242 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL, 



April 20, 1899. 



that mated was dipt only the 32nd of an inch, and one was 

 dipt as much as % the leng-th of the wing-. 



PI,AIN SECTIONS AND FENCE SEPARATORS. 



L. C. Woodman — I have used 100 cases of plain sections. 

 The season was poor, but I cannot say very much either for 

 or against them. The fences are expensive, and the bees 

 glue them up considerably. 



Mr. Powers — I have used both stj-les of sections. The 

 sections of the plain style are better filled. The separators 

 are just as easily cleaned. 



H. G. Giiford — When plain sections are used we get 

 heavier combs and less pop-holes, and there is a saving^ in 

 shipping-cases. 



H. S. CoUingwood — I want plain sections, but not fence 

 separators. I want slats on the separators, so that I can use 

 plain sections, but I do not want any fence separators. Here 

 he showed a fence separator in which most of the cracks 

 were filled with propolis. 



Mr. Bingham called attention to the fact that most of 

 the openings were too narrow. 



Mr. Hilton called attention to the fact that the separa- 

 tor had been used at the outside of the super where the bees 

 could not get behind it, and that and the narrowness of the 

 openings accounted for the great quantities of propolis that 

 had been used. He said that the A. I. Root Co. acknowl- 

 edged that some of the first fences that they sent out had 

 too narrow spaces. The fear of " washboardy " had led 

 them to make the spaces as narrow as they had. This fault 

 has been remedied. 



Mr. Bingham — There is no question that the use of 

 plain sections allows of a saving in shipping-cases, but 

 there are other considerations. Here is one : With tight 

 or closed separators the bees will begin upon only a few 

 sections in the center of the super, and if the flow is slow, 

 or if it is near the dose of the harvest, they will keep on 

 and finish up those few sections that thej' have begun work- 

 ing upon, when, with no separators, they are more inclined 

 to spread out and begin work upon a large number of sec- 

 tions, and perhaps not finish any of them. With tight sep- 

 arators there will be less unfinisht sections than with no 

 separators, and it seems as if open separators might have a 

 tendency in the way of encouraging the bees to spread out 

 and begin work upon more sections than they can finish. 



Mr. Hutchinson — I was over to the convention of the 

 Ontario bee-keepers last December, and Mr. Jacob Alpaugh, 

 who has had much experience in fomb-honey production, 

 took the same view as that advanced by Mr. Bingham, viz.: 

 that separators have a tendency to keep the bees from 

 spreading out and beginning more work than they will 

 finish. That is, they seem to look upon each compartment 

 between the separators as separate from the rest of the 

 super, as independent in itself, and are more inclined to 

 finish up work that is begun than to spread out and begin 

 more work. In other words, tight separators seem to have 

 a tendency to cause the bees to concentrate their efi^orts. 



Mr. Bingham — Perhaps some of you may remember the 

 Betsinger separator. It was made or coarse wire-cloth. 

 The openings were large enough so that a bee could pass 

 thru. If these openings had been too large I suppose that 

 the bees would have made little warts upon the surface of 

 the comb. The Roots have been very careful in this matter 

 of plain sections and fence separators. They are working 

 slowly as they did with the deep-cell foundation. They are 

 not crowding these things. Fence separators may yet be 

 thrown entirely out of the market. 



Mr! Rankin — At the college we gave the plain sections 

 and fence separators a trial. We filled one-half of a super 

 with plain sections and fence separators, and the other half 

 with old-style sections and old-style separators. The plain 

 sections were better filled around the edges. 



Mr. Bingham — When we see how easj' it is for a firm like 

 the Roots to rnake a mistake, we'd better be careful how we 

 adopt anything about which there is even an opportunity 

 for making a mistake. 



NEEDED FOUI, BROOD LEGISLATION. 



The secretary read a paper from Mr. A. D. D. Wood, of 

 Lansing, which went to show the difficulty of doing any- 

 thing in the way of suppressing foul brood so long as there 

 was no better law upon the subject. At the time the old 

 law was past it was supposed that the only possible thing 

 to do with a colony affected with foul brood was to burn it 

 up. We have since learned that it is possible to save the 

 bees, to disinfect and use the hive, to boil the honey and to 

 melt the combs into wax, and to thus get rid of the disease 

 with but little loss except the labor. The trouble is that 



many bee-keepers have only a few colonies, and are not 

 specially interested in bees. They do not know anything 

 about foul brood, and do not recognize it when it first ap- 

 pears, and would not know how to treat it if they (//(/ recog- 

 nize it. It is neglected, and colonies become weak in num- 

 bers, are robbed, and the seeds of the disease are thus 

 spread from colony to colony, and from apiary to apiary. 

