10 



GLEAXIXGS IX BEE CULTURE. 



JAN. 



dom we move them, that the exi>ense, as a 

 whole, is but trirtin?, to fasten the fri'nes 

 when we want them fast. The woo:! slides 

 easily on the metal vabb?t. bat h\ setting the 

 fiMuies down, bees will be cut in two in 

 great numbers, if we attempt to handle them 

 as rapidly as we do the metal frames." 



I believe my two friends made no reply to 

 this ; one of them afterward admitted that 

 he and Doolittle did kill some bees, but 

 seemed to think it but a small matter com- 

 paratively. Xow Jam not going to kill my 

 bees, no matter how slowly I am compelled 

 to work. You all know how much I like to 

 cheapen the articles we use about the apia- 

 ry, if we can have them good ; well, I know 

 there are a great many of you, who, like 

 friend C, would prefer a nice nailed frame, 

 if it was very much cheaper. It is not a 

 new subject to me for I have studied for 

 years, on some plan of making a strong and 

 stiff nailed frame, of thin strips of pine 

 without any of the clumsy triangular corner 

 blocks, so generally used. After my friends 



had gone, I —I shall have to explain that 



when the boys see me walking round our 

 central stairway, they say a new bee hive, or 

 honey extract^^r, is under way. Well, I 

 walked round the stairway, and woke uo 

 and planned frames in the middle of the 

 night, until I worked out the frame below. 

 I think I deserve a little credit here, for I 

 knew while working at it, that if I succeed- 

 ed, it would spoil, in a measure, part of our 

 business — the manufacture of our metal cor- 

 ners. You that have the foot power saws, 

 can make them yourselves, very readily. 



A represents a finished frame, and inside 

 of it. our engraver has shown you an en- 

 larged view of the top of one of the side bars 

 C, and one end of the top bar B. The nar- 

 row neck of B is simply driven into the 

 end of C, and fastened with the slender brad 

 shown in the cut. The engraving is so plain, 

 that you will all doubtless know how to go 

 to work. Get some nice straight grained 

 pine, and have it dressed accurately to i. 

 You had better make a brass gauge and 

 send it to the planing mill ; tell them to 

 plane the stuff so the gauge will just crowd 

 over it. The lumber should be the best sea- 

 soned you can find. We pay about S30.00 

 per M., for ours, already dressed. For the 

 top bars, cut off lengths exactly 19i inches ; 

 for the bottoms, 17|, and for the ends, 9i. 

 These dimensions must be exact ; thev must 

 not vary the tiiickness of a sheet of 'paper. 

 It is just as easy t-o cut them exact as to do 

 it any other way. if you only ''attend to your 

 business." and if your saw is not inclined to 

 go just right, make it your business to make- 

 it go just right, before you commence cut- 

 ting up your boards. I think the best way 



to out boards all of a length, is to fasten a 

 smooth bar just as far away from, the saw, 

 as ctie boards are to be long. First cat your 

 boards off short enough to handle them; 

 make the end stnught and square, and then 

 hold it dose up to tliis gauge, wliile you cut 

 off the lengtlis. 



Now for the notches; this looks very for- 

 midable, at first, but it is very e^xsily, and 

 quickly done. We will sort out all the boards 

 for the end pieces first. Make a gro^^^ve clear 

 across the end like C, with a wabbling saw, 

 such as I iiave told you how to fix, several 

 times. This groove should be about i inch 

 wide, a little less if any thin^; the depth 

 should be just i inch, if that is to be the 

 thickness of your top bar. Of course, we are 

 next to cut the four grooves in each of the 

 top bar boards. Your saw is to be set with 

 less wabble, that it may cut just the tiiick- 

 ness of the end bars. We decided on a lit- 

 tle less than i of an inch for this. The depth 

 is to be so as to leave j ust enough wood in 

 the center for it to drive hard, into the end 

 bars. Raising and lowering your saw table, 

 will gauge this to a hair's breadth, if you are 

 only careful. When your pieces "are all 

 grooved, you have notliing to do but rip otf 

 the strips just the right thickness. I have 

 said nothing about the bottom bar and bot- 

 tom corners, but you can make them in the 

 same way, or as we do our section box stuff 

 and metal cornered frames. Such frames 

 can be made for 2i cents each, and the work 

 should be nice and exact, for that price, 



DEPOSITORY OF 



Pmh 



Or Lietters from Those ^.Vho Have Made 

 ♦ Bee Culture a, Fciiture. 



^"^^OU will have to put me in "Blasted Hopes." I 



ir have about 3.000 lbs. of thick well ripened hon- 



^ ey, and ean sell it for 10c only, at retail. I will 



hare to advertise you in GcHANTNas, for humbug^iaa" 



me; you recomTiiendod cheese cloth for strainer? 



and T could not force my honey throuarh with my 



hands, but it was all sealed. W. B. Coluns. 



Ar-ow Rock, Mo., Nov. 20th, 1877. 



You might put some water with it, the way 

 milk men do, friend C, but on the whole, 

 I think it would be a better way to keep 

 it in a warm room, until it will run through 

 the cheese cloth. Make j^our cloth into a 

 deep bag, and the weight of the honey will 

 force it through. It just occurs to me that 

 we do not quite belong in this department, 

 but I can find nobody else to put here. I 

 wonder if it is true that people who make 

 failures don't say anything about it. 



Some 5 or 6 years ag'o I was badly affected with 

 fever. It was what 1 call B. fever. Well you see, I 

 boug-ht up all the bees I could, and in my first exper- 

 ience in transferring- 1 g-ot wounded on the end of my 

 nose. My j?ood wife, on being calleil, broug-ht me- 

 some water in a tea cup, and I plunged my nose as 

 near the bottom of the cup as was possible, so my 

 nose, for the time, was out of the reach of bees. This 

 was an evil omen. The second year I had about 50 

 stands, and then commenced the seourge among them. 

 The next season I was able to put only 33 into winter 

 quarters, and but 3 came out in the spring. In the 

 fall I had but four, the next spring.O. Tliis, with all 

 the stings, and trials of poor Italian queens, trjnng 

 to get the strij>e on my blacks, and returning symp- 

 toms of fever from time to time, coursing through 

 my bones deserves to me a place in "Blasted Hopes." 



