101 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Feb. 



will find it a " sovereign remedy." The wire, well 

 heated, is a sort of lamp, giving light by which to 

 find the end of the small tube. This simple device 

 may keep some of your A B C scholars from doing 

 just what I did before I thought of it; viz., taking 

 otr the leather from the bellows to get at the tube 

 to clean it; for 1 fdund the sticky stuff would not 

 yield to the persuasions of any sort of swab or 

 scraper I could get up. W. L. Anderson. 



Ninety Si.x, S. C, Jan. 8, 18S5. 



Thanks, friend A. Our apiarist has just 

 found a smoker, the tube badly clogged up 

 with tliis black tar, and he says although he 

 did get it cleaned out with a hot wire he 

 had to heat the wire three times, and he 

 thinks it took more time than the little wire 

 hook we recently illustrated. We have 

 found no trouble in cleaning any of the 

 tubes with this. 



REVERSIBLE FRAMES AND REVERS- 

 ING DEVICES. 



I 



THE AUSORBING TOPIC i)V THE UAV. 



ROM the number of letters and number 

 of devices that every mail brings, it 

 would seem this is now the principal 

 topic of interest. We will begin Avith 

 the plan adopted by friend Ileddon: 



HEDDOX'S HEVEliSIBI.E KHAME. 



Above we give an illustration of the frame 

 l)referred by friend II., and underneath a de- 

 scription of it, copied from the ^1. 1>. J.: 



1 will give my reasons for preferring the style of 

 frame illustrated, aliove all others that I have yet 

 seen described. At a glance, almost any one can 

 estimate the extra cost of constructing such a 

 frame. I believe this frame to be worth se\eral 

 times more than the extra cost, more tlum tlie com- 

 mon ii()n-i-e\ crsilih' frame for only once reversing 

 lor till' jiurposcs Just mentioned, if for none of the 

 iiil\ aiitiiyes hopeii to be ^•iiiiied in the ways spoken 

 of in the tiist iiaif of this aiticle. 



Again, 1 much prefer this frame to tlie old style, 

 even if I never reversed it at all: 1. I am not 

 tr<)uble<l with sagging to])-bars: and the outer Inir, 

 the one which govei-tis the uniformity of the bee- 

 si)ace, oi- Laiiffstroth shallow air-chamber below the 

 honey-board, iie\ ei' sags. I f the inner top-bar sags, 

 it does little hai'iii, anrl wlien reversed, the sag is 

 thuseoireeted as it straifilitens hack to jilace, and 

 the new top-li:ir ijusl from the l)ottom> will not sag. 

 In revei-sin.-. I eit her shake olf the l.ees or revolve 

 th<' iiHier frame \er\- slowh'. I ncTieralh prefer to 

 shake oil the hulk of the bees, and I have found 

 that on an average 1 sjx'nt live minutes to each hive 

 (counting oix'iiing and elosinji) in pertorminj;' the 

 reversal of all the eight frames. Bits of comb and 

 I)ropolis bother but little, as the sharp corners of 

 the wood pieces shave them away like a pair of 

 shears. 



U. It will be nntieod in that while the toj) and bot- 

 tom bars of this frame form "bei^ spaces ' with the 

 hi\-e the same as other frames, the ends do not, and 

 in Ihisditferenee I lind an improvement. It will al- 

 so be noticed that the short end-pieee is taperinji-, 

 reganliny its thickness. Xow, the wln.le end while 

 in the hive comes, lop ', ot an ineh awa\- from 

 the hive end, the bottom of the short piece '„ of 

 an inch, and all below that, ', of an inch away. 

 This large opening, while it gri'atly facilitates in 

 the rapid and eas.^• withdrawal or insertion of the 

 frame, is in no danger of the bees building combs 



in even so large and handy a space where such 

 space is no hiyhcr up than shown in the illustration. 

 While this frame is of slightly less capacity or 

 surface than the standard Langstroth frame, it has 

 a greater brood capacit.v when reversed, and tits 

 the same hive as the standard. 



The above frame certainly possesses some 

 very marked advantages — cheaply made, 

 strong, quickly reversible, witliout any 

 loose pieces, aiid will be one of tlie nicest 

 frames to handle, so far as lifting it out of 

 the hive is concerned, that has ever been 

 constructed. In fact, our British friends 

 have adopted and used, to a considerable ex- 

 tent, a frame made smaller at the bottom 

 than it is at the tO]), to be set in a hive with 

 sloping ends, just to accomplish what friend 

 II. has with his reversible frame. Now, if 

 we were to build new frames right out, I do 

 not know but that the above management is 

 the best thing we can get ; but if they are to 

 be used in the same hives we have been us- 

 ing, a frame of smaller dimensions must be 

 adopted. We have less space for honey and 

 brood, and our old combs must be either 

 cut down, or thrown away. A good deal of 

 waste space is also occupied right over the 

 brood-nest. In fact. I do not know where 

 friend il. is going with an extra top-bar and 

 honey-board, and two extra bee-spaces. I 

 do not really gather from the description, 

 whether a bse-space is to be left between 

 the two top-bars or not. AVill friend II. tell 

 us in regard to thisV 



OTHEK REVERSIBLE FRAMES. 



l^ast month we spoke of an invention of 

 Mr. Nimslii Nuzum. Well. so many other new 

 things have come up since then, that we will 

 not have an engraving made of it. It is 

 substantially the same as the Howes revers- 

 ible frame.' illustrated and described last 

 season. AVe give the cut again, however, to 

 illustrate reversible frames in general. 



Well, friend Nu/.um"s device was almost 

 exactly like the above, only it was made of 

 one piece of metal, without soldering. AVe 

 found the blanks could be cut out very 

 cheaply: but when it came to folding them 

 we found it a pretty slow process. Tlie Bro- 

 ers frame, mentioned just before we went 

 to press, is also made of one piece of metal i 

 but instead of being hinged as in the cut 

 above on the, //a^ sidi of the end-bar, it has 

 two arms, and is hinged in eacli edge of the 

 above end-bar, making a sort of stirrup ar- 

 rangement, or like a swing, as it were, 

 swinging on Urn pivots. The corner is much 

 like the corner in the cut above. Now, in 

 both or all of tlie above arrangements, a good 

 deal of accuracy is re(iuired, for the support- 

 ing arm must just slip over the corner of the 

 frame. If it should be too long it would 

 look awkward, and fit badly: and if it were 

 too short it would not slip over at all. This 



