I have used water feeders of the same construction with my honey feeders, with great success. The bees are able to enter them at all times, as they are filled with the warm air of the hive, and thus breeding goes on, without interruption, and the lives of many bees are saved.
The same end may be obtained, by pouring daily, a few table spoonsfull of water into the hive, through one of the holes leading to the spare honey boxes. As soon as the weather becomes warm, and the bees can supply themselves from the dew on the grass and leaves, it will not be worth while to give them water in their hives.
When supplied with water in their hives, I advise that enough honey or sugar be added to it, to make it tolerably sweet. They will take it with greater relish, and it will stimulate them more powerfully to the raising of brood.
I come now to mention a substitute for liquid honey, the value of which has been extensively and thoroughly tested in Germany, and which I have used with great advantage. It was not discovered by Dzierzon, although he speaks of its excellence, in the most decided terms. The article to which I refer, is plain sugar candy, or as it is often called, barley candy. It has been ascertained that about four pounds of this, will sustain a colony during the Winter, when they have scarcely any honey in their hive! If it is placed where they can get access to it without being chilled, they will cluster upon it, and gradually eat it up. It not only goes further than double the quantity of liquid honey which could be bought for the same money, but is found to agree with the bees perfectly; while the liquid honey is almost sure to sour in the unsealed cells, and expose them to dangerous, and often fatal attacks of dysentery. I have sometimes, in the old-fashioned box hives, pushed sticks of candy between the ranges of comb, and have found it even then to answer a good purpose. In any hive which has surplus honey boxes, the candy may be put into a small box, which after being covered thoroughly with cotton or wool, may have another box put over it, the outside of which may be also covered. Unless great precautions are used, the boxes will be so cold, that the bees will not be able to enter them in Winter, and may thus perish in close proximity to abundant stores.
In my hives, the candy may be laid on the top of the frames, in the shallow chamber between the frames and the honey-board; it will here, if the honey-board is covered with straw, be always accessible to the bees, even in the coldest weather. I sometimes put it directly into a frame, and confine it with a piece of twine, or fine wire.
I have made a very convenient use of sugar candy, as a bee-feed in the Summer, when I wished to give small colonies a little food, and yet not to be at the trouble to use a feeder, or incur the risk of their being robbed by putting it where strange bees might be attracted by the scent. A small stick of candy, slid in on the bottom-board, under the frames, answers admirably for such a purpose. If a little liquid food must be used in warm weather, I advise that it be the best white sugar, dissolved in water; this makes an admirable food; costs but little more than brown sugar, and has no smell to tempt robbers to try to gain an entrance into the hive.
If the Apiarian is skillful, and attends to his bees, at the proper time, they will rarely need much feeding; if he manages them in such a manner that this is frequently and extensively needed, I can assure him, if he has not already found it out to his sorrow, that his bees will be nothing but a bill of cost and vexation.
The question how much honey a colony of bees needs, in order to carry them safely through the perils of Winter, is one to which it is impossible to give an answer which will be definite, under all circumstances. Very much will depend upon the hive in which they are kept, and the forwardness of the ensuing Spring; (see Chapter on [Protection].) It is often absolutely impossible in the common hives, to form any reliable estimate, as to the quantity of honey which they contain, for the combs are often so heavy with bee-bread, as entirely to deceive even the most experienced bee-keeper.
I should always wish to leave at least 20 lbs. of honey in a hive; and as I can examine each comb, I am never at a loss to know how much a colony has. If I have the least apprehension that their supplies may fail, I prefer to put a few pounds of sugar candy where they can easily get access to it, in case of need. In my hive, the careful bee-keeper may not only know the exact extent of the resources of each hive, in the Fall, but he may, very early in the Spring, ascertain precisely how much honey is still on hand, and whether his bees need feeding, in order to preserve their lives. It is a shameful fact that a large number of colonies perish after they have begun to fly out, and when, they might easily have been saved, in any kind of hive.