838 



THF BEE-KEEPERS' REViJ^^, 



The pages are to be ruled in this way for 

 each week of the busy season. At other 

 times, use a page to contain a month's re- 

 cord, dividing it into four columns, one for 

 each week. 



Now, to show how to use the register we 

 will take a few examples, aiming not to 

 choose the most practical examples, but to 

 choose those which, in the least space, will 

 best show how to use the register. 



Suppose that it is Monday, May 18th., or, 

 as we will express it, Monday of the week 

 beginning May 17th., We go into the apiary 

 with the intention of contracting the brood 

 nests of all hives that need it, — in other 

 words, putting in dummies. With the red 

 end of the pencil, we make a character rep- 

 resenting the word, dummy, at the top of 

 the line separating Monday from Sunday. 

 This line serves a double purpose. I regret 

 that I can not give here the system of short- 

 hand which I use. as so much depends on 

 having a good, but simple system of short- 

 hand. As the characters I use, can not bo 

 printed, we will represent nouns by capitals, 

 verbs by small letters, and adjectives by 

 italics. To return to the example, we will 

 now open hive No. 1. put in the dummies, 

 close it, and make the record by drawing a 

 blue line diagonally across the red line hav- 

 ing D at the top, making a sort of x ( not 

 shown here). Now, if we were to write out 

 in full the record made by this simple mark, 

 it would be ;— Monday, of the week begin- 

 ning May 17th., I put dummies in hive No. 1 

 Passing to No. 2, we find that it does not 

 need dummies, so we make the record by 

 drawing a mark as before, but with the jed 

 end of the pencil: In Nos. 3, 4, and 5, we 

 place dummies. When, as in this case, we 

 treat several consecutive hives alike, we do 

 not make the record after closing each one, 

 but wait till we get through and then make 

 all the records at once by drawing a waved 

 line back and forth across the straight line, 

 passing down through the spaces belonging 

 to the hives so treated. This can be done 

 quite quickly by placing the finger where we 

 want to stop, to avoid the liability of going 

 too far. In this respect, it is an advantage 

 to go through the apiary in regular order. 

 In all other respects, it makes no difference 

 how much we skip around ; the unmarked 

 spaces will always show us which hives we 

 have not examined. No. does need con- 

 tracting, and we mark it the same as No. 2. 

 In going through this hive we find queen 



cells in the 4th. frame. We express the fact 

 thus: — Cells in frame 4., which we reduce to 

 C F 4., or C 4,, or simply C, This is written 

 in blue. By looking at the cells, we decide 

 on what day it is best to begin to watch for 

 a swarm. Then, in the space belonging to 

 No. G and in the column belonging to the 

 day of the week we decide on, we write with 

 the red end of the pencil, the letters L. S. 

 ( look for swarm ), or simply S. We will 

 write it here in the column for Tuesday. If 

 a swarm does not come out on Tuesday, nor 

 Wednesday, say, four or five days after, we 

 cross out the S by drawing a red line through 

 it. If a swarm does come out on Tuesday, 

 or a few days after, we cross out the S by a 

 blue line. Then we record the fact by writ- 

 ing s. ( the verb, swarm or swarmed ), in 

 blue in the proper column. 



We will now take an example in the Thurs- 

 day column, supposing that the date at the 

 top of the page is Jun. 20. We want to ex- 

 tract from some hives, and put supers on 

 others, we will write e. ( extract ) in red at 

 the top of the first line dividing Thursday 

 from Wednesday, and S. ( super ) at the top 

 of the second. If we choose, we can make 

 two lines instead of one between all the 

 other days of the week, and three between 

 Wednesday and Thursday. If at any time 

 we need more than these, we can draw an 

 extra line at the time. Hive No. 1 has a 

 super on, and we put on another, and mark 

 the line under S with blue. We do not ex- 

 tract, so we mark the line under e with red. 

 The super that was already on, we find to be 

 three-fourths full which we express thus : 

 Super 1 ^4 full, which we reduce to S 1,% 

 and write it in blue. We will not go any 

 farther with thi^ example. 



Let us now stop to observe the significance 

 of the two colors we use. Notice that all re- 

 cords of things that have actually been done, 

 or that have actually occurred, or of condi- 

 tions that actually exist, are made in blue. 

 All memoranda of things that we contem- 

 plate doing in the future, or that we expect 

 to occur, are in red. Blue is also used to 

 cross our former memoranda, when the 

 thing referred to has been done, or has oc- 

 curred ; and red, when we have decided not 

 to do it, or it has not occurred as we expect- 

 ed. As near as we can exqress it in brief, 

 the significance of red is, not done, not yet 

 done^ not : and of blue, done, or so. All 

 cross marks, whether drawn through a mem- 

 orandum, or through a line running down 



