352 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



uncommon. I have always been ready to 

 ishare anything I kneAV with any one it 

 would help, though I have sometimes been 

 slow in making public a thing that has not 

 been thoroly tested or perfected. 



His prediction in regard to ray article 

 was apparently correct, for it renewed in- 

 terest in the bee-escapes. Various improve- 

 ments were made, and the original inventor 

 was soon lost sight of. I know of no work 

 on bees that gives him credit for liis impor- 

 tant invention. A letter from him appeared 

 in Gleanings a year or two ago, in which 

 he gave a hint of a better method of getting 

 bees off the combs than the bee-eseape; but 

 this hint, like the original description of the 

 bee-escape, seems to have fallen on stony 

 ground. So I am going to " do it again," 

 and try to wake some of you up to an ap- 

 preciation of the better way, for there is a 

 bett/cr way, for many of you at least. 



I keep all, or nearly all, of my bees in 

 out-apiaries, producing both comb and ex- 

 tracted honey and hauling the honey home 

 to extract. For the last three years the bee- 

 escape with me has been a discarded imple- 

 ment, an antiquated device that is used only 

 occasionally. I drive into an outyard with 

 my auto truck, and in ten or fifteen minutes 

 can begin loading into the truck supers of 

 honey perfectly freed from bees, without 

 shaking, brushing, or any previous prepara- 

 tion. I do this by using the carbolized- 

 cloth method. TMs Avas frequently men- 

 tioned in the bee-journals several years ago, 

 and appears to have had considerable vogue 

 in England, tho if it has ever been used to 

 any great extent in this counti'y, we have 

 never heard of it. Properly used, I find it 

 one of the gi^eatest time and labor savers 

 for the beekeeper who runs out-apiaries. 



Tear any ordinary cotton cloth into pieces 

 a little larger each way than the top of the 

 hive. To work to advantage you will need 

 four or five of these, and will pi'obably find 

 more unnecessary. Put these into a two- 

 quart Mason fruit-jar, which makes a good 

 thing in which to keep them. Pour over 

 them a ten-per-cent solution of carbolic 

 acid, one part of pure acid to nine parts of 

 water, just enough of the solution to keep 

 them alaout as wet as they can be without 

 dripping. Any surplus can be squeezed 

 back into the jar. The exact proportions 

 of acid and water are not very material, 

 and some other proportions may be better 

 under some circumstances ; but this is what 

 I have generally used and found satisfac- 

 tory. 



Go to the hive from which you wish to 

 take honey. Remove the cover, lay the car- 

 bolized clotli ovei' the frames, and replace 

 the cover oi- throw something else over the 



cloth to prevent drying and waste of mate- 

 rial. This is all that is necessary, tho I find 

 it advantageous in pi'actice to use smoke in 

 connection, puffing a good volume of it into 

 the top of tlie super, to get the bees to run- 

 ning before the carbolized cloth is laid on. 

 Go to another hive and repeat the opera- 

 tion. By the time you have four or five 

 thus prepared, the first super should be 

 ready to come off. Put the cloth from this 

 hive on another, and take off super number 

 two, using its cloth as before. This makes 

 a continuous operation, taking off supers as 

 fast as you can prepare the hives and han- 

 dle the supers. If you have to spend much 

 time in hunting for supers that are ready to 

 come off, you will not need as many cloths, 

 as it takes only a few minutes ordinarily 

 for the combined smoke and odor to drive 

 the bees down, and the cloths should not be 

 left on longer than necessary. Too strong 

 a solution or a cloth left on too long may 

 taint the honey somewhat. The odor passes 

 off soon when the combs are exposed to the 

 air, so that it does no harm to comb honey. 

 You must be very careful with extracted 

 honey that you expect . to extract soon. 

 When extracted soon after removal from 

 the hives I have sometimes noticed the car- 

 bolic flavor in the honey drained from the 

 cappings. I never take off honey before it 

 is sealed. Probably unsealed honey would 

 more readily acquire a taint that might be 

 permanent if the honey was not exposed to 

 the air. 



Use nothing but the best refined acid. I 

 tried crude acid, thinking that the stronger 

 flavor would be more effective. It was, but 

 the disagi'eeable tarry odor remained on the 

 combs much longer. Carbolic acid is very- 

 high now, on account of the war; but, even 

 so, I think it pays well to use it. Keep 

 your cloths away from the air as much as 

 possible. Put them into the jar as soon as 

 you are through using them. Add a little 

 more solution ; seal them up and they are 

 ready for use the next time you want 

 them. 



The method works much better with comb- 

 honey supers and shallow extracting-supers 

 than on deeper ones, tho I ha.ve used it with 

 many of Langstroth depth. If you have 

 more than one super to remove from a hive 

 it is better to take off the top one as soon as 

 the bees are out of it, leaving the cloth for 

 a short time on the one below. Do not 

 loosen the super from the hive before the 

 bees are out. The draft of air from the 

 crevices thus made interferes with the ac- 

 tion of the carbolized air from above. 



The metliod does not work well wlien the 

 bees are sluggish from cool weather. There 

 is one great objection to tlie jjlan, and it is 



