1889 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CtJLTUfeE. 



735 



THE REESE BEE-ESCAPE. 



AN EXCEEDINGLY IMPORTANT INVENTION. 



TN ray work in the apiary this summer there is 

 vK. n °thing • have used with greater satisfaction 

 W than the Reese bee-escape. This was illustrat- 

 ■*■ ed in G LEANiMis somewhat over a year ago, I 

 believe, but since then 60 little has been said 

 of it that it does not seem to have come into gen- 

 eral use. With me it has proved not only a labor- 

 saver, but has largely done away with one of the 

 most unpleasant operations of the apiary. The 

 usual way of ridding extracting combs of bees is to 

 remove the combs separately, shake the bees off 

 as much as possible, and then brush off those re- 

 maining. 



With many bee-keepers, comb honey is handled 

 in about the same way, except that things are oft- 

 en made worse by handling each section separately. 

 This shaking and brushing bees from the combs 

 is a tedious, wearisome, dauby, and exasperating 

 task. The nice comb honey is uncapped by the 

 bees while the operation is going on; irritated 

 bees take revenge on the operator, and often rob- 

 bing is the natural result of the exposure of honey. 

 All supers, whether for comb or extracted honey, 

 should be of such construction and size as to be 

 readily handled as a whole. Any form of super that 

 must be taken to pieces to remove the honey from 

 the hive is defective. With properly constructed 

 supers the removal of honey by means of the bee- 

 escape is an easy matter. The finished super is re- 

 moved, a bee-escape placed on the hive, and the su- 

 per and cover replaced, alarming the bees scarcely 

 at all, requiring the use of but little smoke, and al- 

 lowing almost no chance for robbers. In a short 

 time the bees will have quietly passed below, and 

 the honey may be removed. Usually I put the bee- 

 escapes on in the forenoon, and remove the honey 

 late in the afternoon, or put them on in the eve- 

 ning, and leave them over night. Very often less 

 time will answer, but usually it is well to allow six 

 or eight hours for the bees to get out. When suf- 

 ficient time can be allowed they are just the thing 

 for an out-apiary. 



I use single cones, making them two inches in di- 

 ameter, and the same in depth. A form for mak- 

 ing them is easily made from wood. Sometimes 

 the bees cluster on the cones in such numbers that 

 some find their way back; but this does not often 

 happen. To prevent the possibility of leaving the 

 escape on so long that combs will be built in it, it 

 should be painted some color strongly contrasting 

 with that of the hive. 



Those who use hives with a double brood-cham- 

 ber can use the bee-escape to very good advantage 

 in preparing their bees for winter. Wait until all 

 brood has hatched, then remove the lower story, 

 and run the bees out of it through a bee-escape. 

 The upper story contains most of the honey, the 

 lower story nearly all of the pollen, and your bees 

 are thus contracted for winter in the best possible 

 shape, and without handling a frame, and with 

 very little contact with the bees at a season when 

 manipulation is particularly difficult. 



Dayton, III., Aug. 27, 1889. J. A. Green. 



You certainly have succeeded in making 

 the bee-escape a great labor-saving imple- 

 ment ; and as I read over what you have to 

 say, I felt ashamed to think that this had 

 not been brought out so prominently before. 



As an illustration : In our experiments 

 with the house-apiary we came to a point 

 where we decided that, if some method be- 

 sides shaking and brushing could be devis- 

 ed to get the bees off the combs and sec- 

 tions, it would be a success. But we decid- 

 ed then that it could not be done ; and un- 

 less you have tested the matter thoroughly, 

 I am inclined to think that the bees will, 

 many times, stick to their combs day after 

 day (especially if the combs contain a little 

 brood ). The only way in which we succeeded 

 in getting them to leave entirely has been 

 to wait for cool weather, and sometimes 

 even then they would stick to the supers 

 until they became too stiff to move. Your 

 idea of having the escape painted some dif- 

 ferent color from the body of the hive is a 

 bright thought. A great many times, very 

 annoying omissions can be prevented by 

 simply having tools or implements painted 

 with contrasting colors. You know we 

 have our covers for sap-pails red on one side 

 and white on the other, so as to tell when a 

 pail has been filled. You will remember 

 that I mentioned that Dr. Miller piled his 

 honey up in tall piles, in order to get most 

 of the bees to leave of their own accord be- 

 fore he came to finally getting them out. 



AMONG THE BEE-KEEPERS OP VER- 

 MONT. 



POINTS OF THE JOURNEY SUMMED UP. 



TTp FTER a Sunday in Rutland, spent both plea- 

 gMgi, santly and profitably, we went to Bradford, 



jR» where lives Mr. Hilos Davis, a bee-keeper 

 ■*^ and hive manufacturer. This place is east 

 of the picturesque Green Mountains, be- 

 tween White River Junction and Wells River, 

 and near the New Hampshire and Vermont line. 

 The location is not equal to the region across 

 the mountain, for honey production. As Mr. Davis 

 was obliged to leave his business on account of 

 failing health, he came here in 1878, and began bee- 

 keeping. He commenced in the spring, with 278 

 colonies, and then had 310 in three yards three or 

 four miles apart. In the home yard, situated on 

 quite a steep hillside, were 96 colonies. These are 

 cared for by a young lady member of his lamily. 

 Miss l.ucy Crehose, who is enthusiastic in the work. 

 At the factory, three miles away, where Mr. Davis 

 owns a nice little water-power, are 150 colonies 

 which he looks after. Mr. Davis was a designer 

 and inventor, and was with one firm in North An- 

 dover, Mass., in this capacity ten years. His facto- 

 ry here was burned a few years ago, and he lost not 

 only much stock and valuable machinery, but a 

 large number of the finest tools which can not be 

 replaced, having been made and collected during 

 his former occupation. The present factory is well 

 fitted with improved machinery, adapted to making 

 hives, sections, crates, etc. He is a skilled work- 

 man in wood as well as iron, and the goods turned 

 out are well and accurately made. He has made a 

 number of different hives, and experimented on 

 and invented various fixtures. His present hive is 

 very ingenious, with many good points; but in our 

 opinion it has so many complicated and accurately 

 fitted parts that the labor required to manipulate it 

 would be a great objection in a large apiary. He 



