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GLEANINGS IN EEE CULTURE. 



J AX. 15. 



fore. Well, it was Sunday, and I did not feel at 

 liberty to talk bees to you. I expected you 

 would stay over on Monday. My wife took you 

 off to church Sunday evening, and Newell took 

 you to the powder-mills Sunday afternoon, and 

 the train left at 9 a. m., and away you went, so 

 I had but very little time to talk with you. 

 There were very many things I wanted to talk 

 about, and some things I wanted to show you. 

 I expected to take you out to some of our out- 

 yards. We could make three yards in half a 

 day, and talk over bee matters on the road. It 

 costs considerably to get to a place; and when 

 you are there, why not stay long enough to do 

 some good ? 

 Platteville, Wis., Dec. 17. 



[Yes, I am afraid we condemned the sealed 

 covers too hastily ; and without saying any 

 thing about it in print. I decided we would 

 give the matter another test this winter, though 

 perhaps not on quite so large a scale as before. 

 One half of our colonies at the out-yard are un- 

 der sealed covers, and the other half under ab- 

 sorbing cushions. 



I know I appeared to be in a hurry while I 

 was at your place; but the fact is, I hurried at 

 all the places — one reason for this being that f 

 had a good many calls to make, and limit'^'l 

 time; and another reason was, I feared in soni" 

 cases I might be a '"bore;" but since I hav 

 come away and read your last two articles I 

 see that I missed it in not tahing more time. 

 But after all, our general readers would not 

 have gotten the information regarding the 

 methods of management so fully and accurate- 

 ly as from your pen; but at all events, next 

 time I come I will go straight to the France 

 home and stay till you get tired of me; so, look 

 out.— Ed.] 



LARGE VS. SMALL HIVES. 



KKASONS WHY THE TEX FRAME IS BETTER 

 TH.VN THE EIGHT. 



By S. C. Ciiriviii. 



Friend Root: — I conclude,' by reading Mr. 

 Gill's article, which you indorse, that he runs 

 his apiary for extracted honey. It may sound 

 strange,but my expcnMence is that ati eight-frame 

 hive is better for extracted than for com b honey. 

 and for this locality it is not good for either 

 kind. I should like to know whether Mr., Gill 

 ever tried his eight-frame hives four stories. I 

 have; and to lift that fourth story is much 

 harder than lifting a third ten-frame story, be- 

 cause it is a lift at arms' length. My hives are 

 on stands eight inches, and it puts a fourth 

 story above good lifting position. Mr. Gill also 

 says, and it's my experience, that, after filling 

 six or seven frames, they 'prefer to occupy two 

 frames above; and if allowed, they will do so; 

 and, as I said in my former article, it gives us 

 ten or eleven frames of brood, and we are oblig- 

 ed to go into the brood -chamber to get this 

 honey which is in the other five or six frames, 

 or leave it through the season, cutting our brood- 

 nest to the size of a ten-frame hive, or any mat 

 near it. This is about the way eight and ten 



frame hives have worked for me this past sea- 

 son. The ten-frame brood-chamber gave me- 

 about nine frames of brood, with two extract- 

 ing-supers, each having nine frames working 

 the same as for comb honey, raising the partly 

 filled one and placing the empty combs between, 

 the upper and lower stories. This gave me 

 strong colonies with plenty of room, and very 

 little swarming. The eight-frame hives were- 

 run two stories for brood -chamber, and gave- 

 from ten to eleven, and in a few cases as many 

 as twelve, frames of brood. Two stories were 

 run for surplus, each having seven frames,, 

 giving fourteen frames, or four frames less than 

 the ten-frame hive; and as they had more broodi 

 they gave rousing big colonies, but also gave 

 me more swarms. Had I gone below and ex- 

 tracted, the result might have been different; 

 but I do not go into the brood-nest after the 

 surplus season opens. Again, I use the large size 

 Daisy wheelbarrow for running my combs to 

 the extracting-room. It takes two ten-frame 

 bodies crosswise and one lengthwise on top of 

 the two, and hard against the head of the bar- 

 row, putting most of the load near the wheel,, 

 carrying 27 combs at a load. With the eight- 

 frame body I can carry only the same number 

 of bodies holding :.'l extracting-eombs, or a dif- 

 ference of six combs, or more than 3.5 pounds of 

 honey at each load less with eight-frame than, 

 with ten-frame bodies. You will say, carry 

 four eight-frame bodies crosswise. The slant 

 of the wheelbarrow head lets the square-edge 

 body slide forward and push up the frames;, 

 and a bevel edge, not having any thing to hold 

 it, is apt to tip over, and then the two stories- 

 so near the hands makes too much of a load. 



Mr. Gill wants us to do without dummies and 

 one-story in harvest while he tiers up to show 

 us the superiority of the eight-frame hive. 

 Let us take the eight and ten frame, use them 

 to the best of our ability to secui-e large crops,, 

 and I think you will find the ten-frame hive- 

 ahead. This has been my experience, and my 

 order this fall calls for ten- frame Dovetailed 

 hives. 



Sarasota, Fla., Nov. 23. 



[As I read over your article I could not help 

 seeing the point you make; but somehow the 

 thought kept coming into my mind. Would not 

 the 12-frame be better than the ten-frame 'P" 

 That is, the same arguments apply very large- 

 ly in the case of the 12 over the 10 as in the case 

 of the 10 over the 8. But the 12 is away off 

 from the standard. The thought came to me 

 again. Is not the lO-frame hive better than 

 the 12 frame? if so, then the two 8s. rather 

 than one large Ki, should have the prefer- 

 ence, so that we can adapt the colony to the 

 se(iso7i and to the lordlity. Regarding this, in 

 the last Americ(ni ApicnUurist Mr. Henry 

 Alley gets in a good deal of truth something 

 after this fashion:— Ed.] 



How will the big- bee-men settle the question as to 

 whether an eight-frame or a ten-frarae hive gives, 

 the better results ? In Gr.EANiNGS for November 15, 

 two experienced bee keepers give their experience 

 with hives having eiglit and ten frames. One of the- 



