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pensate for the loss of solar heat by 

 conduction. By this operation I in- 

 creased the flow of wax a hundred 

 fold — and it was as free from impuri- 

 ties as if the sun alone had done the 

 work. 



The advent of cold weather put a 

 stop to these operations, leaving me 

 several hundred pounds of wax un- 

 rendered. I dumped the whole into a 

 large water tanlc heated by a fiu-nace. 

 After the mass was all melted down, 

 cooled, and rid of the substrata im- 

 purities, I remelted it in drj- heat with 

 a high temperature, leaving the melted 

 wax to run through a close wire 

 strainer into hot water. 



Fasteniug Frames In tlie Hive. 



In my article on page 519, I spoke of 

 fastening the comb frames from the in- 

 side of the hive to keep them in place ; 

 but since then I have nnicli improved 

 on that plan, and now I fasten them 

 from the outside with wire nails about 

 1| inches long, leaving the liead end 

 of the hail exposed nearlj' half an inch. 

 In the inside the nails are forced into 

 a groove of the upper cross piece of 

 the frame, that is made for the narrow 

 strip to hold the foundation or starter. 

 The holes in the hive to receive the 

 nails are made large enough so that 

 they can be puslied or forced in with 

 but little resistance. 



I am now reconstructing all of my 

 upper stories in that waj-, as I go 

 along in exclianging combs in extract- 

 ing. With a tin gauge the boles are 

 always made true to their place, and 

 made with rapiditj*. This arrange- 

 ment will always give us nice, uniform 

 combs, and save time and comb in 

 capping and extracting, etc. 



Exposed Honey and Robbing. 



Will honey exposed in an apiary 

 cause robbing and a demoralization of 

 the bees ? I paid considerable atten- 

 tion to this subject, and finally came 

 to the conclusion that honey can be 

 exposed with impunity under peculiar 

 circumstances. 



Perhaps it ni.ay shock some people 

 to tell them that I often feed back re- 

 fuse honey to the bees in the open air, 

 such as extracted cappings, unwashed 

 hone3--vessels, etc. But I only do this 

 under a healthy government of my 

 apiary, under the assurance that all 

 my hives are well supplied with honey, 

 and this refuse lioney is never exposed 

 near a hive. A liungry dog is always 

 a thief. 



But mark this precaution : When I 

 pile up three or four stories of ex- 

 tracted comb over a hive that has 

 storage for honey, to have them clean- 

 ed out, I always lessen the entrance of 

 the hive. This is to prevent robbing. 

 Now in this there is no contradiction. 



The fact is, you may expose a barrel 

 of honey in the woods away from any 

 apiary, and bees will take it away, but 

 molest none of their neighboring liives 

 on that account. 



In a good honej' season, when bees 

 are busy gathering lioney from flowers, 

 such an exposure of refuse honey will 

 not attract them, unless it may be a 

 few smooth-back, lazy bees that wear 

 themselves out in the friction of steal- 

 ing. At one time, in the honey sea- 

 son, I placed a piece of comb full of 

 honey near the entrance of a hive. In 

 a week 1 removed it, and found the 

 honey still in the comb. 



It is true that I have had honey e.x- 

 posed, and it appeared that the rob- 

 bers made a raid on several hives at 

 the same time ; but after an investiga- 

 tion I found that' the cause was not as 

 much in the honey that was exposed, 

 as in some defect in the unfortunate 

 colonies that were assailed, as being 

 queenless, weak, that were already in a 

 starving condition, or molested by 

 moth, etc. 



It is a good rule, as soon as a hive is 

 raided by robbers, not onl}' to lessen 

 the outlet, but see what is wrong with 

 the hive itself. A healthy colony of 

 bees is always respected. I had one 

 colony the past summer that had not 

 much more than a handful of bees. All 

 summer long it struggled for existence 

 and for an increase. But the colony 

 was health}' and well organized, and 

 notwithstanding its rich neighbors, it 

 was by them never molested in the 

 least. But let any morbid influence 

 be brought to bear on that little col- 

 ony, the robbers by some intuition 

 will soon find it out, and in less than 

 an hour clean it out entirely. 



Defenders and Fighters of a Colony. 



There is another interesting subject 

 in connection with the bees, that has 

 recently attracted my attention and 

 that is, which are the defenders and 

 fighters of a colony ? Are they a dis- 

 tinct class of bees assigned for that 

 function, or are all workers warriors 

 when the occasion demands it ? 



I am inclined to believe that each 

 colony has a standing army full of 

 fight and viciousness. This array in 

 some liives is very numerous, in others 

 of a very limited number. It is this 

 that gives temper to a colony. I have 

 some that are so vicious that it is witli 

 the greatest difticulty that anything 

 can be done with them ; otliers so 

 docile and harmless that the}- hardlj' 

 show any resistance in handling. 



But what made me in particular 

 think that the fighters of a colonj' are 

 a distinct class, was the way the bees 

 conducted themselves that happen to 

 get inside of my honey-house, where 

 the extracting is done. Those that 



follow me in, on the warpath, would 

 buzz around me, and often sting me 

 even two days after their captivity ; 

 but those that got in simply for plun- 

 der, were harmless, and manifested no 

 resistance by any handling, except they 

 should be accidentally pressed by the 

 fingers. These two classes I repeat- 

 edly held as prisoners for several days, 

 in order to watch their actions in re- 

 gard to this matter. I do not know 

 that there is any physical difference 

 between them, as I never made a 

 microscopic examination of the two ; 

 but I might do so in some future time. 



That the stinger in the worker is 

 conclusive that it is a fighting bee, 

 does not make it so ; otherwise the 

 queen would be as belligerent as some 

 of the rest. In defending a hive it ap- 

 pears that the drones mix up some in 

 the melee, but only as a set of noisy 

 bull-dosers. 



Austin, Texas. 



MOISTURE. 



Its Effects on Bees in Cellars 

 Easily Avoided. 



Written for the Bee-Keepers^ Review 



BY U. L. TAYLOK. 



So far as I have been able to dis- 

 cover, there is nothing that would lead 

 me to suppose that moisture afleets the 

 welfare of bees in any respect differ- 

 entljf from the manner in which it 

 operates upon the well-being of the 

 larger animals. The problem in- 

 volved in "Moisture" seems to me not 

 to be a difficult one if we remember 

 two facts, viz : that heat expels mois- 

 ture ; and that moisture furnishes an 

 excellent medium for the escape of 

 heat. So, it is evident that, in the dis- 

 cussion of this question, these two 

 elements must be taken as independ- 

 ent ; that is, what might be an injuri- 

 ous amount of moisture in one case 

 might be perfectly harmless in another, 

 owing to the existence of a higher 

 temperature. 



And it is plain that this matter of 

 heat presents two aspects, viz : the in- 

 ternal heat, so to speak, of the clus- 

 tered colon}', and the temperature of 

 the surrounding atmosphere. Each 

 should be taken as complementary of 

 the other — the higher the one, the 

 lower the other may be permitted to 

 be. The well-fed, fat and vigorous ox 

 throws ofl' the moisture left on his sleek 

 hide by a shower, in clouds of vapor, 

 even in a low teinpei'ature ; while an 

 ox of low vitality, ill-fed and lean, in 

 the same temperature would remain 

 wet and shivering ; but if the tempera- 

 ture were sufficiently raised he would 

 throw ofl' the moisture equally as well 



