302 



THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW 



bee to drink. If some fool bee-keeper 

 would get through the white clover 

 season, say, in central Illinois, about 

 July 10th, and then ship his bees here 

 for a six-weeks-flow of clear clover, 

 then ship back for winter, he would 

 roll up a lot of honey. 



SELLING HONEY TOO CHEAP AT RETAIL. 



But I seized the quill to rake over 

 the articles in the bee journals, and 

 will begin with Gen. Manager France — 

 14,000 lbs. into 3,000 poor victims. 

 Pretty good average. Eh? But — well; 

 that's all right, onlySc in "store pay" 

 delivered in 2-lb. and 3-lb. pails, and 

 ten off for cash, when wholesale 

 quotations are 7c, hardly leaves mar- 

 gin enough for the trouble — or that's 

 the way it looks to the undersigned. 



THE ADVANTAGE OF LARGE EXTRACT- 

 ORS. 



The next article is good: Town- 

 send's expeditious extracting, only he 

 won't break Harry Howe's record in 

 many a long day, with his little toy 

 extractor. He must turn the handle 

 just as many times for two combs, as 

 for four, and even a four-frame 

 machine is ancient histor}'^ with "we- 

 uns. " Miles Morton built an eight- 

 frame extractor, which is just a delight 

 to use. Only have to turn one-fourth 

 as many turns to the handle, stops 

 with a brake, and starts by a push on 

 the reel with the left hand, instead of 

 a big tug at the handle. 



GETTING BEES OFF THE COMBS. 



Another wrinkle, which I never have 

 seen mentioned in the Journals, was 

 our method of getting bees off the 

 combs. We laid a tin cover (which 

 was a flat cover with tin roof and inch 

 cleats) on the ground beside the hive, 

 bottom upwards, that is, cleats on top, 

 laid a Porter bee escape (inserted in a 

 board^the size of the hive) on the cover, 

 and set the super of bees and honey 

 on'that"outfit,jputting a set of empty 

 combs onUhe hive in place of super 

 just removed. This was done to all 



the colonies to be attended to that day, 

 done the first thing upon arriving at 

 the yard, and by the time the last col- 

 ony was fixed that way, the first 

 one was partly emptied of bees; and 

 what remained were badlj' demoralized 

 and ready to be shook, without ob- 

 iecting, and in a short time each super 

 would be practically clear of bees. 



Of course this took extra escape- 

 boards, covers, and empty combs, but 

 good tools, and plenty of them, makes 

 easy and rapid work. One beauty of 

 this system is, the bees don't get cross, 

 as they do with the brush-broom, bift", 

 bang way. 



The next noticeable article is your 

 "expert advice" department. Say, 

 W.Z., do you remember "Puck s" 

 advice to those about to be marrried? 

 It was "Don't." 



ADVANTAGE OF PLAIN SECTIONS. 



But, talking along this line, did you 

 notice August Bartz's advice to comb 

 honey producers generally, in Amer- 

 ican Bee Journal, page 454. I met 

 Bartz while buying honey in 1902. He 

 gave me that idea of a "layer of bees" 

 on top of the sections, in place of "air" 

 as Dr. Miller says, as a good thing to 

 get sections finished. You may re- 

 member I put that into the question 

 box at the Cliicago Northwestern con- 

 vention, but no one agreed with Bartz, 

 if I remember correctly. But what do 

 you think of the "roast" he gives to 

 tall sections and fence-separators; and 

 the praise for "squares," 1 15-16 inch 

 thick. We used to call them "Stuffed 

 Prophets," iv\-\(\. dread them, for they 

 were the last ones to go in my stock — 

 always. Finally, I selected a special 

 town to inflict with that kind only, and 

 showed no other samples — it was my 

 only way to get shut of 'em. 



Then to use separators without 

 "posts!" — great Scott! in this day and 

 age of the bee-keeping world, after the 

 hammering Muth gave that heavy sec- 

 tion fad, at the convention. And Bartz 



