ILLINOIS STATE BEE-KEEPERS' ASSOCIATION". 55 



The Secretary. — I have seen that when leaving it on hives over 

 wanter. 



Mr. Kildow. — That is not a common occurrence. I do not 

 know what causes that. 



The Secretary. — I should like to know if there is any way of 

 getting the effect of the candied honey out of the comb? 



Mr. Dadant. — Have the bees clean it out. 



The Secretary. — They would clean it but they would leave 

 particles. 



Question. — What is the best method of having combs cleaned 

 up after final extraction? 



Mr. Kildow. — Put them out of doors and let the bees clean them. 



The President. — Don't leave them out for the bees to get at. 

 I have ruined many perfectly good combs. 



Mr. Dadant. — Yes, they cut them up. 



Mr. Kildow.^ — I find by putting combs on top of the hives, that 

 if you are not careful, they will go up in there and you have to run 

 them through the escape to get them back out and they leave a lot 

 of honey there then. 



The Secretary. — They stay through the winter in some instances. 



Mr. Kildow. — Putting them on top, I have to re-clean. I do not 

 like that, I tried it. 



Mr. Bishop. — I have tried this thing of putting the combs back 

 on the hive for quite a good many years, and I have put an excluder 

 on, put on one or two sometimes, that would stop up three or four or 

 five and the bees would go up there, clean those up nice, but they 

 would deposit a lot of honey, instead of taking it down, in the ordinary 

 hive bodies, they would start to cluster after that, and then you would 

 have to put on an escape to get those bees down ; when the weather got 

 a little cool, they would just hang in that cluster and it would take 

 several days to get them down. They would cluster there instead of 

 going down through the escape; as a rule you would not have all your 

 honey out of your frames, you would have quite a bit scattered. For 

 the last two years I have tried this business in my final extracting. I 

 would take my supers at night, and set them out near the yeard and 

 stack three, four, five or six on top of one another, put about one-half 

 inch strips in at the corners between each one of those bodies, then I 

 would take the covers off, the next morning I would let them all have 

 a good time. If they did not get them properly cleaned the first day, I 

 would leave them up the second day, finally the next day, they would 

 all be back in the hives. I would take out the frames and examine 

 them, and I never had frames cleaned up nicer in my life than last 

 fall and this fall, and they never hurt the combs at all. I got out 

 about 80 bodies along this fall after final extracting, and I never had a 

 frame that was pinked in the least, and they were perfectly dry and 

 I put them up in nice shape. That has been my experience, and I 

 tell you it saves a whole lot of work, and then you get the honey all out. 



The Secretary. — I should like to ask Mr. Bishop why he tiers 

 them up that way. 



Mr. Bishop. — Because it does not take so many stands to set 

 those supers on; as long as you do not have to get them so high that 



