1909 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



565 



just as successful as Mr. Bartlett, use chaff 

 for packing material. I am convinced, there- 

 fore, that there is not much difference in 

 results whether wheat, oat, or clover chaff, 

 or planer-shavings and sawdust are used. 

 At one time, I myself wintered 300 colonies 

 in chaff-packed hives and winter-cases. At 

 that time I prepared the hives for winter as 

 early in October as convenient, and they 

 were left with the winter protection until 

 about the 20th of May, or until the freezing 

 nights were over. Some of the very light- 

 est colonies were left until June. 

 Mr. Bartlett says further: 



For a pood many years after I betran keepinfr bees I 

 wintered nearly every colony that was in any shape to 

 winter, and averatred 100 lbs. per colony. I attribute a 

 irreat deal to the fact that I wintered my bees at home, 

 where I could give them close attention all the time. 

 I banked snow over them when it was very cold, and 

 contracted the entrances in the sprintr and fall as the 

 bees required. 



I made 45 new cases last fall that are slitrhtly differ- 

 ent from those shown in the illustrations. They have 

 flat roofs, 50x58 inches. Furthermore I did not put 

 on the vestibules, as on the old ones; for when the 

 bees are shut in, if there happens to be a very warm 

 day in the early spring when I am away, the bees 

 come out throutrti the cracks in the vestibule and are 

 not able to eet back into the hive. I lost quite heavily 

 from several colonies, and one year I lost some bees 

 from nearly every colony in one apiary on this ac- 

 count. 



This is another instance where the system 

 needs modifying if the bees are kept in out- 

 yards where they can not be watched from 

 time to time. Closing the entrance in win- 

 ter may do at a home yard, but it will not do 

 for colonies at outyards. 



Remus, Mich. 



REMOVING HONEY FROM HIVES. 



Extracting at the End of the Season; How 

 to Use the Bee-escapes and Still Extract 

 While the Honey is Warm; Getting 

 Ahead of Robbers. 



BY F. GREINER. 



The harvesting of honey after the close of 

 the honey season used to be considered as 

 being accompanied by some unpleasant fea- 

 tures, particularly so in the outyards, where 

 the honey had to be loaded on the wagon. 

 We used to wait until the bees had ceased 

 ilying in the evening before loading; but 

 after some years of experience we have 

 learned to do the work with celerity, and 

 little annoyance of the bees, and get our 

 load home in time to do the extracting be- 

 fore the honey becomes cold, even with the 

 fifteen-mile drive thrown in. The secret is 

 bee-escapes. 



I have no buildings at my out-yards, and I 

 bring the full supers home from the extract- 

 ing-yard for extracting. This may not be 

 profitable; and if I contmue raising extract- 

 ed honey I shall build a house or workshop 

 there soon, and do the extracting as I take 

 the honey from the bees. I would need 

 lower sets of extracting combs. I really do 

 not fall in love with the practice of leaving 

 the extracting till the ena of the season; but 

 at present I am doing this; and when the 



time comes to take the honey I manage as 

 follows: I aim to get an early stai-t; and if I 

 can be on the spot by 7 o'clock A. M., all the 

 better. I remove the filled half-story ex- 

 tracting-supers from the hives as quickly as 

 possible, drive and shake out the bees — not 

 all, of course, but a large majority. As I use 

 queen-excluders on all my extracting-hives 

 there is no danger of getting queens, even 

 if a few bees are left in the honey; so we 

 need not be so very particular. We stack 

 up the removed supers on escape-boards, 

 and cover in the same way; and this is the 

 way I use the escapes here — not at all on the 

 hives. The escape which I prefer for this 

 use on a stack of eight or ten supers is Dib- 

 bern's four-point star escape, with a slight 

 alteration ot my own to make it safer. Of 

 course, we are all aware that no cone escape 

 absolutely prevents bees from returning to 

 the honey. They find their way back 

 through the cone and labyrinth escapes to 

 some extent, and I want to prevent this. 

 Why do I not use the safer Porter? It does 

 not let in light, and the bees do not work out 

 as rapidly as they do with the other style. 

 To make sure that no bees find their way 

 back into the honey I cover each escape on 

 top of the stacks with a wire screen, such as 

 I use to place on hives when moving bees 

 instead of the wooden cover or honey-board. 

 These screen-boards I lift off from time to 

 time, as I am passing, which allows all the 

 bees confined between them and the escapes 

 to go to their hives. In about two hours or 

 a little more I can take off 42 or 44 supers 

 and have them ready for loading. This num- 

 ber makes a fair load for one horse. The 

 man having two horses would, of course, 

 want double the number of supers for his 

 load. In order not to consume any more 

 time in getting that many off and ready, and 

 do the extracting the same day, he should 

 have an assistant at both ends of the route. 

 The full-depth frame for extracting is all out 

 of question for me under these conditions. 

 I do not think that any man is strong enough 

 to handle full-story supers when filled. I 

 know it is hard work to handle even my 

 half-story supers, shake out the bees, load 

 them on to the wagon, etc. The loading 

 consumes about fifteen or twenty minutes 

 of time. My nine-year-old boy Harold was 

 with me on a few of these trips, and I found 

 he could be of considerable help in keeping 

 the supers all the time covered with escapes 

 while I was doing the loading. 



I have racks to nold supers, ten each; they 

 have a bee-tight bottom; and when the su- 

 pers are placed therein, and covered with 

 an escape upon each stack of five, I need not 

 feel uneasy as to the robbers getting in their 

 work. In fact, they have not had much of a 

 chance from the time we commenced till the 

 load is all ready on the wagon, and the whole 

 yard has remained rather quiet. No colo- 

 nies have become greatly excited. 



Before I go after the team I cover the rig 

 with a canvas; and if the ground is sloping 

 away from the bee-yard I may run the wag- 

 on a few rods away under some trees, if 



