THE APIARY.

Otago Witness, Issue 3808, 8 March 1927, Page 11

THE APIARY.

By

J. A.

THE END OF 1927 SEASON. A spell of nine days of continued shrinkage in the weight of my scale hive, taken with the rapid disappearance of clover bloom, and the turning of the bees’ attention to autumn flowers, such as ragwort, . thistles, and dandelion, seemed to indicate clearly that in as far as surplus was concerned the season in the south was ended. Consequently in the early days of the week I finished up my extracting,'- and prepared the colonies for winter. The intention earlier in the season was to reduce all the colonies to a single storey of 10 combs for wintering, but, finding them lighter than was anticipated, they have been left either with two full storeys or a storey and a-half, so as to supply'them with more stores without disturbing the brood-nest. It is my hope that during the month of March there may be sufficient fine days to enable the bees to add to their stores from autumn flowers, and to go into winter better provided than they have been for some years past.. The clover season ended very disappointingly. A cold spell of wet days kept the bees inside and caused the rapid disappearance of bloom. As a result the bees as soon as fine weather started again have turned their attention mainly to ragwort and thistles. It is not unlikely that ragwort will yield more largely than usual. THE CROP. This with me is light, owing largely to the light condition of the hives in the spring. Where the bees were better provided the crop is better, and there will be some fair yields in the Southland district, especially so in those districts which are further from the coast and have had more dry weather. In North Otago, judging from the luxuriant growth of clover, there should be some good yields, Particularly does this seem to be the case in the Maheno and Oamaru districts. I hope to hear of some good returns from there this year. The Roslyn Bush crop was two tons, but onlj- one ton was extracted, the other being held in the combs for spring use. Last year I attempted to do this, but left the doing of it- for the late season, in the hope that the honey gathered from autumn flowers might be returned in this way to the bees, the result being that the season ended abruptly with food-chambers less than half filled. This season I took no such, risk, but put on the foodchambers first, and these are now stored away ready for use in the spring. WINTERING CONDITIONS.

For two years (1925 and 1926) the honey season closed very abruptly about January 25, and was followed by a long period of stormy weather. In both seasons the effect of this was very much marked in the spring following. The reason of this is not far to see... When with hives full of bees the season ends so abruptly it means that there is, at a very early period of the autumn, a large consumption of stores, and consequent!}’ colonies which when the extracting season was over seemed well supplied are found, three months later, at the beginning of the winter, in short supply. This condition, unless the attention of the beekeeper is drawn to it and feeding done, leaves the bees in a destitute position in the spring time, losses are heavy, and the survivors are unable to breed up until the season is far gone. I do not anticipate that this season will produce those results. It was somewhat of a surprise that there could be two such unusual seasons following one another. We.jnay well hope that instead of a heavy shrinkage in March the bees will at least be -able to hold their own. There is certainly plenty of nectar in the fields, and we may fairly expect that weather conditions will come back to normal this year. The beekeeper's attention is, however, drawn to the fact that an autumn which is poor from a beekeeper’s point of view is a poor forerunner of winter, and absolutely fatal as far as spring is concerned, unless heavy feeding is done. In my own apiary I am providing for this by the food-cham-bers stored in the honey-house for that purpose. HOME AGAIN. For some 17 years the writer of this column has been in touch with southern beekeepers through the Otago Witness. He has always sought as much as possible the personal touch, and is glad to have so many whom he can regard as personal friends, particularly in Otago aiid Southland, but also throughout the Dominion. No attempt has been made to give lessons or claim any knowledge bejond what is derived from apiary experience and the reading of current bee literature. Mostly the trend of these notes is along the lines of actual experienee, and is descriptive of work actually being done in the apiary, while those derived from the reading of current periodicals are only such as can be useful from a local point of view. American and Canadian conditions are for the most part so different from ours that a great deal of their experience is of little or no use to us. Especially is this true with regard to wintering. “Home again” means that the season’s work in the south has been completed and that the writer has gone back to his home in Nelson—to the apple-picking and the winter’s work among the fruit trees. The season has been a rather dull one from the apiary point of view, as it has "been one long struggle to get the bees up to the strength required, this, too, against the adverse weather conditions which prevailed in November and December. However, the honey season of is past for me. and I am glad to know that many others had a better experience than mine.