1910 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



519 



HORIZONTAL, AND VERTICAL WIRING COMPARED. 



Note that the comb at the left, built from horizontally wired foundation, is perfect except for the slight 

 sagging. The comb at the right, built from foundation reinforced with seven vertical wires and two hor- 

 izontal wires, is very irregular. 



AN OBJECT-LESSON IN VERTICAL AND 

 HORIZONTAL WIRING. 



Some Surprises. 



BY B. R. ROOT. 



A short time ago, it will be remembered, 

 we referred to the fact that horizontal wir- 

 ing did not prevent the sag in foundation; 

 that it had been found that the five or six 

 rows of cells next to the top-bar would gen- 

 erally contain honey rather than brood, for 

 the simple reason that cells were stretched 

 too much for the queen to occupy. It is not 

 practicable to wire on the vertical plan with 

 thick top-bars. Various schemes showing 

 up and down wires have been given in these 

 columns, but none of them are really satis- 

 factory. More than once the desirability of 

 having vertical wires incorporated into foun- 

 dation during the i:)rocess of making has 

 been expressed. So much was said that 

 some two or three months ago we perfected 

 a machine by which this could be done. We 

 sent out a few test lots of foundation with 

 vertical wires already incorporated in the 

 wax. We also put quite a quantity of tliis 

 jiroduct in our own home yard. This foun- 

 dation with the wires already in was secur- 

 ed to the top-bar by the wedge-groove plan. 

 One or more horizontal wires in addition 

 served to hold the sheet along the center 

 line of the frame. When the bees began to 

 draw it out there was every promise that 

 the plan was going to be a success. But 

 further developments proved otherwise. 

 For some unaccountable reason the comb 

 from vertically wired foundation was wavy 



as the subjoined illustration will show. In 

 the engraving on the left will be seen an or- 

 dinary horizontally wired frame of founda- 

 tion. On the right will be seen a fair sam- 

 ple of a vertically stayed comb with its hills 

 and valleys. The vertical depressions are 

 directly over the wire. Squint along the 

 row of cells and you will see that the foun- 

 dation in the horizontally wired frame has 

 sagged a little. Nothing of this kind ap- 

 pears in the other. But there is an objec- 

 tionable waviness, as before mentioned. 

 This was, indeed, a great surprise. If this 

 waviness were confined to only one of these 

 vertically wired frames, or even to two or 

 three of them, we should not think very 

 much about it; but nearly every one of these 

 combs having vertical supports shows this 

 very objectionable defect. 



Years ago, when we used vertical wiring 

 exclusively, we saw" no such trouble; but it 

 should be remembered that we were then 

 using a much heavier grade of foundation. 

 The light brood foundation of 20 or 25 years 

 ago had a very thick base, or midrib, as com- 

 pared with the same grade of to-day. While 

 it is true that we could remedy these verti- 

 cal waves by using a heavier grade of foun- 

 dation, we would lose one very important 

 object that we sought to secure by the use 

 of the vertical wires — namely, economy of 

 wax. It would be far more practicable to 

 use a heavier grade of foundation for hori- 

 zontal wiring than with vertical. 



Since our preliminary experiiBents with 

 vertical wiring we have been working out 

 another plan of horizontal wiring which we 

 believe is going to solve the difficulty to a 

 great extent if not entirely. The scheme is 



