THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW. 



183 



plus that might otherwise be secured. 

 In fact, some farmers around here who 

 keep a few colonies run them on this plan. 

 One who lives less than a mile from me 

 keeps from ten to thirty colonies, and 

 usually does not secure enough surplus 

 for his own use, some seasons, when I 

 have had a fair crop. He has not had a 

 pound of surplus unless he "took up" 

 some colonies in the fall. Now, for all I 

 know, it may be natural for even strong 

 colonies to hesitate or seem to dislike to 

 build comb from full sheets in the upper 

 stories. But what 1 regard as curious in 

 regard to the matter is the fact that, after 

 the combs had been drawn out, filled, and 

 extracted, the bees seemed still to have 

 an aversion or dislike for them. If the 

 upper story contained part of these new 

 and part natural combs, the latter would 

 be filled and bulged out again before anj- 

 thing was stored in the others, and this 

 without regard to the position the frames 

 occupied. In some instances I put only 

 two natural combs in an upper story, 

 and. though placed on the outside, they 

 would always be filled first, and this con- 

 tinued all through the season after some 

 of the new combs had been extracted 

 from three or four times. But the queens 

 seemed to prefer this foundation comb to 

 lay in. They would, in almost all ca.ses, 

 have it filled with eggs as soon as it was 

 built, and some of them were so keen to 

 get brood started on it that thej' could 

 not wait until the cells were fully drawn 

 out before laying in them. This was a 

 great objection, I found, to having it 

 drawn out below. It made too much 

 room above, occupied with brood. But 

 these new combs, filled solid with brood, 

 were a pretty sight, and they were a fine 

 sight, too, when filled and capped solid 

 full of white honey. The pleasure of 

 seeing and handling these might be 

 classed as one of the things we would 

 not sell for money, even if we could. 



I expected that, when part or nearly all 

 the brood-combs were removed to the 

 upper story, and frames containing full 

 sheets put in their place, it would have a 

 great tendency to check swarming, es- 

 pecially if done before the swarnung 

 fever was acquired; but I found that it 

 had no effect whatever to stop or even 

 hold it back. On the other hand, I be- 

 lieve that, in some cases, it induced 

 swarming that would not have occurred 

 otherwise; for in some instances queeii- 

 cells were at once started in the upper 

 story; and as soon as one of these was 

 sealed a swarm issued, whether they hatl 

 cells below or not. I'sually, though, 

 with strong colonies, as soon as part of 



the brood-combs were placed above, cells 

 were started both above and below. 



With a number of colonies I removed 

 all the brood to the upper story, and fill- 

 ed the lower story with frames containing 

 full sheets; and every colony so treated 

 swarmed. Five of these colonies were 

 in ten-frame hives that I bought a year 

 ago, and one was in a twelve-frame hive. 

 Two of these colonies swarmed before 

 any cells in the upper stories were sealed, 

 and no signs of cells below. 



Some claim that a swarm will never 

 issue with cells in the upper story when 

 there is a queen-excluder between the 

 two stories unless they have also started 

 cells below. But I am absolutely certain 

 that three of my colonies did last season, 

 and I feel morally sure that five or six 

 more did. 



A method that did in all cases prevent 

 strong colonies from swarming, whether 

 they had contracted the swarming fever 

 or not, was to remove all the brood, give 

 empt}' frames below, and use either 

 drawn comb or full sheets in the upper 

 story; and when this was done the bees 

 drew out the foundation more readily 

 than they did when there was brood be- 

 low, probably because they had no in- 

 tention of swarming, and this method 

 gave us the largest amount of surplus of 

 any plan I tried. But almost all the col- 

 onies so treated built a large amount of 

 drone comb below. 



The editor or Gleanings comments as 

 follows: — 



[I have personally tried a good many 

 different ways of wiring. 1 have used 

 the perpendicular and the horizontal plan, 

 wires clo.se together and wires far apart, 

 wires coarse and wires fine. After test- 

 ing, on a large scale, all the different 

 methods, I came to the conclusion that, 

 with medium or light foundation, four 

 Jiorizoiital wires give the best results, 

 all things considered. But in the use of 

 very /i^Q;/il foundation for brood purposes, 

 perpendicular wnQs ahowt 36 gauge and 

 two inches apart gave better results. I 

 believe the time will come when manu- 

 facturers will will put out an extra-light 

 weight of wax with the wires already in- 

 corporatedin it, and so arranged as to 

 hang horizontalU' when the foundation is 

 in the frame. But at the present time 

 the makers are not able to incorporate 

 the wires into such thin sheets without 

 making them cost a great deal more per 

 square foot than the ordinary light brood 

 foundation. 



This question of useless consumers is 

 almost entirely a question of locality. 



