116 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Feli. 2i, 



In running for extracted honey, which has been our 

 specialty for some 25 years, we use what is called a half-story 

 frame, but the name is somewhat misleading, for these frames 

 are more than an exact half story in depth. The end-bar is 

 just six inches long, making the frame in the clear aboi't 6 M 

 deep. The length of these frames is the same as of the frames 

 below. With a deeper frame than this, which we tried on 

 about a hundred hives, some ten years ago, and which we 

 kept in use for a few years, we find that if the hive is not very 

 populous, and the weather cool, it gives the bees too much 

 room at one time, and, on the other hand, if the weather is 

 warm and the crop not very heavy, the queen is more apt to 

 go up into a deep frame to lay, especially as there is often 

 more room than needed for the honey at one time. We there- 

 fore prefer a shallow frame and, if needed, we put on two 

 supers or more on one hive. 



The shallow super, just half the depth of the Langstroth 

 frame, which is used by many is, in our opinion, too much to 

 the other extreme. Its size is so small that with our large 

 hives we would have to use several supers on the majority of 

 the hives, and it increases the labor by giving too many frames 

 to handle. The only advantage that we can see in this 454' 

 super is its permitting the producing of either comb or ex- 

 tracted honey with the same outer shell. But the outlay of 

 money on supers and hives nowadays is so insignificant when 

 the results are taken into consideration that we would never 

 advise any one to stint on this point. As well might a farmer 

 buy a cradle instead of a harvester, as one of our bee-men buy 

 an implement of Inferior grade. The farmer who understands 

 his business not only buys a harvester Instead of a cradle, but 

 he buys the best, even if it costs more, for he knows that time 

 is money. With us, time and honey are both money. An ex- 

 tra super, with the frames, costs but a few cents, and if not in 

 use may be put away with the combs in it. There need be no 

 danger from the moth, even If the super and the combs are 

 kept through the summer, provided they have been put away 

 In a cold room (the honey-house is usually cold), and the room 

 carefully guarded against the introduction of any suspected 

 combs during the summer. 



Here let me stray from my subject only long enough to 

 recommend the use of a sun wax-extractor. When you have 

 "chips" or broken combs during the summer, instead of put- 

 ting them away in the honey-house waiting for enough to be 

 gathered to melt up into beeswax, and thereby running the 

 risk of introducing into that house moth-eggs or larvte, It is a 

 much safer and more agreeable method to put them right into 

 the sun extractor, where, at the first warm rays of the sun, 

 these combs are rendered into very good beeswax, and the 

 parasites they may contain are killed. 



Do we use the narrow frame altogether? Yes, by all 

 means. We have no earthly use for either the Hoffman close- 

 fitting frame or the Heddon frame. They may be good, and 

 perhaps if we were used to them we would like them, but what 

 little experience we have had with them does not recommend 

 them, in our mind. We want the narrow, free-fitting frame 

 both in hives and extracting-supers, and the name of " rattle- 

 box " that has been given to these hives by some noted bee- 

 keepers has no more effect on our opinion than the epithet of 

 " useless toy" that was hurled at the honey-extractor by a so- 

 called experienced European bee-keeper, when this useful 

 machine was first invented. 



If we expected to travel over the country with our bees, 

 taking the hives along like so many trunks, we might like the 

 close-fitting frames, as they would stand the racket best, but 

 when we set a hive down in one spot we expect to leave it 

 there, and when the frames are once placed in proper order, 

 there is no fear of their " rattling about " before the bees glue 

 them fast. When the extracting-combs are well built, we like 

 to space them a little farther apart than the brood-combs, and 

 in a super that Is originally made for 11 frames, we usually 

 put only 10, and if the combs get very thick, sometimes only 9. 



We do not extract during the honey-flow, unless we have 

 absolutely no room left, and there is a prospect of a continua- 

 tion of the crop. To be sure, it is much pleasanter to take 

 out the honey while there is still nectar in the field, as we are 

 not annoyed by robber bees, but with a little care robbing is 

 avoided, and the honey extracted after the crop, is usually 

 best. Yet, we fiud very little objection to extracting the fall 

 crop from knot-weed and Spanish-needle as fast as harvested, 

 for this honey is usually pretty ripe when brought in by the 

 bees. For some reason there is much less danger of fermen- 

 tation in the fall honey than in any other, unless apple or 

 grape juice has been added to it. 



