98 



THE BEE KEEPERS' REVIEW. 



civilization is not a great eham ; honest, in- 

 difstrious citizens starving in the midst of 

 wasting abundance ; adulteration and fraud 

 in nearly every thing we buy or use ; and 

 the statues running over with laws forbid- 

 ding all these things. Well, I guess that 

 whsn adulteration gets so common and so 

 dangerous that we dare buy nothing in the 

 markets to eat, for fear of being poisoned to 

 death at once, that we will be compelled to 

 turn a new leaf and construct a " new heav- 

 en " and a new earth (the co-operative com- 

 mon wealth) wherein merit and well-doing 

 will be the only recognized road to distinc- 

 tion and success. 



FoKESTViLLE, Minn. March 2, 1894. 



Needed Improvements in Bee -Escapes — 

 Can they be Secured ? 



U. O. AIKIN. 



NO doubt many 

 are watching 

 for A report from 

 me as to escapes. 

 Thfc Porters sent 

 iiie escapes having 

 two exits, and one 

 witli a dozen or 

 more. I at once 

 pronounced these 

 no improvement 

 over their regular 

 form. I also re- 

 ceived from Mr. Stead, of Canada, a sample 

 of his new escape. The Stead escape is 

 formed of a numl)er of little gates hinged 

 above, and so arranged as to be placed in the 

 edge of the escape board, thus allowing the 

 bees to pass to the outside of the hive and 

 down the front to the entrance. Of course 

 it can be made of as much capacity as de- 

 sired by putting in more gates. The direc- 

 tions are to put it on with the gates fastened 

 so the bees cannot get out till they are very 

 anxious, then let them out. The gates swing 

 outward, so they cannot return. 



The season and circumstances have been 

 such that I could not make any very exten- 

 sive experiments, nor anything decisive. 



When I wrote upon the subject of escapes 

 some mouths ago (see April last No. of the 

 Review, page ;t2) it seems that the Porters 

 and others gathered the idea that 1 thought 



larger outlets was all that was needed. I did 

 say that the Porter could not do the work 

 fast enough, and say so yet. I also tried to 

 make it plain that something else other than 

 enlarged outlets was needed to make a suc- 

 cessful escape. 



I have removed thousands of supers plac- 

 ing them on end on the ground, leaning them 

 against the hive, placing them on the hive 

 top or in stacks in the open air while the 

 bees left them. When so treated the bees 

 usually leave them in from a half hour to an 

 hour and a half of time. This of course can 

 only be done when robbers do not bother, or 

 when not too cool. If the i ees will leave 

 when so treated, cannot an escape be devised 

 that will work equally rapid ? That some 

 one might develop the necessary apparatus 

 was why I wrote my former articles on the 

 subject. 



All observing apiarists know that when a 

 bee wants to get out of a super, she wants to 

 get out, and will go out in a hurry ; but if she 

 cannot get out then her hurry gets over 

 with. 



Now if the Stead escape be well construct- 

 ed, I think it will do the work fairly well at 

 times. However it will not work well in cool 

 weather where the Porter would work. The 

 Stead cuts the communication between the 

 super bees and those in the hive, while the 

 Porter does not. Just how they communi- 

 cate I do not know ; but I think the com- 

 plete separation is one of the points that 

 must not be over looked in the successful 

 escape. 



The Porter I think is the best all things 

 considered ; but will not work fast enough 

 because it is a pliysical impossibiltiy. Yet 

 if we enlarge the outlet we make communi- 

 cation more direct, and so they feel at home 

 and do not try to get out till they would 

 naturally want to fly or go to the brood nest. 



I have watched bees passing out through a 

 small exit , ell-mell, and find that less than 

 100 pass p r minute. My observation leads 

 me to believe that when bees know the road, 

 and follow each other ttirough in single file, 

 and at a natural pace, they will not exceed 

 25 per minute. That means 1,500 per hour, 

 thus requiring about three hours to pass a 

 pound of bees at a fairly regular and intelli- 

 gent movement. 



In putting comb honey supers on escapes, 

 an intelligent use of the smoker will leave 

 l)ut few bees in the super to start with ; but 

 a full depth extracting super is not so. The 



