r 



ne (Dee -|\^(f peps 



A MONTHLY JOURNAL 

 Devoted to the Interests of Honey Producers. 



\^hj 



:1.00 A YEAR. 



W. Z. HUTCHINSON. Editor and Publisher. 



VOL. XX. FLINT, MICHIGAN, FEB. 15, 1907. NO. 2 



A Flea for Si 



ive 



W. Z. HUTCHINSON. 



"OEFORE talking- about hive-construc- 

 ■^-^ tion, 1 wish tc mention a few criti- 

 cisms or suggestions that have come in 

 on the making cf frames, the wiring of 

 them, and the putting in of foundation. 



Wm. Muth-Rasmussen, of California. 

 suggests that, to save room, my machine 

 for piercing end- bars may be made so 

 that ;t could be fastened into a vise, or 

 hoited to a work-bench, thus doing away 

 with the long base-board wh^ch takes up 

 so much room. The suggestion is a good 

 one, but 1 had no bench nor vjse, and 

 had to make the machine to fit my 

 environments. 



OIL FOR LURRICATING AWLS WHEN PIERCING 

 FRAMES. 



Mr. Muth-Rasm.ussen also says that, 

 with the lumber that he has to deal with 

 in California, the oiling of the awls would 

 make the work much easier. Under the 

 point of each awl, in the bed of the 

 machine, he would have a small hole, 

 perhaps U inch in diameter, filling the 



holes with cotton or sponge saturated 

 with oil, thus the point of each awl would 

 be lubricated with each stroke. The 

 California pine is much harder than our 

 white pine, and such an arrangement 

 might be all right for that kind of lumber. 

 Our white pine is so soft >hat the awls 

 pierce it very easily. 



Mr. H. H. Stewart, of Emerson, Illinois, 

 says that three horizontal wires are as 

 good as four. Perhaps they are. I never 

 tried that number. If a man is not going 

 to hive swarms upon sheets of founda- 

 tion, nor extract honey from new combs, 

 nor move bees about the country, then 

 there is no use for wires at all. If 

 he is going to do any of these things, then 

 wires are needed. Just how few would 

 answer I don't know. The help that these 

 wires a-e when extracting from a new 

 comb is something that 1 fear has not 

 been given sufficient importance. I feel 

 tha four wires are none too many when 

 vi'=wed in that light. 



