THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW 



79 



writers who say that any "fussing" or 

 fixing of swarms, otherwise than natural 

 swarming, is worse than nothing. I say 

 to myself, "surely most of their time 

 is spent swinging in a hammock watching 

 a few colonies, or a few hundred at least, 

 and not in the busy whirl of swarming 

 with say, a thousand colonies, scattered 

 over the country, with from ten to 

 twenty per cent, of them wanting to 

 swarm every week, for, perhaps, four 

 weeks." 



The extracted honey man is not idle at 

 this time; for, he. too, is busy in equaliz- 

 ing brood, controlling swarms, giving 

 room, etc. 



TO WHAT EXTENT THE HANDLING OF HIVES 

 INSTEAD OF FRAMES IS PRACTICAL. 



Here we are confronted by another 

 class of bee keepers (and usually they 

 are producing honey by the wheel barrow 

 load instead of by the car load) who say 

 if a man is to handle bees extensively he 

 must handle hives instead of combs; 

 and I want to compromise with those 

 parties right here by admitting that we 

 must learn to handle hives by one 

 cursory glance, when a rush of work is 

 on, and not spend much valuable time 

 handling over combs looking for queen 

 cells that do not exist, nor in counting 

 frames of brood, unless to note its age, 

 for the per cent, of hatching brood has 

 much to with the swarming impulse just 

 prior to honey flows. 



The methods by which we learn to 

 handle a large per cent, of colonies dur- 

 ing the swarming by handling hives in- 

 stead of combs ( and by this I do not 

 mean sectional hives ) are so many that 

 if 1 should try to describe them the 

 reader would no doubt say as I have 

 said after reading Quinby, Langstroth, 

 Miller, Doolittle and others: "well, I 

 can read their experience, but before I 

 can realize it. I must endure the work, 

 and grind, and torture that they have 

 endured." 



SHOOK-SWARMING A SUCCESS. 



I will not discuss methods here, but 

 will say that shook-swarming is a suc- 



cess, if properly done, in working for 

 comb honey. 1 know many imitators say 

 it is not a success; others say it is too 

 much work; still others say their bees 

 swarmed after shaking them, even worse 

 than before; but I am sure that they are 

 wrong, either in their methods or prac- 

 tice, as I have never had anyone watch- 

 ing my bees an hour; never had more 

 than two helpers; and have not had a 

 prime swarm in the air during the past 

 ten years; and, surely, no extracting- 

 man could do any better or more work; 

 and. with swarming out of the way, I 

 feel sure I could leave my extracting 

 brother behind. With a warehouse filled 

 wiih prepared supers I can give all the 

 room needed for a honey flow, while 

 most extracting men must extract to 

 give more room during a heavy flow; and 

 I kno^ that I can take off more honey 

 in a day than can my extracting brother, 

 but I admit the comb honey must still be 

 cleaned and cased afterwards. 



COMB HONEY PRODUCTION LEAVES THE 



COLONIES IN BETTER CONDITION 



FOR WINTER. 



When the last super is off. my bees are 

 in better winter condition than his, either 

 for indoor or outdoor wintering; and, as 

 a rule, will care for themselves a month 

 later than his the next spring. 



COMB HONEY LIKELY TO BE HIGHER IN PRICE. 



The stampede to extracted honey is 

 something I like to see; for, while our 

 product now brings a better price and 

 quicker sale, the difference will be great- 

 er in the near future, as it should be, 

 because comb honey in the future, as in 

 the past, will be a luxury, and the lux- 

 uries are what bring the most money. 

 I. myself, will sell my comb honey to be 

 used as a luxury, and will buy good 

 extracted honey as an article of food; 

 keeping a few sec.ions for company and 

 Thankgiving dinner. 



1 run my bees for comb honey because 

 I can keep more bees by so doing, as 

 there is something about a colony of bees 

 so run that it is capable of running itself, 

 except during swarming time, and then 



