AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Ill 



placed on the stand where the box-hive 

 stood. Repeat this operation until you 

 have filled your frames from the best 

 comb in the old hive. 



You will now have a lot of scraps of 

 comb left, containing more or less 

 honey ; these should be placed in a 

 shallow pan, and placed in the upper 

 part of the hive on top of the frames, 

 leaving a small hole at the back end of 

 frames for the bees to come up. They 

 will soon find it, and carry it below 

 where it will be of value to them. Cover 

 or close the top of the hive tightly, 

 shake the remaining bees from the old 

 box down in front of the hive, also those 

 in the box you used to get them out of 

 the box-hive, and the work is done. 



After the bees have cleaned out the 

 refuse combs, you have a nice lot of 

 comb to make into wax. This should 

 be attended to at once, as it is valuable, 

 and becoming more so every year. We 

 have wax extractors, but if you do not 

 care to purchase one, you can put all 

 your comb into a stout porous bag — 

 burlap is good — place a piece of board in 

 the bottom of your wash boiler, put in 

 your bag of comb, and place a weight on 

 this to keep it under water. 



Fill your boiler with water, and boil it 

 for an hour or more. Turn the bag over 

 occasionally, and when done, set the 

 whole thing off to cool. When cool you 

 will have a beautiful cake of yellow wax 

 on top of the water. You cannot burn 

 your wax in this way. You can remelt 

 and cake in any form you desire. — 

 Michigan Farmer. 



Fremont, Mich. 



SiiMer aM Fall Management of Bees, 



C. J. ROBINSON. 



In most sections of the temperate zone, 

 July is, for bee-culture, the deciding 

 month— stamping the character of the 

 year either as good, middling, or bad. It 

 is the real "harvest moon" of the bees. 

 The colony which is to prove profitable 

 to its owner, must gradually diminish 

 the amount of brood it contains, and 

 direct its energies chiefly to the accumu- 

 lation of stores. This is, indeed, the 

 habit of the bees, though they sometimes 

 fail to observe it. 



Should the weather be moist, and 

 hence better suited to foster brood- 

 rearing than honey-gathering, the queen 

 will continue to lay eggs freely, the 

 larvae will be carefully nursed, and even 

 drone brood regarded with favor. Then, 



if pasturage suddenly fails, the cells 

 vacated by the maturing young will 

 remain empty, and the approach of 

 Winter will find the colony illy prepared 

 to endure the long confinement that 

 awaits them. The bee-keeper should 

 endeavor by all possible means to ob 

 viate such results. His policy and his 

 management must be regulated accord- 

 ing to the weather prevalent during the 

 month. If it be dry, and permits the 

 bees to gather honey plentifully, his 

 main concern will be to furnish them 

 with room for garnering their stores, 

 by giving them access to surplus cases, 

 and placing supers on his smaller hives. 



But if his bees are in movable-frame 

 hives, he can best aid them and secure 

 his own interest by removing some of 

 the full combs and replacing them with 

 empty ones ; thus*saving them the labor 

 of building combs, and enabling them to 

 direct all their energies to the gathering 

 of supplies. 



The rapidity with which they can 

 gather honey must determine the 

 quantity which may be taken away ; 

 and while the pasture continues good, 

 they will only labor the more assiduously 

 if empty cells be constantly within their 

 reach. This serves, in reality, to stimu- 

 late their industry ; whereas, when they 

 are conscious of possessing an abun- 

 dance, they are apt to remit their 

 exertions, and cease to labor with an 

 activity proportioned to their numbers. 



The rapid gathering of honey neces- 

 sarily tends to restrict brood-rearing 

 because the cells are supplied with 

 nectar as soon as the young bees emerge, 

 and the queen has none, or few, in which 

 to deposit eggs. 



If I understand Mr. Doolittle, he 

 claims to possess bees which have 

 reasoning faculties, special instinct, or 

 habit, or he has educated them to do 

 wonderful things in the line of breeding 

 early in the season, and up to the time 

 when the honey harvest is ready to 

 boom — then the queens take a Summer 

 vacation (?). 



Of course a strain of bees possessing 

 the merit claimed by Mr. D., should take 

 the lead in the queen market, over even 

 that really most meritorious race of bees 

 — the Alpine Carniolans. 



If the weather be warm and wet, and 

 pasturage scarce, the bee-keeper must 

 endeavor to check brood-rearing as 

 much as possible. It is better that bees 

 — especially young colonies — should be 

 constrained to fill a limited (small) space 

 thoroughly with comb and stores, than 

 that they be permitted to expend honey 

 in extending downward, or on numbers 



