168 



NINTH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE 



I find it is advisable to put a little 

 wax in, with a ibrush or something, 

 upon that staple, otherwise the bees 

 will cut away tihe foundation from 

 that point, leaving a deficiency in the 

 comb. Also, wftiere the crossing comes, 

 those spots I also attach by the (brush, 

 with a little melted wax. It has this 

 advantage over the other system, 

 where these wires become slackened, 

 our comb foundation has a tendency 

 to sag. This way, with those wires 

 tied in the ceniter, it gives it tihe 

 strongest tension right where you 

 want the weigftit. That part of it is 

 a grand, good feature. 



Again, the staple method of wiring 

 prevents the tendency of a loose ten- 

 sion, from the fact that, while you wire 

 through the wood, the wire soon cuts 

 into the wood, and gives you a slack 

 wire. In this way, there is no chance 

 to do tlhat. I tried this method on 25 

 hives, and I will own that for me, 

 taking tihe length of time to put in the 

 nail, bend the staple, and put in the 

 wires, that I couldn't make fifteen min- 

 utes difference in time on the 25 hives. 

 It takes less time after those are put 

 in to flnislh the wiring than in the 

 other way. 



Dr. Bohrer — Do you deem two wires 

 BUfiicient? 



Mr. France — I believe they are. 



Mr. Miles — It was up to the con- 

 vention here two years ago, and I 

 wired 25 hives tlhat way, and I had the 

 foundation sag, and' I got the poorest 

 combs that way I ever got. Tfhey 

 sagged w^ith ime right between the two 

 wares. "With the few I used as upper 

 stories I got fair results, but I used 

 most of them for brood-chambers. 

 Last year I went back to wiring on 

 three wires and putting in staples. I 

 found a great deal less sagging than 

 with this system. 



Mr. Kretchmer — There was one re- 

 mark which I desire to reply to. Mr. 

 SOTithworth made the remark that he 

 objected to the Holtoian frames be- 

 cause he couldn't extract from them. 

 I think that is not the fault of the 

 frame but the fault of the construc- 

 tion of the extracter. If the screen is 

 made so that it will exactly fit be- 

 tween the two projections so as to 

 allow the frame to lie perfectly 

 smooth, there will be no breaking, 

 and consequently the fault is not with 

 the Hoffman frame, but with the ex- 

 tracter. 



Mr. Brown — ^We used that system 

 and the foundation sagged, so that it 

 was practically useless for that pur- 

 pose. Mr. France spoke of the time 

 required in wiring. I have had sever- 

 al frames wired through the wood- 

 work, with three cross wires and two 

 corner-ways, and I have not been able 

 to get from a man any more than 

 from 200 to 250 of those frames in a 

 day's time. After Mr. Morgan had put 

 in the nails I wired 135 in an hour's 

 time. The only principle is to take 

 your bunch of frames, have a place for 

 nailing, drive the nails as fast as you 

 can, and then start in and bend your 

 staples, and do your wiring afterwards. 

 Where the five wires have been put 

 in I have got the best possible combs 

 out of them, but it takes too much 

 time for that, and too much time in 

 fastening the foundation. If you are 

 going to draw combs you must have a 

 good honey fiow. 



As far as using the Hoffman frame 

 for extracting, it is not merely the 

 fact of the frame not working right 

 in the extracter, but it does not work 

 right at any time all the way through 

 for a good many men; and I have 

 noticed a great many of the larger 

 bee-keepers use a n on -spacing frame. 



Mr. Morgan — In regard to the wir- 

 ing of the frame, I want to say that I 

 use two wires only, like the one shown 

 by Mr. Southworth. This year I used 

 500 of those frames, and I don't think 

 there was a single frame which sag- 

 ged or broke down in the 500. I had 

 a young man wiring the frames for me, 

 and he would wire three a minute and 

 put in the nails. We used the frames 

 not only with full swarms, but in the 

 upper and lower stories, and with 

 good STicces's in every case. I use two 

 different makes of foundation so that 

 I know whether an ordinary founda- 

 tion will work nicely in that class of 

 frame with that wiring. I am not so 

 prejudiced against the Hoffman frame 

 as some, although I believe it has no 

 particular advantage over the ordi- 

 nary frame. 



Dr. Jones — I would like to hear Mr. 

 Poppleton explain a scheme which he 

 has, which I think beats them all as 

 far as sagging is concerned. 



Mr. Poppleton — Some six or eight 

 years ago a gentleman in California 

 sent me a permit to use his patent, 

 and it is the finest I have ever used, 

 but on account of it being patented 



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