THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW 



207 



a young queen reared in an upper story 

 on the Wright plan, results might be dif- 

 ferent and better. 



We got much better average results by 

 hiving on foundation. Even in the latter 

 case the Doolittle plan of building up an 

 immense force by abundant room and 

 •'millions of honey in our house" is grand, 

 but 1 think it may be better to leave out 

 the excluder, if we intend hiving on foun- 

 dation or starters, or, if we hive on the 

 combs, pick out a hive full containing little 

 or no brood. 1 will also add our modifi- 

 cation of the Doolittle method: When we 

 find a colony preparing to swarm before 

 the flow comes, (and we like to have some 

 such colonies) we often treat it on the 

 Sibbald plan, merely to get a young lay- 

 ing queen on the old stand, or we add 

 some features of the Alexander plan for 



mating first put the old queen, some 

 bees and emerging brood in a hive on a 

 new stand, and then on the old stand pre- 

 pare an Alexander mating pile, as de- 

 scribed in my article of January 1907, 

 and by Mr. Alexander himself. The 

 queens when mated and laying are an 

 acquisition, you may be sure. Now that 

 the flow has arrived we will make forced 

 swarms, as does Mr. Gill and many 

 others, hiving on one comb of brood and 

 starters, or a comb of honey in each out 

 side of the hive. If foul brood is present 

 use no comb in the forced swarm. 



Some seasons bees persist in building 

 drone-comb; in such a season perhaps we 

 must use full sheets of wired foundation 

 as we did do largely during 1906. 



Meridian, Idaho, Feb. 1 1. 1907. 



Helpful Hints in Extensive 

 Bee-Keeping. 



E. D. TOWNSEND. 



rr/ WO years ago we bought three Cowan 

 T extractors of the four-basket size. 

 Previous to that we had managed to get 

 along with two-basket machines. We 

 have never been sorry we made the 

 change, and we expect the next ones we 

 buy will be the six-frame size, fitted with 

 both hand crank and pu41ey attachment 

 for power. We have never had any ex- 

 perience with gasoline engines, so you see, 

 if the pesky thing does not work, why 

 just take hold of the crank, and there you 

 are, 



ADVANTAGES OF A LARGE EXTRACTOR. 



With a two-frame machine we were 

 always waiting for that extractor; this 

 seemed to regulate the amount we could 

 extract. This size may be large enough 

 where one works alone, but. even then, 



when the baskets are full, it does not 

 take any longer to throw the honey out of 

 four combs than it does two. A four- 

 frame machine will throw out all the 

 honey a good lively man can uncap. A 

 second man can feed the machino. take 

 the combs from the extractor and put 

 them into the upper stories ready to go 

 back to the bees, or be piled away for 

 future use. Of course, he turns the ex- 

 tractor and empties the honey, while a 

 third man brings the honey in from the 

 hives. The four-frame machine is about 

 right for a three-man crew— a very good 

 size. The two-frame is hardly large 

 enough for one man to work to best ad- 

 vantage. 



Mr. H. H. Root, the junior member of 

 the A. 1. Root Co.. vv'as here last summer 



