Page:Jardine Naturalist's library Bees.djvu/195

Rh mild weather. If the nights be cold, there will be found in the trough next day, many dead bees which had been tempted to linger there too long. As the season advances, the spring flowers appear in greater abundance, the gooseberry and currant bushes furnish both honey and farina, the seeding turnips and early sown mustard present a very considerable supply; the furze, also, is in full bloom, and the bees become less dependant on artificial feeding. But, unless the weather be remarkably mild, and the stocks of more than ordinary richness, the adventitious supplies ought not to be withdrawn till the beginning of May. During March and April, the activity and bustle of the hive are greatly augmented, and the industrious foragers may be seen in a genial morning hurrying with their loads into the hive in crowds, and jostling and driving one another about with most unceremonious haste. In a strong hive, from 50 to 70 bees, as already stated, may be observed entering in a minute; and, when about to purchase a hive, we cannot have recourse to a more decisive testimony of its strength than the numbers that enter loaded with farina in a given period of time. It is, in fact, during this season, about the beginning or middle of April, that such purchases can be made with less risk than during any other part of the year. The winter is past, and the more trying season of early spring, especially the latter half of February and the whole of March, during which periods more bees die than at any other. Their consumption of honey is then so great, from the circumstance of the Queen having