April, 1909. 



American Hq^ Journal 



our Colorado State convention since I 

 wrote the matter referred to, and I feel 

 that I ought to give the reader the bene- 

 fit of what developed in the convention, 

 as the subject was handled there by 

 some of the big guns. 



By some it was argued that feeding, 

 the presence of abundance of stores, or 

 the making of the bees manipulate or 

 handle these stores, would not cause 

 much increase unless there was abund- 

 ance of pollen in the combs, or being 

 brought in. Many Colorado locations 

 are short on pollen ; this is so true that 

 such locations often find the brood- 

 combs almost totally bare of pollen. 

 In my own location in 20 years I 

 have never seen a surplus of pollen 

 in a single hive ; I think in only one 

 year in that time the bees did not 

 hunt for flour and other substitutes in 

 the spring, and that one time was a 

 spring that the weather was such that 

 they could fly but very little until pollen 

 was to be found on trees. 



Now there is no doubt in my mind 

 but this scarcity of pollen does retard 

 breeding to considerable e-xtent ; but that 

 its absence will fully nullify the effects 

 of feeding or handling of stores, I am 

 not prepared to say; my opinion is that 

 the feeding will help. To have a gen- 

 eral opinion is not conclusive, and to 

 make comparative tests by experiment, 

 so we have an array of facts, both pro 

 and con, few of us ever do. Because a 

 man gets well of a s.ickness after taking 

 such or such medicine is never proof 

 that the medicine cured. All in all, we 

 do know that when bees handle both 

 honey and pollen they will breed better 

 than if either is lacking. A shortage 

 of honey-stores is easily remedied ; but 

 the lack of pollen is by no means so 

 easy, at least with present knowledge on 

 the subject. 



After all was said at the convention 

 I am still convinced that there is bene- 

 fit derived from my instructions in any 

 case, and if there be plenty of pollen in 

 the hive that is easily available, or a 

 little coming in, much will be gained if 

 the bees are made to handle stores daily. 

 I wish I had some of the pollen the 

 East can spare. 



LARGE HIVES. 



Regarding the question of large hives, 

 and the getting of these by storifying 

 with the 8-frame, or any other, for that 

 matter, let me say that our people in 

 convention brought decitied testimony 

 to bear favorably on the subject. This 

 matter is so important that it ought to 

 be repeated and urged upon the apia- 

 rists. The Dadants have for many years 

 urged large hives, and I must say they 

 have the best of the argument — they are 

 right. I notice quite a tendency among 

 our Colorado apiarists to the use of 

 larger hives. I would not recommend 

 the lo-frame hive, but rather the use 

 of two 8-frame bodies. We want an 

 "elastic hive," as some writers used to 

 put it ; and another thing is to have the 

 extra proportion in depth rather than 

 width. There is no question about the 

 truth of the theory that a hive not too 

 wide, but deeper than wide, serves the 

 bees better than a shallow wide one; 

 and if the body be in two parts it is 

 elastic, and can be quickly made shallow- 



er when it will not injure the colony and 

 will favor results in surplus. 



The 8-frame super gives better re- 

 sults in sections than a 10, and this is 

 another reason for using the 8 size. If 

 the apiarist has a mixture he can still 

 use but one size of super. I have for 

 several years used only 8-frame supers 

 on both 8 and 10 frame hives ; and this 

 leads me to discussing the question of 

 honey-boards. I know that but few 

 people use honey-boards in comb-honey 

 production, but it is mainly because they 

 do not know their value, and because 

 the manufacturers do not combine them 

 with the hives as sent out. 



SL.\T HONEY-BO.^RDS. 



I have used all kinds of brood-frames, 

 from the thinnest and narrowest top- 

 bars to the thickest and widest, and I 

 know that bur-combs will be built 

 through any of them; and with the 

 thickest and widest at times, and suf- 

 ficient quantities to make the use of a 

 slat honey-board a very good invest- 

 ment. Some burs will be built through 

 even the honey-board, too, but it saves 

 a big lot of attachments of comb and 

 honey to the under side of the super. 

 The" super should be as clean on the 

 bottom as possible, because if there are 

 bur-combs they must be cleaned oflt be- 

 fore the super be tiered up or placed 

 over another; if not, the tops of the 

 under sections will be smeared with 

 wax. If the bottoms of supers be clean 

 the operator can handle them just about 

 twice as fast in readjusting or in re- 

 moving. 



