THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW. 



205 



day. This, in the average basswood harvest, 

 amounts to thirty to forty pounds a day, so 

 that an inexperienced workman may waste 

 twice his wages in this direction. Still there 

 are bee-keepers who seek the cheapest help 

 in the apiary, with little consideration of 

 experience, skill, or knowledge. In early 

 spring, smoking or otherwise making a dis- 

 turbance in the colonies cause discourage- 

 ment and the bees are liable to abscond or 

 ball and kill their (lucens, especially on 

 cloudy days. 



At an other time we may wish to look into 

 the hives to see if they have enough stores, 

 to clip queens or inspect the brood and there 

 are many robbers prowling around. At this 

 time it requires a powerful smoker constant- 

 ly in full blast, so that clouds of smoke are 

 rolling upward all the time. 



Open hives gently, smoke the bees just 

 enough to avoid stings but leave the bees of 

 the colony in possession of the combs so as 

 to have to push them out of the way in 

 grasping the top bars. The bees know or 

 soon see that it is robbers that need their 

 attention rather than the manipulator, and 

 more bees than usual crowd and form in 

 lines in the spaces and on the top bars, and 

 as a robber passes over or attempts to alight 

 several bees will reach for (^r fly after it, so 

 that no robber can get so much as a taste. 

 As the case may be we may wish to put in 

 combs of honey or feed, and first a comb 

 must be taken out. Now as soon as we 

 shake the bees from a comb several robbers 

 hasten to alight and get their heads down 

 into cells. Poke them harshly and they do 

 not back out but sip as fast as they can. 

 With a cold blast we may puff and puff and 

 puff, and they pay no attention, until the 

 nozzle has been stopped, occupying both 

 hands, and the bellows worked an average 

 of thirty-five times ; then they run around 

 and dip into another cell. 



In case of a four inch barrel, hot, direct 

 draft, well fed smoker, four pressures or less 

 on the bellows brings a cloud that no bee 

 can endure ; the comb may be carried in one 

 hand while with the smoker held in the other 

 it may be guarded until it is safely in the 

 comb bucket. At the comb bucket we may 

 find the lid lined with knots of bees trying 

 to get at the combs on the inside ; one such 

 blast changes their mind as they shoot out 

 of the cloud of smoke in all directions so 

 choked as to fall to the ground. Blow a 

 dense cloud inside so if any robber has got- 



ten in, it will be choking for breath instead 

 of handing honey out through the hinges of 

 the lid. On arriving at the honey house 

 there too, are found bunches and lines of 

 bees trying to get in at the door and only for 

 dense clouds of smoke no one could enter 

 without admitting a small swarm of robbers 

 also. 



One load to a robber multiplies their 

 number at least a dozen times so it saves to 

 begin with plenty of smoke and use it under- 

 standingly. Smoke and manipulations in 

 this way, even after robbing has gotten un- 

 der headway, in large apiaries, will cause 

 them to become less and less troublesome 

 until they give up the business. Such a 

 smoker will effectively stand guard over a 

 comb or comb bucket, or if allowed to re- 

 main in the honey house, it will drive rob- 

 bers from the windows and doors. 



A band of robbers learn to detect colonies 

 which have surrendered before the manipula- 

 tor's smoke by the kind of roar the bees set 

 up and are watchful to pounce upon the 

 combs or in at the entrance at such times, 

 and for this reason the sentinels should not 

 be driven from the entrance ; and robbers 

 being always promptly met at the entrance 

 will soon decide that entrances are not 

 successful or customary points to attack. 



My smoker burns any dry, hard or rotten 

 wood or barks, cut to one inch square by 

 four long, the same as a stove and is lighted 

 with shavings whittled with a jack knife 

 from a pine stick. Light the shavings and 

 throw them into the fire box and pile the 

 wood on top of the burning shavings. 

 Large, constant blast, smokers burn lots of 

 wood, but the wood is the easiest kind to 

 get and prepare. This item is very small 

 compared with the trouble robbers may 

 cause, or the time of the user that may be 

 wasted in fussing with weak, half spirited 

 ones. 



I buy of those in the market the one that 

 is nearest right, and alter it to suit my 

 notion. In moving bees on wagons, if a 

 colony becomes unfastened so that the bees^ 

 pour out, a smoker of this description will 

 either drive them back or burn their wings 

 off which is far preferable to a run away ; 

 and I have often stood an efficient guard, 

 with smoker in hand, over teams and men 

 when cultivating land close by the apiary; 

 and teams may be safely driven through the 

 apiary under cover of clouds of smoke. 



Gbeelei, Colo. June 22, 1892. ' 