 There is scarcely a county in the Lower Peninsula that is 

 free from this disease ; and until there is someone who has 

 the authority and skill to step in and help bee-keepers to 

 crush it out, it will continue to spread. Over in Ontario this 

 disease threatened to wipe out the industry of bee-keeping- 

 when an inspector of apiaries was appointed. He has now 

 been at work several years, and the disease is fast disap- 

 pearing from the Province. Wisconsin has followed in the 

 steps of Canada, and now has a similar law and a most effi- 

 cient inspector. Illinois and New York are also working to 

 get a similar law. Colorado has a foul brood law. There 

 is too much machinery about the old law. There is too much 

 trouble to get it enforced. If it turns out that there is no 

 foul brood where it was suspected, then the man who com- 

 plained is shouldered with the expense of the examination. 

 This fear of being called upon to bear the cost deters many 

 from complaining that would otherwise make a complaint. 



Mr. Rankin — This disease is certainly on the increase. 

 In Sanilac county I found an entire apiary dead from foul 

 brood. 



Pres. Hilton — We need protection from foul brood. The 

 old law was all right at one time, but now it is different. 

 Many of j'ou probably have never seen foul brood, and do 

 not know what it is like, and I hope you never will. The 

 brood dies and turns a dark brown, and it is stringy and 

 ropy, and emits a disagreeable odor. Seeds of the disease 

 get into the honey, and anj' of this honey carried to some 

 other hive starts the disease there, and so it goes. Some of 

 j'ou ma)' think that there is no foul brood near you, and that 

 you will never need the law in your own personal case. This 

 is something that you cannot be sure about. It may be 

 nearer than j-ou think. Even if it isn't the way to keep it 

 away from you is to have it stampt out wherever it may be. 

 If we as a body ask for this law, and show the legislature 

 that it is really needed, it can be secured without a doubt. 



Upon motion of Mr. Bingham, it was unanimously 

 voted that Mr. Rankin be instructed to draft a bill similar 

 to the Ontario or Wisconsin law, and secure its introduction 

 to the Michigan legislature. 



THE HEDDON HIVE .\ND MANAGEMENT. 



D. R. Van Amburgh — With the Heddon hive I put on 

 the sections when the bees are ready regardless of whether 

 the hive is composed of one or of two cases. It is from the 

 swarm that I get the honey. I give the supers to the swarm. 



Mr. Hutchinson — Mj- practice is the same as that of Mr. 

 Van Amburgh. As soon as the bees are nicely at work in 

 the first super, and it is half or two-th,irds full of honey, 

 that is, the sections have reacht that stage of completion, I 

 raise up the super and put another underneath. I fill all 

 sections full of foundation. When the bees have made a 

 good start in the second super, and honey is coming in at 

 a good rate, I raise both supers and put another underneath. 

 It must be remembered that the force of bees in the hive is 

 rapidly increasing at this time of the year, and it does not 

 take long for enough to hatch out to fill a super. By the 

 time that it is advisable to add another super, if that time 

 comes, it is likely that the top super will be ready to come 

 off. If the bees are a little slow in completing the corner 

 sections I would not leave the super on for them to be com- 

 pleted, but take it off and take out the unfinisht sections in 

 the corners. As soon as enough of these unfinisht sections 

 have accumulated to fill a super I fill one and put it upon 

 some colony. I would not tier up supers more than three' 

 high. If a colony is crowded for room, and has three 

 supers, and the top one is not ready to come off, I would 

 give it, bees and all, to some weaker colony. I have never 

 had quarreling when I did this. In hiving a swarm, I hive 

 it in two cases of the Heddon hive, with only starters in the 

 frames. It is hived upon the old stand, and the old hive set 

 by its side. The supers are transferred from the old hive 

 to !the swarm. In about three days, after the bees have 

 quieted down and recovered from their swarming-fever, I 

 remove the lower case. If hived in only one case there is 

 danger of their absconding, but there is no danger after 

 three days. On the seventh day the old hive is moved to a 

 new location. This robs it of its surplus bees at the time 

 when the )-oung queens are hatching, and, as a rule, there 

 is no after-swarm. If there is an after-swarm I usually go 

 thru the hive and cut out the remaining queen-cells, and 



