274 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



May, 1921 



if entire supers of these are used, the re- 

 sultant honey must be sold as an inferior 

 grade, owing to its greater lia})ility to 

 granulation. 



In order to produce honey in the half- 

 filled sections that will not granulate the 

 following season, must we extract the hon- 

 ey, break or cut out the combs, and melt 

 up for wax and refill with fresh foundation? 

 If we only knew the reason why honey in 

 sections of comb drawn the previous sea- 

 son is more inclined to granulate than in 

 combs recently drawn out from foundation, 

 we might in some way avoid the ditficulty 

 and so use our last year's half-filled sec- 

 tions very much to our advantage. Bees 

 will occupy and fill these a great deal 

 quicker than they will supers filled with 

 foundation. 



My Experience With Granulation. 

 During the season of 1915 we had a fair 

 crop of honey; but the quality was not so 

 good as in previous years; and, what was 

 worse, it began to granulate early, and 

 there seemed to be no end to this trouble. 

 We had used some sections with drawn 

 combs, but the tendency of the honey to 

 granulate did not seem to be confined to 

 such sections. I noticed also that combs 

 most inclined to granulate seemed to con- 

 tain more or less light-amber honey, evi- 

 dently something besides clover. Moreover, 

 I found some combs were free from granu- 

 lation, except perhaps an inch or so at the 

 bottom of the section where it was solid; 

 while others might be granulated at the 

 top, but not at the bottom. Another thing 

 I noticed was that those combs that con- 

 ained pure clover honey did not granulate. 

 A Possible Explanation. 

 These observations led me to conclude 

 that the tendency of honey to granulate does 

 not depend nearly so much on the age of the 

 comb as on the kind of honey with which it 

 was filled. I remembered that, during the 

 spring of 1915, there had been an unusual 

 flow of honey from dandelion bloom. In- 

 deed, most of the hives were packed with 

 dandelion honey. Few hives had enough 

 room for brood. As clover bloom opened, 

 the hives were given supers; but the yield 

 of clover honey was light, and a large 

 amount of dandelion honey was carried up 

 into the sections to make room in the brood- 

 chamber for the queen. This accounted 

 for the large number of sections containing 

 honey of a light-amber color, it being a mix- 

 ture of clover and dandelion. The fact that 

 dandelion honey granulates quickly after 

 being gathered accounts in part, at least, 

 for the unusual amount of granulation in 

 this locality during 1915. 



My Guess Corroborated. 

 At the close of the season of 1915 we had 

 a good many unfinished sections. The honey 

 was extracted from these, and the combs of 

 the poorest were cut out and melted up for 

 wax, while the whitest were saved to be 

 used again next year. These were not used 

 as bait combs; but, after marking with a 



])encil every section containing drawn 

 combs, the supers were filled with them and 

 they were used on the hives the same as 

 si'ctions of foundation. 



The season of 191G in this vicinity proved 

 very good for clover. There was a fair yield 

 of dandelion honey that was quite largely 

 used for the production of brood. Surplus 

 from clover was not stored until after June 

 25, with the result that not much dandelion 

 honey was carried up into the supers; yet 

 a few colonies stored some. It was late in 

 August when one of our men cleaning sec- 

 tions exclaimed, "What is the matter with 

 this section?" "Why, that has begun to 

 granulate, ' ' I said, and I took the section 

 and looked it over to see why it should 

 granulate so quickly. Was it a section con- 

 taining a last year's comb? Not at all. It 

 was a comb built new this year. What kind 

 of honey? It was amber, the same, appar- 

 ently, that made us so much trouble last 

 year. 



We have found some combs since where 

 early granulation had set in, but apparently 

 without the slightest regard to the age of 

 the comb; but in every instance in sections 

 or combs with light-amber colored honey, 

 which, without doubt, was largely dande- 

 lion. So I am more than ever convinced 

 that my theory concerning the cause of 

 granulation is not far from right. 



The reason the same kind of honey granu- 

 lates more freely some years than others 

 may be because a small quantity of another 

 kind is mixed with it — enough to work mis- 

 chief, but not easily detected either by color 

 or flavor. Some one will ask, "Why is it 

 that bait sections are more liable to granu- 

 late than others?" I answer, because the 

 foundation, being already drawn out, bees 

 are more liable to store early-gathered hon- 

 ey in these than in those that must first be 

 drawn from foundation. 



Best Sections from Bait Combs. 



But why are these bait combs so much 

 darker than those drawn from foundation? 

 Combs, as we all know, will darken with 

 age; and, if kept over, and filled and sealed, 

 without the addition of new wax, will ap- 

 pear very much darker than new combs. In 

 some way bees seemed to have learned the 

 scriptural injunction about putting new 

 cloth into old garments. At any rate, they 

 seem to hesitate about adding much new 

 wax to last year's comb. To overcome this 

 diflSculty I have been in the habit of cutting 

 down old combs so they will not be more 

 than three-fourths of one inch thick. This 

 literally compels them to add new wax to 

 lengthen out the cells and then cap with 

 new wax, giving them a nice appearance. I 

 have had such combs the past season that 

 went in with my best grade of honey. Such 

 combs should be used preferably only when 

 the best grade of honey is coming in, so as 

 to be out of danger of getting mixed with 

 dandelion or other honey that granulates 

 soon after being gathered. 



Middlebury, Vt. 



