1882 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTUKE. 



149 



any water, and thus get a candy not burned 

 in the least, but of always the same consis- 

 tency. Did not friend Heddon burn his 

 candy just a littleV 



COJVIB FOUNDATION, AND WHERE IT 

 STANDS AT THE PRESENT TIITIE. 



ALSO SOMETHING IN REGARD TO RECENT IMPROVE- 

 MENTS IN ITS MANUFACTURE. 



-HEN the bees build comb, we see such 

 a multitude of them, with (to our 

 eyes) a multitude of different notions 

 in their different little heads, it seems impos- 

 sible that any thing good or regular should 

 come of it. "Well, in looking back over the 

 years since I first told you comb fdn. should be 

 made on rolls, it seems to me we bee-keep- 

 ers have been behaving much like the bees. 

 There have been a multitude of notions, and 

 many things have been taken up, and then 

 dropped again, for years, it may be, until 

 somebody came along and took up the same 

 old thing, and, lo and behold ! after brush- 

 ing off the dust and cobwebs of age, and 

 adding a few very simple touches, it is ex- 

 actly the thing after all. AVhen I first told 

 you, after a couple of months of work, that 

 sheets of wax would come out of rolls as we 

 wanted it to, what a breeze there was ! Our 

 first experiment was with quite light walls, 

 for we wanted it like natural comb ; but be- 

 fore we had rolled out many hundred pounds, 

 I got the idea into my head that we should 

 give the bees wax enough to make the whole 

 of the comb, and proposed to put it in heavy 

 walls they could work down. At just this 

 stage our friend Perrine came along with his 

 patent, as you know ; and before he took the 

 mill away, I told him my plan. He so far 

 fell in with it, that JSIr. Washburn worked 

 the mill over by his directions. The fdn. 

 produced was almost exactly like that now 

 called Dunham fdn., as we can show by 

 samples of the work we have yet. The walls 

 are nigh, and the tops of them level, almost 

 like the top of a board ; and, in fact, the 

 sheets came out of the mill almost like a 

 board out of a planing-machine. The mania, 

 however, that soon sprung up, to have as 

 many square feet from a pound of wax as 

 possible, induced Perrine to have his mill 

 worked over, and induced us, also, to make 

 our subsequent mills with the light narrow 

 wall. Before discarding the heavy wall, I 

 did try it in hives ; but, unfortunately, I 

 used bleached white Avax for the experiment, 

 and it was so hard, in that April weather, 

 that the bees could not handle it. You 

 know white wax was all the talk then. 



Well, as mills were necessarily very high 

 then, as Mr. Washburn is a mechanic who 

 commands high wages, others commenced 

 to make mills. It was found, about this 

 time, that our fdn., although it worked nice- 

 ly In cool weather, stretched and bulged 

 badly in the heat of July and August. I oe- 

 lieve Mrs. Dunham was about the first to 

 make mills after us, and, for some reason, 

 she commenced to make the original thick 

 wall. It was soon found that, with yellow 

 wax and hot weather this worked all right ; 

 and, still more, the heavy walls held the 



sheet up from stretching and sagging. She 

 did not try to make a great many square 

 feet to the pound, but rather to make a good 

 stout comb that would stand hot weather. 

 As her mills were nice, and low in price, 

 they have obtained, I am glad to say, a great 

 sale. 



Now another nice little point comes in 

 here: In trying to get fdn. as thin as possi- 

 ble, we made sheets without any side walls 

 at all ; and as the bees worked these into 

 nice comb honey, it was thought to be a 

 great saving. In using such for brood- 

 combs, however, it was found some colonies 

 of bees took hold of them very reluctantly ; 

 and, in fact, some bees were so poorly post- 

 ed as to what was going on in the world, 

 they would not touch them at all. They 

 couldn't see the point, until they had 

 learned, at least, unless some kind of a side 

 wall was given them. We found this out by 

 the dipped fdn., which gave a sheet with 

 walls on one side, and not the other. The 

 bees worked one side, and left the other 

 plain. To get them to take right hold quick, 

 we must have a good fair wall, and it wants 

 to be soft wax, and not compressed. 

 The base of the cell may be as hard as yon 

 please, providing it is as thin as natural 

 comb. Bees handle the walls with compar- 

 ative ease, because they can get their 

 " thumb and linger " each side of the wall, 

 and pull it up, as a potter pulls up the clay 

 in turning a crock. The only way they have 

 of making the bottom thin, is by scraping 

 them down, which is necessarily a very slow 

 operation. 



Now another point: When we commenced 

 making dies for the rubber plates last sea- 

 son, we decided, of course, on the heavy 

 walls. We made a nice sheet from our best 

 mill, but could not get a plaster cast to come 

 off without breaking. The walls were too 

 high, and too straight up. Vve must make 

 a new mill, to get a single sheet of wax for 

 these molds, or we must buy a sheet of some 

 one who had a mill producing a sheet that 

 would ''lift" from plaster. A sample, re- 

 ceived from friend Dadant, we found would 

 lift. We sent to him for some whole sheets, 

 and from these our rubber plates are modeled. 

 Now, the very point that makes the Dunham 

 fdn. lift from the plates, while ours would 

 not, also makes it come out of the rolls, and, 

 I think, very likely keeps it from sagging in 

 the hives. What is this point? I think I 

 can make it plain to you by a diagram from 

 the ABC book. 



B A 



Our fdn., and, indeed, all that is made 

 that I know of, except the Dunham, is made 

 after the natural comb, as at B. Mrs. Dun- 

 ham, while making the bottom of the cell as 

 we all do, makes the wall to these cells 



