164 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



March, 1920 



H 



C 



TALKS TO' 



By lona 



[LJj 



AVING last 



month 



made def- 

 inite arrange- 

 ments for the 

 purchase of the 

 colony or colo- 

 nies of bees, the 

 necessary bee- 

 keeping supplies 



should now be ordered in readiness for the 

 arrival of the colonies of bees, unless by 

 good fortune the bees and the supplies have 

 both been purchased of a nearby beekeeper. 

 Later in the spring shipments are bound to 

 be delayed, and therefore it will be the part 

 of wisdom to place one 's order immediate- 

 ly, if purchase has to be made of a beekeep- 

 ers ' supply house. 



Books and Magazines. 

 Those who are really interested in bees 

 will begin their list of supplies with some 

 of the best bee books now on the market 

 and will also subscribe for at least one of 

 the leading bee journals. The beekeepers' 

 supply catalog with its generous illustra- 

 tions "will also give a fund of information; 

 but it is hardly necessary to advise the en- 

 thusiastic beginner to obtain all the infor- 

 mation possible concerning bees, for he will 

 not only read all he can find on the subject, 

 but will also supplement this by most en- 

 lightening visits with neighboring beekeep- 



GTS. 



Making the Choice, Comb Honey or 

 Extracted? 



The honey which the bees produce in ex- 

 cess of their winter needs is called surplus 

 honey. This may be stored in small boxes 

 called sections, which hold about one pound 

 of honey each and are sold with the honey; 

 or it may be stored in frames holding from 

 three to "six pounds, the honey being cut out 

 and sold as chunk honey or extracted from 

 the combs and the same frames of combs 

 used repeatedly year after year. The honey 

 produced in the sections is called comb hon- 

 ey, and that extracted from the combs is 

 called extracted honey. 



Now at the very outset it will be neces- 

 sary to decide whether to produce comb hon- 

 ey or extracted, for, as just explained, the 

 equipment in the two cases will differ. There 

 are several good reasons why the average 

 beginner will find it to his advantage to 

 produce extracted rather than comb honey. 



For the first year, the comb and the ex- 

 tracted-honey outfits do not differ materially 

 in price, except for the extractor; but in 

 succeeding years the advantage is all in fa- 

 vor of the extracted-honey outfit; for the 

 same combs in which the bees store honey 

 the first year may be used repeatedly year 

 after year, while the sections of foundation 

 in which comb honey is stored must be re- 

 placed at considerable cost every season. 



Comb is made of wax, which is a secretion 

 from certain glands of the bees; and for 

 the production of a pound of wax it is 

 probably necessary for the bees to consume 



BEGINNERS 



Fowls 



1 



TU 



from five to fif- 

 teen pounds of 

 honey, which 

 might otherwise 

 be sold as sur- 

 plus. Therefore, 

 besides the ex- 

 tra cost of sup- 

 plies the bee- 

 keeper loses con- 

 siderably from the fact that bees run for 

 comb honey are compelled each year to 

 build all the comb in which they store their 

 surplus honey. Such comb would quite like- 

 ly contain as much as three pounds of wax 



Standard hive body with empty frames. See page 

 166 for frames after being filled with foundation. 



and might therefore require 15 or more 

 pounds of honey for its production. 



Comb-honey production requires far more 

 skill in order to produce a good crop, and 

 at the same time keep down swarming. The 

 section boxes are so much smaller than the 

 combs the bees naturally build that bees do 

 not enter them as readily as they do the 

 large combs used in extracted-honey produc- 

 tion. Therefore, it is sometimes necessary 

 to use certain inducements to get the bees 

 started in section supers. Also, the extract- 

 ed-honey man finds that giving an abund- 

 ance of room helps greatly in the prevention 

 of swarming, while the comb-honey man is 

 compelled to keep his colonies more crowd- 

 ed; for otherwise the end of the season will 

 find him with a lot of unfinished sections. 

 Extracting-combs of ripe honey one-third 



Comb-honey super and iti-tions. 



or more unsealed will, when extracted, result 

 in first-class honey. Sections ono-third seal- 

 ed must be sold at a low price. 



Furthermore, extracted honey may be pro- 

 duced in many localities and in many sea- 



