296 FIFTY YEARS AMONG THE BEES 



of the upper part of the spring balance, the short end of 

 the lever being supported by a light frame- work that 

 stands on the adjoining hive. When all is properly ad- 

 justed, the long end of the lever is raised, and the weight 

 is read, and then taken down, so that a comb or combs 

 may be added to bring up to the desired weight. If no 

 precaution is taken, the spring balance, when first raised, 

 will slide on the lever down against one's hands or shoul- 

 der. To prevent this a stout string has one end tied to 

 the short end of the lever, and the other end tied to the 

 ring of the balance, so as to keep it within bounds. 



RESERVE COMBS OF HONEY. 



After all I have said about feeding, I am happy to 

 say that since about the time of the coming in of the 20th 

 century very little feeding has been done. ^lost years 

 not a feeder is put on. This is partly due to the increase 

 of fall pasturage, and perhaps in some degree to the fact 

 that the present stock of bees are more provident than 

 they were some years ago. 



In spite of the better fall feed, some colonies in 

 8-frame hives might be short of stores before the white- 

 honey harvest. To meet such cases, combs filled with 

 sealed honey are kept in reserve from the previous fall. 

 These reserve combs are valuable for another purpose. 

 Left to themselves the bees would have very little honey 

 in the hives at the opening of the honey harvest, and all 

 vacancies in the brood-chamber must be filled before 

 honey goes into the supers. Now if we have reserve 

 combs on hand from the previous fall, so as to have the 

 brood-chamber entirely filled with brood and honev ?t 

 the opening of the harvest, then there is nothing left for 

 the bees to do but to tote the first honey up-stairs, instead 

 of waiting for the brood-chamber to be filled. You may 

 ask what is gained by merely swapping last year's honey 

 for honey in the sections. There would be nothing gained 

 if the honey in the reserve combs were white-clover 



