208 



THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW. 



rain, out of the wind, out of the reach of 

 thieves, implemeuts and bees close together, 

 and last but not least, out of the reach of 

 robber bees. The annoyance from robbers 

 is the one great cause of irritability among 

 the bees of an apiary, and I want to tell you 

 that if you have a colony that is so con- 

 founded mean that you expect to be stung 

 even when using a smoker, set it in the house 

 apiary and the bees will behave perfectly ; 

 it would almost be safe to open the liive 

 without smoke. 



A house apiary ought to have its doors 

 and windows so arranged that Che house can 

 be made perfectly dark when desired. 



The floor upon which the hives rest may 

 be connected with the walls, but the central 

 portion of the floor ought to be disconnected 

 from that upon the hives rest. This allows 

 one end of the building to be used for a shop 

 and the other for a honey house. 



Make the building about one-third larger 

 than it is expected that it will be needed and 

 fill the walls with sawdust. The second 

 story will be found valuable for all kinds of 

 storage room. Have an outside stairway to 

 this second floor and there may also be an 

 inside stairway or a trap door. 



When a swarm is issuing it can be quickly 

 discovered by any one inside the building 

 on account of the peculiar roaring that may 

 be heard all over the room. 



The main objection to a house apiary is 

 that the bees, especially the queens, in 

 returning, enter the wrong entrances where 

 the hives are so close together. I found 

 more queenless colonies than I ever had out- 

 doors. I had four different figures in four 

 dififerent colors painted around the en- 

 trances, and the bees certainly learned them. 

 Every fourth entrance was alike, and when 

 stragglers came back from where a swarm 

 had been hived, and did not enter their own 

 hive, they were almost certain to go into the 

 fourth entrance which was like their own in 

 form and color. 



On the whole, I think the house apiary, 

 when rightly made and managed, is, in many 

 localities, a thing of comfort and profit. 

 It is an easy thing to pack colonies for win- 

 ter, and after being packed I can see what 

 splendid advantages can be gained from 

 stove heat on the inside during extremely 

 cold weather ; although I have never exper- 

 imented with this feature as my out-apiary 

 is six miles away. 



DowAGiAO, Mich. July 80. J8;»l. 



Cleaning up Empty Combs. 



PELHAM & WILLIAMS. 



J'AVING about a thousand empty 

 combs from which the honey had 

 been extracted, we were desirous of 

 having them cleaned up quickly and put 

 away in the comb closet for the winter, but 

 the bees seemed to think there was no hurry, 

 at any rate they were provokingly slow. The 

 combs were hung in supers and put on top 

 of the hivGS and tiered up four and five high, 

 but as a little honey was coming in, it being 

 the latter part of September, the bees would 

 collect the cleanings in the central combs of 

 each super leaving only the outer combs dry. 

 Finally a large box was procured that would 

 hold four or five dozen Langstroth frames in 

 two tiers. This was set in the rear of a col- 

 ony and connected with the hive by a tin 

 tube an inch and a half in diameter and 

 about eight inches long. The box was hung 

 full of combs and covered with a heavy cot- 

 ton cloth, a board cover to keep out rain be- 

 ing propped up several inches above the 

 cloth. The bees seemed to think: "Well, 

 this is somebody else's store house we have 

 got into and we'll just take what we can get 

 and carry it home." At any rate they 

 cleaned up extractor combs and unfinished 

 sections very rapidly. 



The tin tubes are readily made from old 

 fruit cans by unsoldering the joints and roll- 

 ing the tin about a^ round stick. They 

 should be a little over size so that when com- 

 pressed and put ill the holes they will spring 

 out and fit tightly. 



We prefer the large box to a stack of su- 

 pers as it will hold sections either loose or in 

 the racks, or cappings in shallow boxes or 

 anything from which we want honey cleaned 

 off by the bees. Two or three of these "clean 

 ups" make quick work of the usual fall job 

 of putting away empty combs for the winter. 

 The arrangement is due to the ingenuity of 

 Mr. M. L. Williams. 



Maysville, Ky., July 1.^), 1891. 



[i have frequently seen this condition of 

 things when I wished to have sections 

 cleaned up and have succeeded by stacking 

 them up out of doors, in supers, and allow- 

 ing the bees to enter through a small en- 

 trance. If a large entrance is given, so 

 many bees will crowd in that, in their quar- 

 rels to see who shall have the spoils, some of 

 the combs will be literally torn to pieces. If 

 only one or two bees can pass through the 

 entrance at a time, no such results will oc- 



