COMB HONEY. 



103 



COMB HONEY. 



get a gilt-edged article. Years ago, all comb 

 honej' was produced in glass Ijoxes. Tliese 

 were about five inches square, fifteen or six- 

 teen inches long, glassed on both ends. They 

 were not altogether an attractive package, 

 and were never put upon the market without 

 being more or less soiled with buiT-combs 

 and propolis. As they held from ten to fif 

 teen pounds of honey each, they contained a 



larger quantity than most families cared to 

 purchase at once. To obviate these and 

 other difficulties, what is popularly known 

 as the "• section honey-box "' was invented. 



It was what was wanted — a small package 

 for comb honey. Thus was accomplished, 

 not only the introduction of a smaller pack 

 age for comb honey, but one attractive and 

 readily marketable. The retailer was at onte 

 able to supply his customer with a small 

 quantity of comb honey without daubing, or 

 fussing with plates. The good housewife, in 

 turn, had only to lay the package upon a 

 plate, pass a common table knife around the 

 comlj, to separate the honey from the section 

 proper, and the honey was ready for the table, 

 without drip. 



WIDE FRAMES AXD HIVE-SUPERS. 



The next thing was something to hold the 

 sections while on the hive and being filled. 

 There was a score of different sorts of racks, 

 frames, trays, boxes, clamps, all of which 

 possessed some special featnn-s. It would 



DOUBLE-TIEK AVIDE FRAME. 



be impracticable to show all of these differ- 

 ent devices ; but for the sake of illustrating 

 some principles it may be well to mention 

 some of those that are used most largely. 



What was known as the double-tier AAide 

 frame was perhaps the first device for hold- 

 ing sections in the hive. This consisted of 

 a frame of the same depth and length as the 

 ordinary brood-frame, but of the same width 

 as the section, as sho'OTi in the illustration 

 preceding. This was used very largely at 

 one time ; but in the comse of time it was 

 discovered that it had several objectionaljle 

 features. First, a whole hiveful of them 

 gave the bees too much capacity to start 

 on ; and, as a consequence, this discouraged 

 them from beginning work. Second, they 



DOOLITTLE'S SINGLE-TIEK WIDE FKAJIES. 



did not permit of tiering up to any degree 

 of advantage. Third, it was not conven- 

 ient to get them out of the hive, and more 

 inconvenient still to get the sections out of 

 the wide frames. For these reasons wide 

 frames, or crates holding only oue tier of sec- 

 tions, were adopted. 



The Doolittle surplus arrangement con- 

 sists of a series of single-tier wide frames 

 having no projections to the top-bars, al- 

 though shallow wide frames have lieen made 

 with such projections. 



Both the single-tier and double-tier shown 

 had tin separators nailed on one side of each 

 wide frame ; but in the arrangement shown 

 below there is no provision for a separator. 



As the engraving shows, this is simply a 

 shallow tray of the same depth as the section, 

 plus a bee-si ace. and is divided off by trans- 

 verse partiticns — ihese very j artiticns pre- 

 venting, of course, the use of separators; but 

 those who did use this style of crate, and use 

 it still, claim they can get along witl.'out sep- 

 arators; that they have no difficulty in crat- 

 ing for market all their honey. But the 



