1900 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



623 



cell-walls will still produce a comb with heavy cell- 

 walls 



8. Very high cell-walls in foundation are not cut 

 down to the thinness of ceL-walls in natural comb. 



((. The thin and extra thin and the " 1899 " dec-p cell 

 foundations produce a comb that appioxiniaies very 

 closely the lightness of that which is naturally made 

 by the bees. 



10. When heavy foundations are used, the extra 

 weight of the comb built upon them is due more to 

 the extra weight of the cell-walls than to the heavier 

 midrib. 



11. When very light foundations are used, the some- 

 ■what heavier comb is due almost entirely to the mid- 

 rib being heavier than that of natural comb. 



12 When foundations containing an abundance of 

 wax to build the entire comb are used, the bees still 

 add much more wax, sometimes nearly enough to 

 build the comb without the help of the wax in the 

 foundation. 



13. Wax seems to be given with the best economy 

 when the midrib of the foundation is of the thickness 

 of the midrib of natural comb, and when there is a 

 small, or at most a moderate, amount of wax in the 

 cell-walls. 



14. Poorly attached combs in sections seem to be 

 more the result of weak colonies and poor honey-fJow 

 than to the kind of starter that is used ; though large 

 starters and strips of foundation in the bottom of the 

 sections do help to strengthen the union of comb to 

 the section. 



15. Separators between the sections are essential to 

 the best results in producing comb honey. 



10. The thicker the comb, whether natural or artifi- 

 cial, the greater the proportion of honey to wax in it. 



17. In natural worker comb, one inch thick, the pro- 

 portion of wax to honey is between 1 to 20 and 1 to 25 

 by weight. 



In the main, the results of his experiments 

 seem to agree very well with those made by- 

 Mr. Weed, with one or two exceptions ; and 

 that is, on the point as to whether the bees 

 reduce or thin down the thick midrib of ordi- 

 nary medium brood foundation, and whether 

 the cell-walls of foundation are thicker than 

 those of ordinary comb. In referring to the 

 table on page 11 of the bulletin, which, by 

 the way, is a very interesting one to study, 

 Prof. Gillette says : 



If we examine columns four and five we shall see 

 that the increased weights of the examples of comb 

 on artificial foundation were due more to the extra 

 wax in the cell-walls than to the increased amount of 

 wax in the midribs in cases of the heavy foundations, 

 "but not in cases of the thin and extra thin super, or 

 ■"1899" deep-cell foundations. 



Elsewhere, in referring to the same matter, 

 lie says : 



with this additional evidence, it seems impossible 

 to avoid the conclusion that heavy foundations result 

 in combs heavier than the natural, and that the in- 

 creased weight is due both to thicker midribs and 

 heavier cell-walls, but much more to the latter than 

 to the former in cases where heavy foundations are 

 employed, even though much wax is left unused in 

 the midrib. 



Strangely enough, I get almost the opposite 

 conclusion after a careful study of the table. 

 The experiments that Mr. Weed conducted in 

 my presence also seem to support my inter- 

 pretation ; namely, that the increase in the 

 weight of comb made from heavy foundations 

 is generally due more to extra wax in the mid- 

 ribs than to the extra wax in the zvalls. In 

 the table on page 11 of the bulletin, for ex- 

 ample, we find that a comb of medium brood 

 1.30 inches thick and one inch square had a 

 midrib that weighed 6.87 grains, while the 

 cell-walls weighed only 12.63 grains. Comb 

 of the same size, built entirely by the bees, 

 without foundation, 1.33 inches thick, had a 

 base weighing 2.20 grains, while the walls 

 weighed exactly 10. Now, if we subtract the 



2.20, the weigl'.t of the midrib of the natural 

 comb one inch square, from 6.87, the weight 

 of the midrib of a one-inch-square comb from 

 medium brood foundation, we have as a differ- 

 ence 4.67 grains, while the difference in the 

 weight of the walls between the two is only 

 2.63 grains. The difference in midribs in this 

 case is nearly twice as much as the difference 

 in the walls. Take another example : Anoth- 

 er medium brood comb }^ inch thick, com- 

 pared with the same thickness of natural 

 comb, shows a difference in midribs of 3.45 

 grains, while the difference in the walls is only 

 1.95 grains. I find just two other sets of fig- 

 ures that show a slight increase by half a 

 grain for the wall over the midrib ; but all the 

 rest support my understanding of the table. 



A careful study of the photographic repro- 

 ductions given in this bulletin seems to bear 

 out also the assumption that the increase in 

 weight is due rather to the septum than to the 

 increase in the wall. 



But Prof. Gillette's tables do show th^.t the 

 bees reduce the bases of heavy and medium 

 brood foundations slightly more than I have 

 been led to believe from Mr. Weed's experi- 

 ments, and that the bees also make a slight 

 increase in the weight of the walls when the 

 comb is built from heavy and medium brood 

 over those walls built in natural comb. 



The knowledge gained from this bulletin is 

 important and very valuable ; and while to 

 me, at least, it does not change materially the 

 conclusions arrived at by Mr. Weed, it goes 

 to show the great importance of making all 

 the foundations with bases practically as thin 

 as the bees make them, whether for brood pur- 

 poses or for sections. While it has not been 

 possible, from a mechanical point of view, to 

 make all foundations with such bases, the 

 Root Co. has been working toward that end, 

 and its foundations of 1900 have much thinner 

 bases than the foundations of 1898 and the 

 fore part of 1899. 



Prof. Gillette's tables also show considera- 

 ble variation in building of cell-walls ; and a 

 careful study of the figures shows to me that 

 the surplus of wax in foundation (and we 

 must have a surplus to keep the sheets from 

 sagging) should be put in the ivalls of the 

 foundation itself. But the Root Co. is striving 

 to reduce the wax, both in the walls and in 

 the bases, and hopes to have, before two or 

 three years roll by, a brood foundation as thin 

 as that now made for super, but which shall 

 have incorporated in the wax itself very fine 

 slender wires, about No. 40 size. Such foun- 

 dation would be a great saving in first cost to 

 the bee-keeper, because now he is obliged to 

 buy a foundation for brood-frames that has a 

 surplus of wax, not because the bees need it 

 in drawing out the combs so much as because 

 it is required to keep the sheets from sagging 

 while being drawn out. 



While these experiments seem to modify in 

 part some of the conclusions made by Mr. 

 Weed from his experiments, yet in the main 

 they corroborate his principal propositions. 

 There are some other points that I wish to 

 speak of, but I shall have to defer their men- 

 tion until our next issue. 