The honey-board should be made of 

 narrow slats. I use ^-inch, ripping them 

 from common thickness boards. Our 

 factory people persist in making the slats 

 wide, usually from ij^ to l^; this is 

 too wide. Another fault with the fac- 

 tory people is in making the board with 

 a slat set plump against the rim-piece, 

 so that bees climbing the side of the 

 brood-chamber must turn inwards to 

 find an opening to get above. If any- 

 thing this is a more serious fault than 

 the wide slat. The rim-piece should be 

 of J4 or % width — the same as the thick- 

 ness of the hive-body sides — then the 

 first slat should be set leaving a good 

 free opening so that all bees climbing 

 the hive side can go right on up the 

 super side, too; and every super should 

 also have a free passage-way up the 

 side, an uninterrupted climb-way to the 

 roof. This is important, and must not 

 be overlooked in hive-construction. 



In nailing the honey-boards I do not 

 try to make them break-joint (that is, 

 to have a slat come over the space be- 

 tween top-bars) ; this feature is a good 

 one, but so hard to maintain because of 

 varying position of the frames if a 

 follower is used — the follower may be 

 on one side now, and tomorrow be on 

 the other side. The slats are just put 

 as close together as can be to let the bees 

 pass freely through. 



If you have both 8 and 10 frame hives 

 make just as many of these slat-boards 

 as you have hives, but with this dif- 

 ference: For the lo-frame hives make 

 the board cover the hive— that is, if the 

 lo-frame hive is 2% inches wider than 

 the 8, each side slat for the rim will be 

 z'A inches wider than the rim side of 

 the 8-frame board. This of course 



breaks that direct run up the hive side, 

 but the bees, after turning inward till 

 they find the opening, can then continue 

 on up the super side. With such honey- 

 boards you can use 8-frame supers on 

 any width hive. I use the T-super, and 

 they are made with ordinary thickness 

 ends, and, of course, are shorter than 

 the hive-body, so I make the end-piece 

 of the rim enough wider so the hive- 

 body is fully covered, and still the short- 

 er super covers all openings. 



HOW TO CLEAN HONEY-BOARDS. 



The honey-boards usually come off at 

 the close of the season with lots of wax 

 adhering in bur-combs. To clean them 

 I heat a tank of water to boiling, then 

 with a pile of the boards beside me I 

 dip them one at a time into the water, 

 churning it up and down until the wax 

 IS melted from the end. then reverse 

 and churn as before, until the other end 

 IS clean, then flip it onto a pile. The 

 boards come out hot and are practically 

 dry m a few minutes. It is a little 

 warm on the fingers, but not unbearable, 

 and if you have never tried this way it 

 will surprise you how little time it takes 

 to clean several hundred; in fact, you 

 want to work rapidly to get best re- 

 sults. Keep the water boiling, and that 

 throws the accumulating wax to the 

 ends.while you churn in the middle, and 

 the air escaping from the wood and the 

 bur-combs makes an additional bubbling 

 and boiling so that there will be a space 

 of several inches about the churning 

 board that is free from wax. When wax 

 gets so it crowds the churning place, 

 skim off some of it. You can clean a 

 board this way while you would be 

 thinking of whittling the wax off, and 

 the wax accumulations will pay you big 

 wages for the time emplodyed. 



TOP-BARS WITH GROOVE AND WEDGE. 



I know such top-bars are popular, but 

 they are so just because the factory 

 people make them so, and the users 

 never tried other kinds in the right way, 

 if they_ tried any other kind at all. 

 There is no use whatever in a groove 

 and wedge to fasten foundation; they 

 are worse than useless, being a source 

 of trouble to bee-keepers, and add to the 

 first cost of the frame. Make the under 

 side of the bar just as plain as plain can 

 be. To fasten foundation fix a board 

 about J4-inch shorter than the inside 

 measure of the frame in length, and a 

 plump J^-inch narrower than the net 

 inside measure up and down. On one 

 side, about the middle, nail lengthwise 

 a cleat an inch or so thick for finger- 

 hold, and in one edge near each end 

 drive a nail so that when the frame is 

 laid over the board with the top-bar on 

 these 2 nails the board just comes up 

 a scant half way through the frame. 

 In like manner put one nail only in the 

 other edge of the board, but have this 

 nail at the middle of the length. With 

 2 nails, one near each end for the top- 

 bar to rest on, and the one at the centre 

 for the bottom-bar, every frame is 

 bound to lie solid without a teeter. 



Melt some wax in a cup about the size 

 of a pint dipper or possibly a little larg- 

 er — this can be done over a common 

 small-burner kerosene lamp; with the 

 lamp you can guage the heat, for the 

 wax should be just thoroughly melted 

 and no more. Grasp the board in the 



