1894 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



453 



changes through life the color of her bees, or 

 ever is mated a second time, which is just 

 about one and the same thing. Please let us 

 hear the testimony through this journal. 

 Beeville. Texas. 



[You have brought up a subject that sorely 

 needs ventilation. Our own customers have at 

 times complained that queens we have sent 

 them, at first produced pure Italians and after- 

 ward hybrids. We have always told them that 

 thi'ro was an exchange of queens. But this 

 explanation seldom satisfies, and the customer 

 feels that we either sent a queen in the first 

 place that was not strictly pure, or else one that 

 did not keep pure. Of course, this last is 

 absurd. Yes, we have had customers complain 

 that a select queen sent was nothing but a poor 

 hybrid, when our record showed that the hive 

 from which the queen was taken had pure bees 

 in it at the time of her removal, or until the 

 progeny hatched from the new queen in her 

 place. 



Here is another case where the queen-breeder 

 is unjustly accused: An inexperienced bee- 

 keeper imagines his hive queenless when it is 

 not. He sends for a queen, introduces her (or 

 thinks he does), and in the course of time he 

 finds a queen laying in the hive, and assitmes, 

 of course, that this is the new queen. In the 

 majority of instances, when the queen is already 

 present, the stranger is killed, and the old 

 queen-mother goes right on assuming her ac- 

 customed duties. The purchaser does not notice 

 the exchange, but he does notice that the newly 

 hatched bees are no improvement, and then he 

 accuses his queen-breeder of dishonesty; or, if 

 not that, requires him to send another queen, 

 agreeing to " return the old queen." Now, on 

 the part of the purchaser there is an honest 

 misunderstanding; and on the part of the 

 queen -breeder there is an assurance, as his 

 records show, that he sent just what he agreed 

 to. But to prove it to his customer, he can not; 

 and so, to keep up his record for fair dealing, 

 he sends another valuable queen; or, in effect, 

 sends two queens at the price of one, and the 

 purchaser has the use of only one. — Ed.] 



T SUPER, HEDDON SUPER, AND WIDE FRAME. 



SEPARATOKS VS. NO SEPARATORS. 



By Dr. C. C. Miller. 



The article of Hon. R. L. Taylor, on page 337, 

 with its bloodthirsty footnote, claims my atten- 

 tion. Like him, I have used " the Heddon su- 

 per and the wide frames very largely." I have 

 also used the T supers largely, but, unlike him, 

 I have discarded the first two and retained the 

 T super. 



I have puzzled quite a little, Bro. Taylor, over 

 your statement that there is no trouble in pack- 

 ing sections produced without separators. When 

 the Heddon super first came out, a good deal 

 was said about its being a success without sep- 

 arators, and I was sanguine about them; but I 

 never succeeded in getting satisfactory work, 

 and I supposed I was stating a general truth in 

 that respect. True, I could manage, not with- 

 out trouble, I confess, to pack the sections; but 

 it was a good deal harder to unpack them with- 

 out breaking cells open. If you can succeed in 

 it, I wonder wherein the difference lies. Is 



there any management that will make the bees 

 build straighter without separators for you than 

 they do for me ? 



You are counting that an occasional section 

 will be fastened to a separator, and you seem to 

 count that as so much against the separator. I 

 think that is a mistake. Why is it fastened to 

 the separator? If I mistake not, it is in all 

 cases because the bees have put more honey on 

 one side of the section than the other, thus mak- 

 ing it swing out of plumb and against the sepa- 

 rator. If the separator were not there, would it 

 not bulge out of its place so as to be just as bad 

 as with the separator? There is, however, this 

 difference, that, when the section is cut away 

 from the separator, it will bleed; but I never 

 knew it to bleed much, and the adjacent section 

 is not affected as it is without the separator. 

 Now, unless it be true that in some way the 

 separator C(M{ses some sections to be built out of 

 true — and I never heard that claimed — then I 

 think it is true that all the sections that are out 

 of true with separators would be so without, 

 and in addition there are untrue sections with- 

 out separators that would be true with separa- 

 tors. Allow me to say, however, that I don't 

 have sections fastened to separators nowadays. 

 I use bottom as well as top starters, not for that 

 special purpose, but primarilyjto make sure that 

 the sections shall be well fastened at the bottom. 



Admitting, however, that separators are not a 

 necessity for every one, is it fair to consider that 

 separators are an essential part of the T super? 

 Please take it on its own merits, and compare 

 fairly. Y'ou say the Heddon super can be emp- 

 tied more rapidly than the T super if the time 

 required to get the separators out is considered. 

 In other words, getting the separators out takes 

 time. Well, so can the T super be handled 

 more rapidly without separators. And if you 

 don't need separators with the Heddon, neither 

 do you with the T. 



I don't agree with you, that " it is fair to say 

 that at least twice as much time is requiced to 

 get the sections fixed in the T supers," but there 

 is probably something in knowing how. I don't 

 think we take much more than half as much 

 time now as we did at first. Leave separators 

 out of the count, and I think it will take a very 

 little longer, but I'm not sure It will take any 

 longer to put sections in the T than in the Hed- 

 don super. 



I think you are wrong in claiming that "the 

 Heddon case has the added advantage, that 

 sections filled in them contain considerably more 

 honey, so that less foundation, fewer sections, 

 and fewer shipping-crates, are required.'' In 

 that, you are talking about the difference of 

 separators or no separators, and please remem- 

 ber there's no law to compel you to use separa- 

 tors in T supers. You are right in claiming for 

 supers without separators all the advantages I 

 have quoted, unless it be the matter of founda- 

 tion; for with a comb of honey of a given thick- 