The combs are cleaned by the bees after extracting. We 

 usually put the supers back on the hive in the evening just 

 before sunset, so that the uproar caused by the daubed combs 

 may subside without trouble. 



We have already said in this article that we keep our 

 supers in the honey-house when not in use. The only require- 

 ments iu this cold climate to keep those combs safely for 

 years are, to have them in well-closed boxes safe from the 

 depredations of mice, and to let the temperature of the room 

 fall, during the winter, to 10" Pahr., or less. We have never 

 known such combs to be damaged by the moth, unless the 

 latter was carelessly introduced in the room during the sum- 

 mer. 



We use full sheets of worker-comb or foundation in our 

 extracting supers. Our reason for doing this is to avoid the 

 building of drone-comb in the frames, and the consequent 

 occasional rearing of drones in the extracting-supers. 



Hancock Co., 111. 



Wintering in a Barn — Packing Bees, Etc. 



BY WM. H. EAGEKTY. 



I see that some are asking about wintering bees in a barn. 

 I have thus wintered them, and tho they used up considerable 

 honey they wintered very well. I placed the hives so that 

 they were along the south wall of the building, and about six 

 Inches from the wall, with the hives about six inches apart. 

 The space between the hives and the wall was packt with 

 chaff and straw, i made a box for the hives to stand on, by 

 taking 2x4's and nailing boards to both edges and also to the 

 ends. Tho box made a dead-air space under the hives. I had 

 the front of the hives face into the barn instead of outward, 

 and the winter being cold I had no trouble from the bees in 

 the way of coming out of the hives. 



PACKING BEES PROPERLY FOB WINTER. 



I see that a bee-keeper in Cedar county, Iowa, has fixt up 

 his bees for winter by packing the super with straw, and also 

 packing in straw between the hives, then putting on a cover 

 of leaves and straw over the hives, and covering all with 

 boards. It would be better to put the leaves in the super, 

 and leave the straw for the outside packing. They should be 

 oak leaves, as they are tough and leathery, and they should 

 be gathered on a sunny afternoon, so that they might be both 

 dry and warm when put into the super. 



A very good covering for bee-hives on the summer stands 

 is slough-hay or rye-straw tied in bundles and stood around 

 the hives, all the bundles being tied together at the tops. This 

 covering requires no lumber, the bundles standing straight 

 enough to shed rain. If used in a windy country a little dirt 

 can be thrown upon the butts of the bundles of hay or straw 

 to hold them in place. 



HOW BEES FLY TO AND FROM THE HIVES. 



A late correspondent speaks of the flight of the honey- 

 bee, and of the bee-line. My apiary is located on a gentle 

 swell of land near a creek bottom, and just high enough to 

 give me a good view of my bees as they come and go when at 

 work during the busy season of the year. From what I have 

 seen I am led to believe that the bee flies In a very straight 

 line from one object to another, 'but those objects are not so 

 far apart as some might be led to believe. I have seen the 

 bees, when coming home with their loads, nearly all make for 

 a tall apple-tree, and from there to the hives. Having found 

 their line, I have gone along it to see how they operated 

 further along the line, with the result as above stated. 



My best chance to see the flight was when the bees were 

 going from the hive to the fields to get their loads, and I saw 

 that they moved a little sidewise with each stroke of the large 

 wings, going first to one side than to the other, something as 

 a skater moves when skating on the ice, going first with one 

 foot than with the other, but keeping a true line in the main. 

 A single bee seemed to fly as if iu a tube with a diameter of 

 about IJ-^ inches, moving not ouly sidewise but also up and 

 down, to something like the same extent, and, like the skater, 

 they seem to gather more force with each side movement. 



I stay in the bee-yard about all the time from early 

 spring until late in the fall, and I watch the insects quite 

 closely. In this country changes of the weather are quite 

 frequent and very sudden, and it is fun to watch the bees 

 when they come home to escape a summer shower. The 

 showers are driven before a strong wind, and they make the 

 bees " hustle their boots " to reach the hive in time to escape 

 a wetting. Republic Co., Kans. 



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