THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW. 



11 



titnde, then carefully, slowly, gingerly, peel 

 off the quilt : every snap, and sputter, and 

 tear, of the propolis and brace combs, as they 

 give way, jarring and irritating the bees- 

 why, we could take off three honey-boards 

 to one quilt, and with less irritation to the 

 bees. Perhaps our genial friend can do 

 better with quilts than we can ; we think he 

 could, because we have never used them — 

 seeing others use them satisfied us. J. H. 

 Martin makes a few inquiries about the 

 "shake-out"' function. No, Bro. Martin, 

 we do not walk up to a hive, grasp a super 

 and proceed to shake out its inmates without 

 first driving down most of them with smoke. 

 We then ahake out nearly all that remain : 

 in short, a super of honey for the extractor 

 is freed from bees in exactly the same man- 

 ner as we perform the same act with a case 

 of sections. 



We have still on hand several articles upon 

 " Bee-Hives," some of which may appear in 

 the Feb. Review ; in the meantime, if there 

 are any who feel that the subject has not 

 been exhausted, or that it has not been 

 fairly handled, let them remember that the 

 columns of the Review are always open to 

 any amount of logical reasoning; and let 

 us all remember that the general purpose 

 cow, the general purpose horse, the general 

 purpose sheep, the general purpose fowl, the 

 general purpose bee, the general purpose 

 hive, the general purpose anything can never 

 successfully compete with the special pur- 

 pose article. 



eXT-RKOTEO. 



"According to Nature."— Advantages of 

 Shallow Frames. — Specialization. 



Y A STRA.NGE coincidence the editor 

 of the Reviev,' and the Ajjicultuvist 

 both hit upon "Bee Hives" as a special 

 topic for their .January issues. This number 

 of the A23iciilturist is most excellent, and 

 contains several articles that we would be 

 glad to copy entire, but some short extracts 

 from a few of them is all our space will 

 allow. 



"'Modern apiculture has been called un- 

 natural. That is not the way to put it. By 

 a seemiiifj violation of Nature, man actually 

 turns her to his advantage. He flattens the 

 brood nest. Then the bees, to retain the 

 natural form, fill the frames to the top bar. 



With tlie upper surface of the brood-cluster 

 thus enlarged and pushed up to the top bar, 

 the bees will enter the supers more readily. 

 Bees work best nearest the cluster, and the 

 only way to get rid of the honey they will 

 store in the upper part of the frames, is to 

 flatten the brood-nest. As a rule, this arbi- 

 trary shaping of the brood-nest will not in- 

 terfere with brood production. If the queen 

 cannot do as she would like, she will do the 

 next best thing — go into the farthest verge 

 of the hive if necessary. In cold weather 

 bees draw up into a compact cluster, which 

 six inches of depth accommodates. . . . 

 . . Six years of experience has taught 

 me that 1^2 inches space per frame is too 

 much. An inch in thickness for each comb 

 and a bare bee space between them is right 

 if we wish the combs filled with brood to the 

 top bars." — Geo. F. Rabbins. 



" I began bee keeping with frames 18 

 inches deep ; have gradually cut them down 

 to iy%. In doing so I have met numerous 

 advantages and no very serious disadvan- 

 tages. I think I have gone far enough, but 



do not care to go back I like 



these shallow hives with frames at fixed dis- 

 tances, because by their use nearly all the 

 operations of the apiary may be carried on 

 without handling frames and withoat the 

 use of superfluous fixtures. They can be 

 carried, hauled or shipped from place to 

 place without any fear that the frames will 

 slide together, killing bees and queen, or 

 producing crooked combs. They give that 

 control over the size of the hive and the dis- 

 position of the stores that in other hives is 

 only to be gained by the use of a multitude 

 of appliances and the expenditure of much 

 more time. No doubt some forms of such 

 hives have been somewhat overpraised and 

 advantages claimed that are not completely 

 borne out in practice, but the principle is a 

 valuable one and the shallow, fixed frame 

 hive has come to stay In win- 

 tering outdoors in these hives I use a rough 

 outer box about eight inches larger each way 

 than the hive, and pack with leaves. So 

 prepared they have wintered bees even better 

 than deeper hives under the same conditions. 

 A great deal of paper and ink have been 

 wasted in the effort to prove that bees ought 

 to winter better in deep hives, but theory is 

 one thing and fact another. My experience 

 has been that bees v/intered better in Sim- 

 plicity frames than they did in deeper ones ; 

 and now actual comparison, side by side, 

 shows that they winter still better in a shal- 

 low frame Our business is not 



what it once was. In years of plenty we are 

 met by a host of competitors that, ten years 



aco did not exist The only 



chance for the specialist is in greater special- 

 ization. He must have his methods so sim- 

 plified, so systemized, and his appliances so 

 adapted to their purposes that he can do a 

 larger business than now and yet neglect 

 nothing. The use of the shallow hive, with 

 frames at fixed distances is, I think, a long 

 step in this direction."— J«;/it^.s' .-1. Green. 



M. A. Kelley argues for closed end, stand- 

 ing frames. Z. T. Hawk says that specialists 

 are a bar to the adoption of a "standard" 



