26 



THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW 



too fussy and particular, and something 

 that it will not pay them to bother with. 

 1 have known extensive producers of 

 comb honey who had no extractor, and 

 others who used an extractor only rarely. 



The extracted honey man has the more 

 justification for confining himself to his 

 specialty. In most cases it will not pay 

 him to attempt to produce a small 

 amount of comb honey. 



Whether comb or extracted honey will 

 prove the more profitable is a question 

 that each must decide for himself, ac- 

 cording to his local conditions. But even 

 if he decides that it will pay him best to 

 make comb honey his main crop, it is 

 my opinion and firm conviction that he 

 cannot afford to confine himself exclu- 

 sively to that. There are three main 

 reasons for this. 



THE COMBINATION SYSTEM GETS THE BEES 



STARTED IN THE SUPERS EARLY 



IN THE SEASON. 



The first is the fact that it is often 

 difficult to induce the bees to begin work 

 promptly at building comb and storing 

 honey in tiie supers. 



Upon this hinges much of our trouble 

 with swarming, and not a little of our 

 success or lack of it in getting a good 

 crop of honey. Often a colony will do 

 almost nothing for days when other colo- 

 nies are storing rapidly, the only ap- 

 parent difference being that the back- 

 ward colony seems disinclined to make a 

 start. Sometimes after they have once 

 begun they will thereafter do well, but 

 often their comparative idleness, at a 

 time when honey is coming in freely, re- 

 sults in the contraction of the swarming 

 fever. With a short honey flow these 

 delays and hindrances result in a serious 

 curtailment of the honey crop, often in- 

 deed, m an entire failure. The cram- 

 ming of the brood chamber with honey is 

 not the least of the evils, and with an 

 old queen effectually spoils the chances 

 of the colony doing well later. The 

 man who has only a few colonies, and 

 plenty of time to give to each individual 

 case, can remedy these evils in various 

 ways, but the aim of the ap'arist who 

 expects to make money at the business 

 must be to accomplish results with as 

 little manipulation as possible. 



IT SECURES A SURPLUS EVEN FROM WEAK 

 COLONIES. 



The second argument against exclusive 

 comb honey production is that a colony 

 that is weak or only moderately strong 

 in numbers cannot produce comb to the 

 best advantage. That foundation princi- 

 ple of bee keeping, "keep all colonies 



strong," applies with far greater force 

 to colonies producing comb honey; for a 

 colony that will do very fair work storing 

 honey in combs already built, may do 

 nothing whatever at building comb in a 

 super. I have frequently heard bee 

 keepers say, at the close of a very fair 

 honey flow, that many of their colonies 

 had not made an ounce of honey. This 

 is sheer waste. There is something 

 radically wrong with a colony, or its 

 management, when a colony that has its 

 combs in the brood chamber completed, 

 and is beyond the nucleus stage, cannot 

 be induced to store honey in combs in the 

 super, if there is any to be gathered in 

 the fields. 



IT LESSENS THE NUMBER OF UNFINISHED 

 SECTIONS. 



My third reason for advocating the 

 mixed system is the fact that ordinarily 

 the close of the honey flow finds a great 

 many sections on the hives only partially 

 completed. These sections are seldom 

 salable at any profitable price. To ex- 

 tract the honey from them is a tedious 

 and somewhat unprofitable job, while the 

 honey, being mostly unsealed and un- 

 ripe, is not of very good quality. More- 

 over, careful observation for years has 

 convinced me, that beyond a very 

 limited number, that may perhaps be 

 found profitable, a section that is filled 

 with empty comb is simply a section 

 spoiled. 



Many, I know, will not agree with me 

 here, but when we consider that honey 

 stored in such sections will very seldom 

 seldom grade higher than No. 2, worth 

 in most markets two cents per pound less 

 than No. 1, it should be evident that it 

 would be more profitable to have this 

 honey in the extracted form, or in a more 

 salable and higher priced comb. A still 

 stronger argument against the use of 

 drawn combs in sections is that many 

 times (almost always, when the honey 

 flow is good) sections will be drawn, 

 filled and completed, even sooner than 

 the sections of drawn comb will be en- 

 tirely finished. 



All these drawbacks to be met in the 

 exclusive production of comb honey are 

 easily avoided or remedied by an intelli- 

 gent combination of the two systems. 

 Take notice that I say a combination of 

 the two. The man who sets aside a 

 portion of his apiary to be run for ex- 

 tracted honey throughout the season, 

 while the other part is devoted to the 

 production of comb, is not using a com- 

 bination system. He is using both sys- 

 tems and using them independently, 

 whereas, in a true combination system. 



