"The first important requisite is to have all good ones to start with. Enough weak families are united together till they are strong, or some other disposition made of them." I then gave him an outline of my method of wintering, which I can confidently recommend to the reader.
ACCUMULATION OF FÆCES DESCRIBED BY SOME WRITERS AS A DISEASE.
This accumulation of fæces is considered by many writers as a disease—a kind of dysentery. It is described as affecting them towards spring, and several remedies are given. Now if what I have been describing is not the dysentery, why I must think I never had a case of it; but I shall still persist in guessing it to be the same, and suppose that inattention with many must be the reason that it is not discovered in cold weather, at the time that it takes place. Some stocks may be badly affected, yet not lost entirely, when moderate weather will stop its progress. When a remedy is applied in the spring, long after the cause ceases to operate, it would be singular if it was not effectual. I have no doubt but some have taken the natural discharge of fæces, that always takes place in spring when the bees leave the hive, for a disease. Others, when looking for a cause for diseased brood, and found the combs and hive somewhat besmeared, have assigned this as sufficient; but according to my view, have reversed it, giving the effect before the cause.
THE AUTHOR'S REMEDY.
For a time, I supposed that this moisture on the combs gradually mixed with the honey, making it thin, and that the bees eating so much water with their food, would affect them as described. Some experiments that followed, induced me to assign cold as the cause, as I always found, when I put them where it was sufficiently warm, that an immediate cure was the result, or at least, it enabled them to retain their fæces till set out in the spring.
BURYING BEES.
Burying bees in the earth below the frost, has been recommended as a superior method of wintering, for small families. I have known it confidently asserted, that they would lose nothing in weight, and no bees would die. I found, in testing it, that a medium quantity of honey sufficed, and but very few were lost, perhaps less than by any other method. Yet the combs were mouldy, and unfit for further use. There was no escape for the vapor and dampness of the earth. This did not satisfy me; it only cured "one disease by instituting another." I saved the bees, (and perhaps some honey), but the combs were spoiled.
EXPERIMENTS OF THE AUTHOR TO GET RID OF THE FROST.
I wished to keep them warm, and save the bees as well as honey, and at the same time, get rid of the moisture. I found that a large family expelled it much better than small ones; and if all were put together in a close room, the animal heat from a large number combined, would be an advantage to the weak ones, at least,—this proved of some benefit. Yet I found on the sides of a glass hive, that large drops of water would stand for weeks.
SUCCESS IN THIS MATTER.