446 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



July 15 



brood is found, the set of combs above, as 

 soon as all the cells contain honey, may be 

 extracted, the queen placed on them, and 

 the position of the bodies reversed and treat- 

 ed as at the start. 



Some time before the close of the honey 

 season, which in this locality is in Septem- 

 ber, I make another general inspection of 

 all my colonies; and if any disease is fovmd 

 I mark the hives. Wheii I finish extract- 

 ing I leave on the hives a sufficient number 

 of clean filled combs to exchange later in 

 the season for any foul-broody ones that I 

 find. I now wait until all brood-rearing is 

 over, which is about Nov. 1, then I remove 

 from each foul-broody colony all the combs 

 and in their places put a new set of clean 

 combs containing a sufficient amount of 

 honey for a winter supply. As there is no 

 brood-rearing going on at this time, this 

 method is very sure. 



WHAT IS TO BE DONE WITH THE DISEASED 

 COMBS? 



The diseased combs may be saved until a 

 good honey-flow, when they may be clean- 

 ed up, filled with honey, and extracted; but 

 unless the owner has a good safe place to 

 keep them, and considers them of much 

 value, I think it is a good practice to extract 

 the honey and render the combs into wax. 



I have been much interested in the arti- 

 cles recently published on plans for getting 

 rid of European foul brood. I have had no 

 experience with this disease, but would sug- 

 gest that the reason why American foul 

 brood appears to be more difficult to handle 

 in this way than European foul brood is 

 that, in the former disease, a much larger 

 per cent of the brood dies after being capped 

 over, and these capi)ed-over cells are not so 

 readily cleaned up as the uncapped cells. 

 However, when the combs are full of honey 

 the bees have made a thorough job of it and 

 the combs are then clean. 



Prophetstown, 111. 



CLEANING OUT BAIT SECTIONS AND EX- 



TRACTING-COMBS AT THE CLOSE OF 



THE YEAR. 



How to Avoid Fighting and Robbing. 



BY G. C. GREINER. 



This is an old subject, discussed and talk- 

 ed about lime and again; but I believe 

 there are some points connected with it 

 that have never been mentioned. 



To prevent the gnawing of combs, one of 

 our prominent writers advises reducing the 

 entrance to a single bee-space. This may 

 have the desired eifect: but in my opinion 

 there is a better way to accomplish the 

 same result, but in an opposite direction. 

 The am^all-entrance plan seems faulty in 

 more than one respect. 



We are told to reduce the entrance to 

 guard against robbing. How can we expect 

 that the same device can be a protection in 

 one place, keeping robbers out, when at the 



same time, only a few steps from it, we 

 make it as inviting as we can to coax rob- 

 bers in? Isn't this a little inconsistent? 



Then the small passage causes a terrible 

 jam. It is a continual crowding and fight- 

 ing to see which will be first, either going 

 in or coming out. The wear and tear of bee- 

 life in trying to get at the tempting sweet is 

 entirely nee(iless. A little different method 

 will prevent all this trouble. 



Again, the reduced entrance greatly de- 

 lays the job. What is the object in prolong- 

 ing the anxiety and efforts when the whole 

 business can be done in less than two hours' 

 time without the least crowding or fighting 

 among the bees? 



Another unpleasant feature in connection 

 with small passages is the excited condition 

 of the bees; they will sting everybody, far 

 and near, if they have to fight to" get at ex- 

 posed honey, and they are all the more ex- 

 citable if this work has been delayed until 

 all natural sources have ceased to yield 

 honey. 



The plan I have followed for years is 

 something like this: When I strip my colo- 

 nies of all their supers at the final ending 

 of the honey season, which is generally dur- 

 ing the fore part of October, these supers are 

 taken, one after another, directly from the 

 hive to the honey-house, and extracted. 

 They are then stacked up as high as I can 

 reach, in rows, on the west side of my bee- 

 yard. All my hives face the east, so that 

 the supers are placed, as you might say, be- 

 hind the bees. Every first or bottom super 

 is set on a hive-stand with the hive-bottom 

 in its proper place; and every entrance so 

 formed (all supers with regular hi^■e-bot- 

 toms are perfect hives) is securely closed, us- 

 ing one of the sawed-out rabbet -strips as an 

 entrance-block. The bait sections are sort- 

 ed out as soon as possible, and stacked in 

 like manner after all capped honey they 

 contain is scratched with an uncapping- 

 comb. 



L>uring the accumulation of supers all bee- 

 stacks are kept ])erfectly tight, and covered. 

 Not a bee is allowed to get a taste until all 

 combs, baits and extracting, are ready for 

 the cleaning. I select the first pleasant 

 warm day; and if there is still a little fall 

 honey coming in, all the better. I wait till 

 about .'5 o'clock; then I open the whole out- 

 fit from top to bottom, except the crack be- 

 tween the two lower supers and the regular 

 hive-entrance at the bottom. This latter I 

 keep closed, for I do not wish to show my 

 bees the way that might lead them into 

 mischief later on. All openings are either 

 at the back or higher up, where they could 

 not find an entrance in a common hive, if 

 they should take a notion to look for trouble. 



The accompanying drawing shows one of 

 the stacks when opened for the bees. It 

 takes only a very few minutes for the jubi- 

 lee to begin. It seems as though all the 

 bees of the yard were summoned by magic 

 to this ^ ery spot. I?ut there is such a large 

 area of accessible honey, and no restriction 

 whatever against entering and partaking of 



