1890 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



169 



— that is, so far as size and shape were con- 

 cerned. Of course, the brood-combs would 

 have to be made shallow in order that they 

 might answer tolerably for holding the 

 frames small enough for surplus. Accord- 

 ingly he makes all stories of his hive so as 

 to hold a frame only 4i inches deep. This 

 depth was decided upon from the fact that 

 fence-boards (j inches wide were always to 

 be had, of pretty fair lumber, and at a com- 

 paratively low price. The hive is made with 

 beveled joints, to keep out wind ano rain, 

 and to keep them in place, very much as I 

 designed the Simplicity hive originally ; but 

 his hives are (as mentioned) only about half 

 the depth of the regular Simplicities. As 

 he makes the hive square instead of oblong, 

 the shallow frames contain from three to 

 four pounds of comb honey. He has a spe- 

 cial mode of manipulating them so as to 

 get large yields of surplus comb honey, and, 

 also, so as to manage artificial swarming 

 in a very expeditious and certain manner. 

 He winters in the cellar, and prefers only 

 one story for wintering, even with combs 

 only 4i inches deep. Before his explana- 

 tions were given, a good many said he had 

 been copying Ileddon's new hive ; but it 

 transpired, however, that he had been using 

 these hives by the hundreds for many years 

 before Heddon"s patent, and so these charges 

 were withdrawn. Mr. Taylor has been an 

 extensive customer of ours for a good many 

 years. When I asked him why he had nev- 

 er given us a description of his hive for print, 

 he said he had done that very thing, but for 

 some reason or other '' we editors " had de- 

 cided not to publish it. As he is located 

 quite a distance from his railroad station, he 

 does not make hives for sale ; his sole busi- 

 ness is raising honey. 



SPREADING BEOOD. 



FRIEND DOOliITTLE REPLIES TO MRS. HARRISON. 



Well, surely Mrs. Harrison is having' a hard 

 time in picking that old " crow " (see page 93 of 

 Gleanings). It would naturally be supposed that 

 Mrs. H. had lived long enough to know that "tough 

 birds "pick more easily after immersing them in 

 boiling water— water heated by strong arguments, 

 backed up by years of practical experiments along 

 the line under discussion, rather than giving them 

 a bath in the cold water of one failing experiment. 

 No, Mrs. H., you can never got out those wing and 

 tail feathers in that way. The top of my shiny 

 pate shows that the tenderer (feathers) hairs have 

 been pulled out, but I shall protest most furiously 

 against losing the rim of hair left around the out 

 edges, let me assure you. Now, joking aside, I 

 wish to thank my good Sister Harrison for bring- 

 ing up this subject of " spreading brood in the 

 spring," for it gives me a chance of saying a few 

 words on the subject which I have wanted to say 

 for some time, yet I saw no good opportunity for so 

 doing. If in any article that I have ever written I 

 have conveyed the impression that an indiscrimi- 

 nate spreading of the brood would be of value, eith- 

 er to the novice or the expert, I wish to take it all 

 hack, for I never wished to convey any such idea. 

 In some of my articles I have placed the time of 

 commencing to spread the brood at about May Ist. 



This was done with the expectation that each one 

 would use judgment, that judgment to be based up- 

 on his locality, the condition of the bee's, and the ; 

 advancement of the season. For Instance: 



One season, when the first day of May arrived, 

 there was not a particle of brood in any of my hives 

 to spread. For me to have tried to spread the brood 

 at that time would have shown that I was devoid of 

 common sense. Again, in 1878, when the first day 

 of May arrived, all of my hives were filled with 

 brood and bees, some colonies having eggs and lar- 

 vae in the queen-cells preparatory to swarming. To 

 have waited till the first of May before touching the 

 bees, in such an early season as was that of 1878, 

 would have shown that I was not " up and dressed " 

 as I should have been. Once more: All the colo- 

 nies in any apiary can not be treated alike. Take 

 an ordinary year in this locality, the date being 

 May 1st. In the first hive we open, we find a good- 

 ly number of bees, say enough to cover seven 

 combs on a frosty morning. We open the hive and 

 find brood in only five combs. The center comb of 

 the five has brood in it all along the bottom and 

 side bars, as well as at the top. The two on either 

 side of it are two-thirds filled, while the two outer 

 frames have brood in each, to the amount of one- 

 third of a frame full. Now, practical experience, 

 covering a period of 17 years, has proved to me that 

 a gain of two days in bees can be secured by revers- 

 ing those combs of brood, or, in other words, plac- 

 ing the middle combs, or those the fullest of brood, 

 on the outside, and those from the outside, having 

 the least brood in them, in the center. By this plan 

 we have not really spread the brood, but we have 

 placed it in such a shape that we have made an am- 

 ple number of bees desire all the brood which they 

 could care for; and the result is, that in about a 

 week, or the next time we open that hive, we find 

 those five frames all solid with brood— a state of 

 things which would greatly delight any bee-keeper. 

 We now put a comb of honey, having its sealing 

 broken, in the center of these five filled combs of 

 brood, which so stimulates the bees, when remov- 

 ing it, that, should a cold night now occur,— yes, or 

 two or three days of cold weather,— the bees will be 

 so active that the required temperature is kept 

 right up, and a gain of two or three days more is 

 made. So we keep on with this colony till the hive 

 is filled with bees and brood, one week, at least, earli- 

 er than it otherwise would be; and when this week 

 of bees comes at just the right f ime for the honey 

 harvest, they will make all the difterence between 

 a full crop of honey and half a crop, or, in extreme 

 cases or short seasons, no crop at all. Have I not, 

 then, received pay for ray trouble? 



The next hive I come to gives off a light buzzing 

 sound, scattered down between two or three spaces 

 of combs, thus showing that there are but few bees 

 in that hive, for I do not know that I ever opened a 

 very weak colony of bees without hearing this 

 sound. I know that it is weak in bees from this, 

 but am surprised to find that they have brood in 

 three combs: and the wonder Is. that the bees have 

 held that brood as well as they have. Now, should 

 I treat this colony as I did the first, the veriest nov- 

 ice, standing by, would say, " Doolittle, you have 

 lost your reason." This colony has all of the brood 

 crowded together, so that there is only just space 

 enough between the combs for a single tier of bees 

 to stand, similar to the contraction plan as recom- 

 mended by Bro. J. E. Pond, and the bees are shut 



