JULY 1, 1915 



529 



CONVEMSATIONS WITH DOOLITTLE 



Alt Borodino, New York. 



~ ANORKING FOn KXTRACTEn HONEY. 



M^*'- *'You are telling us all the time 



'^H^i how to work for section honey. 

 ^^B| Can't you tell us something about 

 ^HH tlie best way of working for ex- 

 ^^Bl 1 1 acted honey?" 



In the late seventies and early 

 eiglities I i>rodueed much extracted honey, 

 selling it for 15 to 20 cts. per pound to my 

 neighbors, and I considered it profitable ; 

 but when the price went down, from various 

 reasons, to 7 to 9 cents I concluded that 

 section honey was more profitable. As to 

 mj- way of working in those years, I find in 

 an old diary some notes which I jotted 

 down, gi\ing the best way of working to 

 secure a good yield, or one-third more 

 pounds than I could of section honey from 

 colonies of approximately the same strength. 

 I liave never fully carried out these plans, 

 but I believe them worth trying. 



A\ the beginning of fruit-bloom examine 

 all colonies. From those that have brood 

 in from seven to eight frames, and as many 

 spaces well filled with bees, take one frame 

 of brood from the brood-nest, selecting the 

 one containing the most nearly maturing 

 brood. Shake tlie bees off in front of the 

 hi\e. and put a frame containing all work- 

 er-comb in the middle of the brood-nest, in 

 place of the comb of brood taken out. Now 

 put on a queen-excluding honey-board, leav- 

 ing it on till the close of the season. The 

 reason for taking this frame of brood from 

 the brood-nest is that I find the queen will 

 lay much faster in the middle of the brood- 

 xieM at this time of the year than she will in 

 the outside combs. This being the case, 

 right in the middle of the brood-nest is 

 where we want the queen doing her work. 

 What is wanted at this time of the year, or 

 up to 30 days before our main honey-flow 

 cnrnes. is all the brood and young bees we 

 can get. The frame of brood removed is 

 put in an extracting-super directly over the 

 brood-nest, and the super filled on each side 

 with empty combs, or those having only a 

 little honey in them. The bees go right to 

 work in this up])er story. If the weather is 

 warm, and a little honey is coming in, I 

 can, in a week or so, take another frame of 

 brood from this same colony. This is put 

 in the extracting-super beside the first comb 

 of brood, taking out a comb that was beside 

 the first frame of brood to give it place. As 

 the bee? have cleaned the combs next to the 

 frame of brood first put in. and put a little 

 new honey in them, such combs are just 



right to r)ut in the brood-nest in place of 

 the brood removed. 



Just a word of caution, especially to be- 

 ginners : Be a little careful not to take too 

 much brood early in the season from the 

 brood-nest lest the queen and bees become 

 discouraged. Our object is to stimulate the 

 queen to lay to her fullest capacity. 



In another Aveek, take another frame 

 from the brood-nest and exchange it for 

 another of the cleaned combs from the 

 sujier. Five days later take still another 

 frame of brood from the brood-nest, but 

 this time put it in another super and set it 

 under the first, or over the brood-nest, de- 

 stroying any queen-cells that may have been 

 started in the first super given. This sys- 

 tem of management is to be followed just 

 as long as the bees emerging from the extra 

 brood gained will be of profit to me work- 

 ing on the clover and basswood bloom. 

 There is a certain time during the life of a 

 colony, each season, when we can build it 

 up faster than at any other time during the 

 season, and that the bees from such build- 

 ing-up will be of double the profit to us 

 that the.y would at any other time. With a 

 ten-frame Langstroth hive worked in this 

 way the brood in the brood-chamber and 

 that in the supers may amount to 14 full 

 frames, which, barring accidents, will put 

 75,000 field workers on the stage of action 

 just as the flow of nectar from basswood 

 bloom reaches its height. In 1877 such a 

 colony gave me 22 lbs. of extracted honey 

 for three consecutive days, and the result of 

 the season from that colony was 566 lbs., 

 enough remaining in the hive for successful 

 wintering. Some colonies worked in this 

 way gave one-third better results than did 

 other colonies of equal strength that were 

 allowed to take their own course. If I 

 wished to run two or three colonies for 

 comb honey, 15 or 20 days before the end 

 of the honey harvest I took two or three of 

 these large colonies and removed the two or 

 three extracting-supers, and in their places 

 put on three section supers. The bees will 

 fill three about as soon as they will one. In 

 less than an hour these section supers will 

 be filled with bees and they go right to work. 

 In this way I could take nearly as much 

 section honey (even though late in the sea- 

 son') as [ could if the colony had been 

 v.'orked for section honey from the begin- 

 ning o\' the honey-flow fi'om clover. The 

 sections nie so nic-ly filled that nearly all 

 of them will chiss as fancy. 



