AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



525 



Would there not be a general mixing of 

 the races under the circumstances ? 



One question here for friend Green to 

 answer : Can you explain how it is that 

 Italian queens mated in a yard with 

 dark Carniolans, and, also, dark Carnio- 

 lan queens mated in a yard with Italian 

 drones, both produce only good — yes, 

 beautiful — Italian bees? I wish you 

 would explain this. 



One more point, and I am done. Mr. 

 Green says : 



"To sum the matter up, the "golden 

 Carniolans" have been produced by 

 crossing Carniolans with Italians, then 

 breeding for yellow bees." 



No ; they were not. I deny the state- 

 ment in toto. I have explained how 

 they were produced, and have informed 

 the readers of the Bee Journal of the 

 method by which any one can reach the 

 same results. 



I do not see why such statements 

 should be published. Go and make the 

 experiments according to my advice; 

 then if you cannot produce yellow Car- 

 niolans, it will be in order to dispute my 

 statements. Until this has been done, 

 it seems to me that all who deny my 

 statements are decidedly out of order. 



Now, friends, treat this subject with 

 more fairness. Do not continually cry 

 "fraud " and "humbug," until you have 

 made an attempt, by actual experiment, 

 to disprove my statements. 



Wenham, Mass. 



Frames Instead of Hives. 



G. M. DOOLITTLE. 



I have carefully read over the leader 

 in the last Review, and read thQ article 

 by our friend Gravenhorst over and 

 over again, and have tried to place 

 myself right alongside of friend G. in all 

 of his manipulations, going through 

 them as near as any one can in mind, 

 and in this way trying to get in just the 

 position which he and the editor of the 

 Review occupies, to see if there was in 

 reality a " shorter cut across apicultural 

 fields " than the " round about way " I 

 have been traveling. 



Well, after turning this thing over and 

 over in my mind ; after taking all the 

 steps with friend G. which he takes, and 

 then coming back and taking my own 

 steps over again, I think I see just this 

 difference between the two methods : 

 friend G. and the editor take the "short 

 cut " across the field, while I go around ; 

 but in the field there is a high hill, and 

 they on their " short cut " climb up over 



the hill and down on the other side, 

 while I go around, going perhaps the 

 same distance, but save the climbing up 

 and the holding back coming down 

 which they have to do. 



In other words, I do not see where the 

 average bee-keeper, using the regular 

 Langstroth frame, need do one particle 

 more work to secure the same results 

 that can be obtained with any other 

 hive, while by using this Langstroth 

 hive, which he already has, he saves the 

 climbing up (getting new hives, and 

 making of the same, etc.), and also saves 

 the holding back (necessary cash which 

 such a change of hives will require). 



Knock the bottom-board off the Lang- 

 stroth hive, if it is a fast-bottomed hive, 

 and you can manipulate it to just as 

 good advantage after the bees have been 

 in it a year as you could a box-hive or 

 the Gallup hive, or the divisible brood- 

 chamber, and this I say after having 

 used the divisible brood-chamber hives 

 for the past three years. To tempt me 

 to adopt a thing, the " short cut," when 

 viewed from all sides, must be a short 

 cut, not something that lies parallel all 

 along the way of the long route, yet 

 having a different aspect. When I com- 

 menced to use the shallow frames neces- 

 sary to the divisible brood-chamber, I so 

 made them that should I ever desire to 

 go back, two of them could be put to- 

 gether so as to make one of my regular 

 frames again, and after using them for 

 three years, this Summer found me 

 making the 300 back into 150 again, 

 so that to-day finds me without a single, 

 half-depth frame in my yard. 



Why did I do this ? Because I could 

 not secure any better results, taking all 

 in all, than I could with the others. To 

 be sure I could control swarming almost 

 entirely by a proper manipulation of the 

 brood-chamber ; could shake out the 

 most of the bees and the queen ; could 

 clip the queen-cells, by turning up the 

 hive and driving the bees out of the 

 way with smoke ; could spread the 

 brood by transposing the parts of the 

 hive ; contract the hive for swarms by 

 hiving them in only one part of the 

 brood-chamber ; but when the end of 

 the season came around, I could not see 

 that it took any less work, or that I had 

 a pound more honey to show for it, than 

 by the old way, or with the hives I had 

 been using for the past 20 years ; so I 

 said, "lean see no saving here, but I 

 can see a pile of work and expense in 

 changing hives if I go on and adopt this 

 short-cut (?) plan. 



Now, I will say this, that had I fifty 

 colonies in these divisible brood-chamber 



