154 PRODUCTION OF COMB HONEY 



not fully master his business will have a large part of his colonies 

 building up so late that the harvest will be half over before they 

 are really ready for storing. Suitable spring protection, as dis- 

 cussed in the chapter on wintering, will have an important bear- 

 ing on the condition of the colonies at the opening of the harvest. 



Care of Weak Colonies. — Some bee-keepers take frames of 

 brood from their best colonies in spring to give to the weak ones, 

 thinking thereby to equalize the colonies and bring all to the 

 opening of the flow in strong condition. Unless the stronger 

 colony has seven or eight frames of brood this is not good practice. 

 A better plan will be to take all very weak colonies and set them 

 on top of the strong colonies, first removing the cover from the 

 hive containing the strong colony and placing a queen excluder 

 and a sheet of newspaper in its place. The queen excluder will 

 keep the queens each in her own apartment and the paper will 

 prevent the bees from fighting until they have become accus- 

 tomed to the new condition and acquired a common odor or 

 whatever it is that is characteristic of a colony and by means of 

 which they recognize the numerous members of the same family. 

 In a few days the bees will have made openings through the 

 paper and the workers will mingle freely. Both queens will go 

 on laying and the heat from the strong colony below will be of 

 great help to the weak one above. In a few weeks they will 

 have also become strong and may be again set back on their 

 original stand. Two stronger colonies will result from a strong 

 one and a weak one or even two weak ones, in this manner than 

 by equalizing the brood and leaving them separate. 



If a colony is sufficiently strong that the hive is getting 

 crowded before time to put on the supers, it may then very 

 readily spare a frame or two of brood to assist those which are 

 not so far advanced. 



Dr. Miller's Plan. — Since Dr. Miller perhaps holds the 

 world's record of average production per colony, his system has 

 attracted wide notice among the bee-keepers of the world at 

 large. As before mentioned he uses the eight-frame Langstroth 



