many bee-keepers in the spring months of 
the present year found great difficulty in inducing their bees to 
leave their nests to take artificial food. Both top and bottom 
feeding failed to entice the bees to leave their combs, the weather 
was so cold. Proper attention to hives now would prevent the 
necessity of untimely feeding in spring, and keep the minds of 
apiarians at rest about their bees during the winter and early 
spring months. The various modes of feeding are understood and 
all are very good. We have boards with tin troughs in them 
sufficiently large to hold 8 quarts or 0 lbs. of syrup in each, which 
we use for rapid feeding in autumn. Such troughs, filled with 
good syrup and placed under strong hives, are emptied in two 
and three hours ; and they are so constructed with tubes and 
funnels that they can be filled and refilled from the outside with¬ 
out disturbing the bees or uncovering the hives. The tin troughs 
in our feeding boards are 11 inches wide and lj inch deep. 
For the purpose of storing syrup rapidly large pie dishes and 
dripping tins with chips of wood in them can be used in hives 
not full of combs ; and hives full of combs can be raised by ekes 
to admit the dishes and dripping tins between combs and boards. 
By-and-by the weather will be too cold for feeding bees—too 
cold for them to elaborate and store away food for winter and 
spring use, too cold for them to nurse brood if breeding commence. 
As soon as feeding is completed the boards of hives should be 
well scraped and cleaned. If wet they should be dried or changed. 
If their doors are not already contracted, they should be for 
two purposes—viz., first to keep mice out, and secondly to pre¬ 
vent unnecessary loss of heat. If mice find access to hives in 
winter they are very destructive. The bodies of bees are not 
eaten, but after all are beheaded the mice eat the honey. As 
bees like to close themselves cosily up in their winter quarters, 
and keep the cold out by using propolis in small cavities and 
crevices and in cementing the hives to the boards, we approve of 
the use of mortar for the latter purpose, for it tends to drive the 
rain that may fall on the boards off and outward. 
The covering and protection of hives on the approach of winter 
is of more importance than many bee-keepers seem to believe. 
Protection from both rain and severe frost should be aimed at. 
Nothing answers better for an inner covering of hives than a good 
thickness of soft dry hay placed over and around them and pressed 
close. For an outer covering wheat straw well drawn out and 
combed with the fingers and neatly tied answers and looks well; 
indeed, no other kind of covering on hives looks so well. Straw 
covers are cheap, characteristic, and if well made and put on 
are ornamental. Roofing felt and other kinds of materials are 
used for covering hives. In large apiaries substitutes of all kinds 
are used as covers. 
The distance for hives to be placed above the ground is a 
question of great importance. Our hives in summer are about 
I inches above the ground ; in winter we like to have them about 
8 inches above the level. Snow seldom is more than 8 inches 
deep. Hives should be above the snow line in winter in order to 
be kept dry, for wet boards in frosty weather may become too 
cold for the bees standing on them. Even if the moisture of 
boards do not become frozen, it will cause the combs to decay. 
After hives are covered and secured for winter very little, if any, 
attention will be required in the apiary till about the middle of 
February.—A. Pettigrew, Bmvdon. 
FEEDING BEES. 
“ Leon ” wishes to know if it will be necessary to feed a driven 
stock “ all through the winter.” As there seems to be a very 
general misconception in regard to winter feeding, I shall answer 
his query in a more general way. And first of all let me say that 
winter is the period when bees ought to be allowed perfect quiet 
and rest. Anything that disturbs them then inevitably causes a 
loss that cannot be repaired. Of all disturbing causes feeding is 
probably the most general. It is quite usual to find old-fashioned 
bee-keepers going round their hives in the dead of winter pouring 
in syrup at the crown hole or pushing in a wooden trough at the 
doorway. In either case the bees are tempted to leave the cluster 
probably never to return ; robbers are invited to share the oozing 
spoil, mould and dysentery generally result, and spring finds the 
stock reduced to a handful if not dead. 
“ Leon’s ” query admits of but one answer at this season—viz., 
feed at once, as rapidly as possible, all the stores the stock is 
likely to require till spring, say 15 to 20 lbs. of syrup; thereafter 
tuck up warmly and leave all quiet till spring. 
Autumn feeding is, I think, a necessary evil. While it goes on 
the bees are kept in an unnatural state of excitement that results 
in reduced numbers. The little brood then raised cannot make 
up for the loss of the thousands that perish. The brood itself, if 
raised late, is frequently the cause of dysentery during the winter, 
since the young bees emerge from their cells with bodies distended 
with foeces. and if they do not get a cleansing flight soon the 
combs are soiled and the air poisoned, resulting in a general 
attack of dysentery. This leads us to the conclusion that neces¬ 
sary feeding should in autumn be completed as rapidly and as 
early as possible. Unsealed stores are also well known as a cause 
of great mortality in winter. The honey or syrup in open cells 
readily absorbs the vapours of the hive, swells in bulk, oozes out 
of the cells, rendering the whole hive damp, and finally poisons 
the bees. The end of September is late enough to feed any bees, 
but the earlier before then the better. As a matter of fact, I may 
add that all of my bees that have required feeding this autumn 
have dwindled to less than half their strength. Those not fed at 
all still cover all their combs. The latter, however, are not fully 
provided, but what they have will be all at once by filling their 
empty combs from a watering can. 
Slow autumn feeding has sometimes another evil—it causes the 
queen to exhaust herself, laying at a time when the bees cannot 
raise brood. I have several hives in which eggs are always plen¬ 
tiful, but I never see a larva or a sealed brood cell : this is owing 
to the absence of pollen, which has been very scarce with us, 
what is in the hive being already so covered with honey or syrup 
that the bees themselves do not know where to find it. 
The above remarks apply, of course, to syrup feeding, and 
are only partially true of candy-feeding. The latter may be 
safely practised all through the winter, but only in cases of 
necessity, as it still causes some excitement, and if flour is used 
will cause breeding at an untimely season. The time is now at 
hand when 1 propose to pack my stocks for the winter, leaving to 
