COMB HOXEY. 437 



less, owing to the time occupied iii transportiug the honey, 

 but it is all placed in the surplus apartment at the mercy of 

 their owner. 



A much safer method to induce the bees to work in the 

 supers, is to place in them, nearest the brood, a few imfinished 

 sections from the previous season. This is what Dr. C. C. 

 Miller calls a "bait." These unfinished sections have been 

 emptied of their honey by the extractor,, and cleaned by the 

 bees the previous Fall. The supers should be located as near 

 the brood apartment as possible, with as much direct com- 

 munication as can be conveniently given. 



729. But, with the greatest skill, it is impossible to attract 

 the bees into the supers, as long as there are empty combs in 

 the brood-chamber. 



If the queen is unable to occupy all the combs with brood, 

 the empty ones should be removed at the beginning of the honey 

 harvest, and either given to swarms or divided colonies, or 

 placed outside of the division board (34^9). This is called 

 ''contraction." We would warn our readers against excessive 

 contraction, for, after the honey season is over, a hive which 

 has been contracted to, say, two-thirds, of its capacity, has 

 become dwarfed in honey, brood, and bees, and will run some 

 risks through the Winter. Besides, that part of the super, 

 which is above the empty space, is but rehictantly occupied bj' 

 bees. 



**If the reader has ever constructed a hive, whose surplus 

 department was wider than the brood chamber, jutting out over 

 the same, he has noticed the partial neglect paid by the bees, to 

 the surplus toxes which rested over wood instead of combs. 



' ' Now this same difference made by the bees, between wood 

 and comb, they will also make between combs of honey and 

 combs of brood, and with our 8-frame Langstroth hive, we 

 notice far less neglect of the side surplus combs than we noticed 

 when using the 10-frame hives. This is one objection to the 

 method of contracting by replacing the side combs of brood 

 chambers with fillers or dummies." — J. Heddon "Success in 

 Bee-Culture. ' ' 



