1920 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



191 



by the beekeeper instead of the for- 

 mer "fortuitous conjunction of con- 

 ditions." 



Fortunately, the experiment in the 

 repeated reduction in the size of the 

 brood-chamber was not conducted 

 without a check. Some beekeepers 

 produced extracted honey throughout 

 the comb-honey era, retaining the 

 original brood-chamber capacity. The 

 most prominent among the defenders 

 of the large hive was Charles Dadant. 

 In the early days of the movable 

 comb hive he had adopted the Quinby 

 hanging frame, but instead of using 

 eight frames, as advised by Quinby, 

 he built his hives to hold eleven 

 frames. In 1874 he wrote : "For six 

 or seven years I have tested the lay- 

 ing ability of my Italian queens. For 

 this purpose all my hives destined to 

 produce honey have been made with 

 a capacity for eleven Quinby frames, 

 or, if American, sixteen. * * * • 

 By the first of June three of my 

 Quinby hives had between seventy 

 and seventy-five thousand cells con- 

 taining brood, while the best of my 

 Americans had about ten thousand 

 cells of brood less. Yet both kinds 

 had equally young and prolific queens, 

 the same pasture and the same care." 

 —(Gleanings in Bee Culture, Vol. 2, p. 

 29). This amount of brood, as combs 

 are ordinarily filled, would be twelve 

 to fifteen Langstroth frames. 



The Dadants, being producers of 

 extracted honey, have continued the 

 use of this hive. They fought con- 

 sistently against the reduction in the 

 size of the brood-chamber, which was 

 brought about during the comb-honey 

 era. From 188S to 1899 the discus- 

 sion of large vs. small hives con- 

 tinued, in which Charles Dadant and 

 C. P. Dadant defended the large hives 

 in opposition to the comb-honey pro- 

 ducers. In 1895 A. N. Draper pro- 

 posed a modification of the Dadant- 

 Quinby hive, which is now known as 

 the Jumbo hive. About this time E. 

 R. Root was advocating the use of 

 the two-story, eight-frame hive, since 

 the eight-frame was then standard. 

 As a result of all this discussion there 

 began a tendency toward increasing 

 the size of the brood-chamber. 



During the comb-honey era many 



improvements were made in hives 

 and frames, practically all of which 

 were comb-honey requirements. The 

 thick top bars, self-spacing devices, 

 as well as many other improvements, 

 were designed especially for the 

 coml)-honey hive. Furthermore, a 

 standardization of hives and frames 

 used in this country was practically 

 accomplished during this era. 



The Second Extracted Honey Era 

 The Federal Pure Food Law was 

 passed June 30, 1906, ushering in a 

 new era in beekeeping. We are now 

 in the early morning of the second 

 era of extracted honey production 

 which promises to be the brightest of 

 the eras in American beekeeping. It 

 is no longer necessary to sell with the 

 honey the combs in which it was 

 stored in order to convince the con- 

 sumer of its purity, since, under the 

 Federal pure food law and the pure 

 food laws of the various States, this 

 is now done by means of a label. Ex- 

 tracted honey production has in- 

 creased by leaps and bounds since the 

 passage of this law. 



The new era of extracted honey 

 production began after the beehive 

 had been standardized and we have 

 plunged into the midst of ex- 

 tracted honey production, using a 

 hive designed for comb-honey pro- 

 duction. In closing it may be well to 

 mention at least one of the difficul- 

 ties involved in using a comb-honey 

 hive for extracted honey production. 

 The ten-frame Langstroth brood- 

 chamber is now admitted to be too 

 small for the complete development 

 of the colony previous to the honey 

 flow; therefore, two brood-chambers 

 must be used for brood-rearing at 

 this time. If the second brood-cham- 

 ber is given on top the queen usually 

 goes into it, but often fails to go 

 down! again, thus abandoning the 

 lower brood-chamber, the combs of 

 which are partially filled with pollen 

 as the brood emerges. When the sec- 

 ond story is filled with brood and 

 honey the queen may go into the next 

 super above, abandoning bo'th the 

 first and second stories. In other 

 words, no matter how many hive- 

 bodies are used, the queen is often 

 partially confined to but one of them 



The eight-frame Langstroth hive and Dadant hive compared 



at a time, with a tendency to go up- 

 ward into the supers, abandoning in 

 turn each brood-chamber, if the 

 queen excluder is not used. If in 

 building up previous to the honey- 

 flow a second hive body is placed 

 below, the queen often fails to go 

 down, and she may become suffi- 

 ciently crowded for further brood- 

 rearing room that a tendency to 

 swarm is developed in the colony be- 

 fore the queen finds the combs below. 

 With the horizontal wiring of the 

 frames it is difficult to overcome the 

 stretching of the cells just below the 

 top bar of the frame unless all of 

 these cells are used for brood-rearing 

 the first year, thus reinforcing the 

 wa.x cells by means of the cocoons. 

 When there is one or two inches of 

 comb adjacent to the top bar that is 

 unfit for brood-rearing on account of 

 misshapen cells, we are asking too 

 much of the queen if we expect her 

 to pass freely both up and down, past 

 spaces and sticks and finally across 

 the imperfect comb to find cells in 

 which to deposit eggs. 



This trouble may be overcome to 

 a large extent by carefully sorting 

 the combs, using in the brood-cham- 

 ber only those which are strength- 

 ened hy cocoons to the top bar. In- 

 verting the frames, the first year they 

 are used, results in a reinforcement of 

 the upper portion of the comb if 

 brood is reared in them to the top 

 bar, which is at the bottom when the 

 frame is inverted. Some better meth- 

 od of wiring the frames may be de- 

 veloped by which sagging of combs 

 may be overcome. Dr. Miller sup- 

 ports the foundation in his frames by 

 means of wooden splints to overcome 

 the tendency of the combs to sag. 

 He also secures combs built down to 

 the bottom bar by using wider foun- 

 dation, which extends down' between 

 the two halves of a split bottom bar. 

 He thus eliminates the barrier formed 

 by the usual space between the comb 

 and the bottom bar of the frame as 

 well as the barrier formed by mis- 

 shapen cells in the upper portion of 

 the comb. He reports that his queens 

 pass readily from one hive-body to 

 another. 



If the same sized frame is to be 

 used for both the brood-chamber and 

 extracting supers, the Langstroth 

 depth is probably a fair compromise. 

 Extracting combs deeper than the 

 Langstroth would be objectionable in 

 supering and in extracting, and brood 

 combs shallower than the Langstroth 

 would be objectionable from the 

 standpoint of brood-rearing. Unless 

 something can be done to overcome 

 the tendency of combs to sag, as they 

 usually do with horizontal wiring, 

 l)eekeepers may again return to the 

 deeper frame for the brood-chamber 

 and use a brood-chamber large 

 enough that a single story is suffi- 

 cient, since in such hives the barrier 

 formed by misshapen cells in the up- 

 per portion of the comb does not limit 

 the activity of the queen, but may be 

 utilized to the advantage of the bee- 

 keeper as an obstruction to check the 

 tcndcnc}' of the queen to enter the 

 supers. 



Washington, D. C. 



