1907 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



619 



two apples. These are produced from the 

 center blossoms, which open sooner, drop 

 their petals sooner, and close their calyces 

 sooner than the rest of the blossoms. From 

 the standpoint of the fruit-grower, these cen- 

 tral blossoms are the only ones to be consid- 

 ered so far as his interests are concerned. 

 To quote from the report of the field ento- 

 mologist, carrying on a branch of the State 

 Experiment Station here, "The center blos- 

 soms are invariably the first to open their 

 petals and first to drop them. They are first 

 to close their calyces, and most likely to set 

 fruit which will remain without dropping 

 from the tree. It is, therefore, evident that 

 this first spraying should be done with these 

 blossoms in mincf." You will see that there 

 is a powerful incentive for the man with a 

 large amount of spraying to do to get at it 

 before the outside blossoms have fallen 

 This, undoubtedly, will be bad for the bees. 

 But with the large amount the fruit-grower 

 has at stake, can we altogther blame him? 



can be cut from the standai'd size, and the 

 remnants used for starters in the frames on 

 which swarms are hived. In this way there 

 would be no indication to the foundation- 

 maker of the size of frame. in which it was to 

 be used. 



Please remember that the users of shallow 

 hives are not denied the privilege of handling 

 frames if they want to. They are not oblig- 

 ed to double the size of the hive or add a 

 whole story of brood or honey unless they 

 want to. They can make such additions 

 just about as easily, and even more gradual- 

 ly, by single frames than the users of the 

 large frames. Mr. Dadant does not relish 

 the idea of hunting a queen by shaking the 

 whole swarm out. Of course, that is im- 

 practical with his hive; but if he could do it 

 with less time and labor than by overhauling 

 the frames (and 1 can easily prove that this 

 is the case), is there any good reason why he 

 should not do it? 



DEEP VS. SHALLOW BROOD-CHAMBERS. 



There are one or two points in Mr. Da- 

 dant's article on page 485 that I want to re- 

 ply to. In the first place he calls attention 

 to the fact that the Heddon hive has not made 

 the progress that might have been expected 

 of it. It is true that the Heddon hive has 

 not become greatly popular. I will admit 

 that it may even have lost some of the 

 popularity it once enjoyed. But there are 

 some good reasons for that aside from the 

 fact that it is a divisible-brood-chamber hive. 

 While I think great credit is due Mr. Heddon 

 for his introduction of the divisible brood- 

 chamber, I was never very well satisfied with 

 his hive after it had been in use for some 

 time. The frames were too hard to handle 

 when manipulation became necessary, and 

 there were some other defects of construction 

 which soon led me to discard the hive. I 

 once had about fifty of them. I have just 

 one now. But some slight changes in con- 

 struction, mainly the adoption of a closed-end 

 hanging frame, made a shallow hive that 

 suited me much better, and I have several 

 hundred of these in use now. Probably there 

 are others who gave up the Heddon hive be- 

 cause they recognized its faults and did not 

 have the opportunity I had to make a hive 

 that avoided them. 



The point that only two per cent of the 

 foundation sold by the Dadant factory is for 

 shallow hives is not as important as it would 

 appear, for it happens that a large propor- 

 tion of those who use shallow hives— all, in 

 fact, with whose methods I am acquainted — 

 are comb-honey producers, following the 

 modern plan of hiving all swarms in con- 

 tracted brood-chambers with only narrow 

 starters of foundation in the frames. Natu- 

 rally this consumes very little brood founda- 

 tion. These narrow strips, too, can be cut 

 just as easily from the standard width of 

 sheet as from a special size. That is exactly 

 what I shall do in preparing my hives this 

 season. In fact, all the full sheets I want 



On page 485 C. P. Dadant, while favoring 

 dee}) brood-chambers, admits that "shallow 

 hives are more desirable for migratory bee- 

 keeping. ' ' The one who swings this pen fails 

 to see the advantage to be derived from hav- 

 ing to fasten together four pieces where there 

 are only three with a deep chamber, or even 

 fastening together six or eight where former- 

 ly there were only four or six. 



SIMPLE FRAMES, ETC. 



In the same article he quotes Editor Hutch- 

 inson as being in favor of simplicity in hive- 

 construction — plain simple frames without 

 projections of staples, stating that these "fix- 

 ings that are put upon frames and hives are 

 a needless expense and bring no recompense. ' ' 



Can it be that Mr. Hutchinson has never 

 tried staple-spaced frames — that is, frames 

 separated from each other by staples? If he 

 has, I can not see why he should pronounce 

 such spacing a needless expense. I have 

 tried both ways, and I would no more go 

 back to unspaced frames than an intelligent 

 woman would leave a first-class washing-ma- 

 chine and go back to a plain tub. The rea- 

 son for my decision is that staples are not 

 costly; they are not in one's way when un- 

 capping, and, when returning them to the 

 hive, I can space them accurately, collectively, 

 by shoving them together in a body — a very 

 important matter, and many times multiplied 

 in robbing time. For five years we have 

 never seen the day when, extracting in rob- 

 bing time, we had to quit extracting in time 

 of robbing. The same largely holds good 



