THE AMERICAN APICULTURIST. 



295 



QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS. 



CKOOKED COMBS. 



Angelica, iV. Y. 



Have not been able to attend to my bees IVii- 

 some time, anit my new swaiins have 

 "buljied" and "crooked" tlieir combs in a ter- 

 rible manner. 



(:Souie of the swarms were hived on founda- 

 tion aiulottiers on "empty frames;" but, as to 

 diU'erence in ettect, it appears to be about 

 "six one waj' and half a dozen the other,' as 

 lor as 1 can see I) 



Have trieil widening, narrowing aijd "trim- 

 iniug" the combs, making things worse every 

 time, if anytiiiiig. So, here I come again to 

 tlie old API, for advice. 



W. M. Baknlfm. 



[Wlien we have bulgy or crooked 

 combs, they are niucle to lill tlie 

 frames by shaving, trimming and 

 more generally by pressing the 

 combs between two boards. Any 

 combs, it matters not liow bulgy 

 and crooked they may be, can be 

 straightened and made to till the 

 frames nicely by the pressing proc- 

 ess. We take such combs and 

 hiy them down on a perfectly flat 

 board and then with a thin knife 

 detach the comb from tlie frames in 

 the bulgy and crooked places ; an- 

 other piece of board is placed on 

 the comb and then we get upon 

 that and thus press the comb into 

 the frame. Cotton twine is then 

 bound around the frame to keep 

 the comb in place. Incase the comb 

 is new and does not rest on the 

 bottom-bar, a piece of wood is 

 placed between the bottom-bar and 

 comb so that the latter will not 

 sag. This operation, of course, 

 must be performed while the comb 

 is warm. 



If the combs are full of brood in 

 all stages, the brood will not be dam- 

 aged in the least by the pressing 

 it will get, provided the boards usetl 

 are larger than the frame so that 

 they will rest on the end pieces of 

 the frame, which should be seven- 

 eighths of an inch thick, or just tlie 

 thickness of the comb used for 

 brood-rearing. 



This process has been practised 

 nearly thirty years in the Bay 

 State apiary, and we find crooked 

 combs can be made as straight as 



a board by this operation. In all 

 cases when we have transferred a 

 colony of bees to frames this press- 

 ing method has been used. 



Combs that are but slightly bulg}' 

 maj- be straightened by pressing 

 the bulgy parts down by using the 

 flat side of a large knife or with a 

 thin board while the combs are 

 warm. The first process given 

 will give perfect satisfaction and 

 the result after one trial will 

 convince all who test it that any 

 one can have combs as straight as 

 desired.] 



FEEDING BEES. DISEASED BEES. 



Hamilton, Ohio. 

 Mr, Alley: 



Dear Sir:— The most of the answers to 

 Query So :^1 given in the 'Ari" recommend 

 early feeding the winter stores. But there is 

 nothing said about the condition of the brooa 

 chamber. We will suppose there is consid- 

 erable brood m the coiul)s, and they are put 

 on six or seven combs. How can they rill the 

 combs with stores? It seems to me liiat tlie 

 combs shoulil be nearly clear of brood, so 

 that they can put their stores in the middle of 

 the brood-chamber where they will cluster 

 in winter. 



Witli regard to that trembling disease, is it 

 a motion of the abdomen back and forth? I 

 thought that was breathing motion. Could 

 you describe tlie symptoms ? 



T. K. 



[The condition of the brood- 

 chamber should not be considered 

 at all when bees must be led. All 

 the cells in the brood-nest do not 

 contain brood, and there is al- 

 ways room in abundance for the 

 storage of food, even in a seven- 

 frame hive. The bees will store 

 the food given them in the empty 

 cells, and as the brood emerges the 

 cells will at once be. utilized for 

 the storage of syrup. You do not 

 seem to realize that one comb the 

 the size of the Langstroth Stand- 

 ard frame will weigh, when full, 

 from seven to ten pounds. Such 

 is the fact ; we have weighed them 

 on many occasions and found them 

 to contain ten pounds of hone3% 

 Of course, such frames are some 

 thicker than they should be for 

 brootl-rearing. You can see by 

 this that there is a large amount of 



