340 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



May 28, 



there will be some improvement on marketing honey some 

 sweet day. 



Labge Hivbs.— I am strongly in favor, and will vote for, 

 the large hive, every time. We usually see the motto in bee- 

 books : " Keep all colonies strong." This is a good motto, 

 and to do this I find it necessary to use good-sized hives. I 

 run mostly for extracted honey, and use 10 frames, 14^ 

 inches square, making the body of the hive 15 inches, in the 

 form of a cube. I practice the Demaree method in securing 

 honey. By this method I can double the amount over the 

 shallow-frame-tiering-up method. I had my extractor changed 

 so that the frames may hang in the comb basket the same as 

 in the hive. I can handle one large frame much quicker than 

 I can two shallow ones. Then it is always annoying to put 

 frames into the extractor lengthwise, as the ends of the top- 

 bar are apt to catch when we handle them rapidly. Colonies 

 in large hives give me hardier and more prolific queens, and 

 longer-lived bees. 



A blacksmith near me has a colony of bees in a salt barrel, 

 and the barrel is full from top to bottom. There is a big 

 crack or opening about an inch wide from top to bottom, and 

 yet a colony has wintered in that shell of a thing for four or 

 five years without any protection. A small colony in a shal- 

 low hive would perish there the first month of winter. 



I have a few colonies in 8-frame Simplicity hives that I 

 run for comb honey. They need a great deal of attention, 

 and must frequently be fed to keep from starving. The mid- 

 dle frames are often found without a drop of honey. 



Even where we use shallow frames the 10-frame hive has 

 this one great advantage: There is usually honey left in 

 every frame — if not above, there will be some at the ends. 

 With plenty of honey in the ends of the frames, the bees are 

 kept more nearly like they would be in a square brood-cham- 

 ber. It is generally believed that bees do not move lengthwise 

 in the winter, but that is a mistake. Bees usually move 

 toward the warmer part of the hive. If the sun shines on 

 one side of the hive in cool or cold weather, how quickly the 

 cluster makes for that side of the hive. I have often had col- 

 onies eat out all the honey in one end of the hive, and leave 

 the other end full. 



I used to go to a neighbor to recruit my weak bees in 8- 

 frame hives in the spring. His were in hives ranging from 

 10 to 14 Langstroth frames. He had powerful colonies, but 

 he thought the bees in hives with more than 11 frames did 

 not do as well as those in the 10 and 11-frame hives. 



I wonder why some factories do not make a 10-frame hive 

 with frames about \0% inches deep, to accommodate those 

 who want large hives for comb honey. Then, either shorten 

 the frames or enlarge the sections, so that four sections will 

 fill out a section-case without a useless amount of wood to fill 

 up vacant space ; or, in other words, the section-case should 

 be the same in length and width as the brood-chamber, doing 

 away with an outer case over the sections. The 4}-4x4Ji sec- 

 tions are not large enough to hold a pound of honey. Usually 

 14 ounces is the minimum weight, yet thousands of them are 

 sold for one-pound sections, and bee-keepers usually speak of 

 them as " one-pound sections." Why not have a one-pound 

 section ? Updegraff, Iowa. 



Working for Comb Honey — Putting on Sections. 



BY G. M. DOOIJTTLE. 



If we have been successful in working our bees for brood, 

 so as to obtain a multitude of bees in the right time for the 

 honey harvest, as I have told should be done, would we secure 

 the best results from them, often repeating this in the columns 

 of the different bee-papers, to emphasize the great importance 

 of this matter, by the time this appears before the readers of 

 the American Bee Journal, spring will have given place to 



summer, and we are ready for the next step in working for 

 comb honey. This will be putting on the section-boxes, or a 

 part of them, for I contend that it is poor policy to give any 

 colony (unless it is in the case of two prime swarms being 

 hived together), all of the surplus room on the start, as such 

 tends to discourage them, as they do not as yet have a sufiS- 

 cient amount of bees to take possession of so large amount of 

 room. 



I generally give surplus room amounting to from 25 to 

 30 pounds at the start, giving as much more room when the 

 bees have fully taken possession of that first given, and finally 

 the full capacity of the hive (about 90 pounds), when the 

 force of bees increases so as to need it. However, as a rule, 

 the swarming season arrives before all of the sections are put 

 on, when no more sections are added until the old colony has 

 a laying queen. 



Always, in managing bees, the apiarist should have an 

 eye on the future as regards his honey harvest, until the har- 

 vest arrives, and when it arrives, then bend his every energy 

 for the time which is present. 



For instance, my main honey harvest comes from bass- 

 wood, which blooms from the 5th to the 25th of July, so all 

 my operations previous to this time must be in reference to 

 this harvest, or all my efforts will result only in failure. Now 

 the time of the bees swarming has a very important bearing 

 on what I secure as cash out of the apiary. If they swarm 

 too early they defeat my plans, and if loo late it is nearly as 

 bad. The thing is to have them all swarm at the right time, 

 which is brought about as nearly as may be, by keeping back 

 the strongest and building up the weakest. This is done by 

 drawing bees and brood from the strong and giving to those 

 which are weaker, until all are brought to a uniform strength 

 •at the desired time of swarming. 



" But," says one, " when is the proper time for increase ?" 

 To which I reply, about 15 to 20 days before the main honey 

 harvest. Why ? Because this gives time for the young 

 queens in the old colonies to become fertilized, and not enough 

 time to the new swarm to get so strong as to desire to swarm 

 again. Remember, I am talking exclusively of producing 

 section honey, for the production of extracted honey requires 

 a somewhat different mode of procedure, in my opinion, and I 

 have extracted as high as 566 pounds from a single colony in 

 one season. Nothing can detract more from our crop of comb 

 honey than to have our bees contract the swarming fever dur- 

 ing the honey harvest, unless it is, the having them so weak 

 at the time that they are of little or no value. 



About the first of June, one year, I was accosted by a 

 neighbor, saying, " Have your bees swarmed yet?" "No," I 

 said, " nor do I expect them to generally for the next two or 

 three weeks." 



" Well," said he, " I guess you won't get much from them, 

 for Mr. S. is haying lots of swarms." 



" All right," said I, " I shall be glad to have Mr. S. secure 

 a good crop of honey." 



Well, the result was, during the height of the honey har- 

 vest Mr. S. was having lots of swarms, which he was putting 

 back, cutting out queen-ctlls, etc., in the vain hope to get 

 them to go to work, while only now and then a swarm was 

 issuing in my apiary, with the sections being filled as if by 

 magic. 



I have often said the securing of the bees in the right 

 time for the honey harvest counts more toward cash and fun 

 in the apiary than anything else, which is true, but next to 

 this is the managing of those bees, so they will be only bent 

 on storing honey during the honey harvest ; for the lack of 

 either gives the apiarist only small return for his labor among 

 the bees. 



After doing all in my power to secure all swarms between 

 the 15th to the 25th of June, if the season is an early one, 



