TtiHj BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW. 



285 



to form the union with the wood is only 

 partially heated and will cool too soon to 

 enter the pores of the wood. The aim is to 

 arrange a line of smokiut: hot wax along 

 the section and drop the edge of the found- 

 ation into it. If the line of wax is hot it 

 will melt the foundatiou and join more 

 strongly than the foundation itself could. 

 A full sized sheet treated thus may be kick- 

 ed around the shop, taken out and play 

 ante-over the woodshed aud then the only 

 way will be to take a stick and punch it out. 

 When we are learning there may be a little 

 satisfaction in watching the wax as it cools 

 and tilt the section to note the amount of 

 adhesiveness and set them away carefully. 

 By a hustling type setter as soon as the oper- 

 ation is understood the sections are jerked 

 away and given a flip into a capacious re- 

 ceptacle. It is impossible for any amount 

 of wax, however small, to cool half as soon 

 as the section could be removed and that I 

 may not have to wait is the reason for more 

 than one block. The more adept we became 

 at the work the more blocks are necessary. 



When sections are not immediately placed 

 on the hives or are hauled long distances 

 to out apiaries during varying degrees of 

 temperature and moisture it is necessary to 

 employ the sure and certain method of fast- 

 ening. 



Flobence, Calif. Sept. 1, 1895. 



Numbering Hives— A Fair Criticism. 



W. E. LAMB. 



EDITOR Review : — Your discussion on 

 the subject of records, and numbering 

 hives is quite interesting to me, and moves 

 me to give my views on the subject. As I 

 read your experience, in adopting and sub- 

 sequently abandoning the practice, it occur- 

 red to me that it might be explained in one 

 or more of the following ways:— 1, you may 

 be too busy, and, in a measure, have to let 

 the bees "slide," 2, the Heddon hive and 

 system, which you use, involves less manip- 

 ualation than those in use by the majority 

 of bee-keepers, and, cou3e<iuently, you have 

 less need for records, y. The system of 

 keeping records which you used may have 

 been more laborious than necessary. I 

 merely mention these as possible explana- 

 tions, and it will not be necessary to say any- 

 thing further about them. 



It does not seem to me that the number- 

 ing of our trees and animals is a fair paral- 

 lel ; for the reason that everything we have 

 to do with them is purely external, and 

 everything we can know about their condi- 

 tions is learned from an external standpoint. 

 We can see their needs at any time by sim- 

 ply looking at them ; consequently the labor 

 of writing down anything about them would 

 be wasted, as it is just as easy to look at 

 them as it would be to look at a book. If 

 we had to do principally with the under- 

 ground parts of trees, I think the case would 

 be more nearly parallel. Then, every time 

 we did anything with the m we should have 

 to get out a kit of tools, and spend consider- 

 able time and labor, and, at last, we should 

 do more or less injury to the tree. Under 

 these circumstances, I think we should wel- 

 come a means of knowing something about 

 underground conditions and needs, from 

 above ground. 



You say that records will not tell you 

 which hives need surplus, but when there 

 are already one or more supers on a hive 

 they will tell you when the last one was put 

 on, which, taken together with the strength 

 of the colony and the flow of honey will en- 

 able you to judge pretty well whether another 

 is needed or not. 



One of the principal reasons for using an 

 apiary register, which will apply to a great 

 many, especially farmer bee-keepers, is the 

 fact that we can seldom leave our work in 

 a finished condition. We have just so much 

 time we can spend in the apiary, and when 

 that is up we have to drop our work to be 

 taken up again at another time. We 

 might go through the apiary in regular order 

 and "stick a stake " where we left off, but 

 that would not always do, as some hives will 

 need attending to worse than others, and we 

 want to attend to them first. Then there 

 will be some that, for various reasons, we 

 decide not to attend to at present. I 

 want to distinguish these from those that I 

 have attended, and from those that I have 

 not yet examined. This might all be done 

 by means of stones or something of that 

 sort, but I can make any ordinary record 

 as fast or faster than I could lay stones on 

 the hives, and when there is anything special 

 that I want to remember I can put it down 

 in much less time than would be required 

 to write it on the hive. Besides, if I write 

 it on the hive and it is something that wants 

 attending to at a certain sime, I shall not 



