48 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION 



and is handy to carry combs to and from the extracting room. 



Where one intends to keep ten or more hives of bees it is ad- 

 vantageous, unless a special preference is held for honey in the 

 comb, to procure an extracting outfit and install it in the room de- 

 signed for use as a honey room. The principal piece in the outfit 

 is an extractor. This consists of a can twenty to thirty inches in 

 diameter and the height of an ordinary table, fitted with a faucet 

 at the convex bottom which causes the honey to drain out through 

 the faucet. Mounted on a pivot in the center of the bottom and 

 connected with a crank at the top is a comb basket holding from 

 two to six Langstroth combs and capable of being revolved rapidly 

 by means of a crank. The modern extractors are arranged with 

 reversible comb baskets so that the honey can be thrown from both 

 sides without removing the combs from the extractor. For the 

 small apiary the Cowan reversible extractor, holding two combs, 

 is a convenient and popular size. The extractor should be stood 

 upon a box or low bench high enough to permit the honey to be 

 drawn off below. As the honey will have particles of wax in it, 

 a thin cheese cloth sack, should be provided to tie over the faucet 

 and strain the t honey through. This cloth should be wet before 

 tying on, as otherwise the honey is slow to pass through. A cover 

 of similar cloth or heavier to fasten down over the top of the ex- 

 tractor prevents dust from settling in the extractor when not in 

 use. 



There are several styles of honey or uncapping knives used to 

 remove the cappings, prepatory to placing the combs in the extrac- 



Figure 12. The Quinby uncapping knife. 



tor. They are designed along general principals. The first, of 

 which, the Bingham knife is an example, is a narrow thin blade, 

 capable of being bent, with the tip curved up and the handle elevat- 

 ed so that the blade can be brought parallel to the combs, the idea 

 being to be able to reach all the little indentations of the comb. The 

 second type is heavier, broad, and with a pointed tip at a greater or 



