L894. 



TEE AMERICAN BEE-KEEPER. 



121 



years after, the extractor was unknown. 

 Working fur comb honey and working 

 for extracted honey, are two different 

 things, and it is a noticeable fact that 

 those who clamor most loudly for large 

 hives are among those who work for 

 extracted honey more largely than 

 for comb. 1 never questioned the 

 advisability of large hives when work- 

 ing for extracted honey ; but after 

 using the standard Gallup hives three 

 seasons exclusively for comb honey 1 

 began to question their practicability 

 for such purpose, and will here tell the 

 readers of the Review how I decided 

 upon the size of the brood chamber 

 which I have been using for nearly 

 twenty years. 



After using the twelve frame Gal- 

 lup hive for two years, while looking 

 over the bees one spring, 1 noticed 

 that nearly every hive had from two 

 to four combs of nice white honey un- 

 used, and 1 kept watch of the matter 

 to see if this honey was turned into 

 brood, and the brood from it became 

 bees in time to do work in the honey 

 harvest, as I considered that such 

 changing of honey into bees had much 

 to do with the yield of comb honey I 

 would secure. A careful watching 

 showed that honey was not converted 

 into brood, but on the contrary more 

 honey was added to it during the sea- 

 son. This careful watching also 

 showed that the average queen would 

 not occupy more than 800 square 

 inches of comb with brood for any 

 length of time ; hence I began to see 

 that my twelve Gallup frames gave 

 me about 650 square inches of comb 

 to be occupied with houey and pollen 

 nearly all the time, as they gave about 

 1 ,450 square inches of comb as a whole. 



I especially noticed this fact, when 

 hiving new swarms on the whole 

 twelve frames, for they would not en- 

 ter the sections to any amount until 

 all the brood frames were full, when 

 I had from 500 to 600 square inches 

 of comb filled with the nicest of white 

 honey, which would be from 2.~> to 30 

 pounds. This honey was just the 

 honey I wanted in the sections, but 

 with these twelve-frame hives I could 

 not get it there, and must sell it as 

 chunk honey, if I sold it at all. 



In talking with a bee-keeper one day 

 on this point he told me that this stor- 

 ing of honey in the brood frames was 

 what he wanted, as it insured the safe 

 wintering of the bees after a poor sea- 

 son, and we far better have some ex- 

 tra honey in the hives than occasinally 

 lose our bees in winter for lack of 

 stores. After he had gone I fell to 

 reasoning and I soon saw that if I held 

 to the twelve frame hives 1 was using, 

 my bees would be wintering on from 

 25 to 30 pounds of the very choicest 

 of honey, which should go into the 

 sections and be turned into cash, and 

 in case of a poor season the bees 

 should be looked after to see if they 

 had honey enough for winter and if 

 not they could be fed sugar syrup to 

 make up the deficiency, said syrup 

 costing less than half what the honey 

 would bring when sold in the market. 

 Again, I found that where the bees 

 commenced storing honey to any 

 amount in the brood nest, and espec- 

 ially is this true with the Italians, 

 that the tendency was for them to keep 

 storing there instead of going into the 

 sections, or boxes as we used and 

 called them then, the result of which 

 was that when fall came I had but 



