V 
and its Economic Management. 273 
store to far better purpose than the new and fragile combs, 
while the others may constantly be passed through the 
brood chamber to keep them in condition, there can be no 
question as to the greater economy in using breeding 
combs for extracting purposes. 
With plenty of store combs and the “ safety valve” 
below, the bees cannot well be idle if there is anything 
to be gathered. A common practice is to lift the 
upper storey and place another under, but where excluder 
zinc is used the brood nest is always retained at the 
bottom; hence the bee-keeper’s manipulations are much 
restricted. 
No Bees Brushed from Combs. 
When removing completed sets, let it be done during 
the busy hours of the day, when the few bees therein will 
soon leave if piled up in a room with large windows 
arranged as explained under Bee-houses.* This, to my 
mind, is far better than using bee-escapes to supers, and if 
a bee-house is not available, a large box or other case can 
easily be set up to answer the same purpose. Another 
way is to shake the bees from the combs, using a feather 
for the stragglers ; and still another, with shallow frames 
when fixed securely, is that first adapted to modern hives 
by James Heddon, of Dowagiac, Mich., who had not the 
slightest knowledge that his “shaking out” process had 
been long practised in this country with fixed combs, 
where we call it “throwing.” Still another method of 
clearing supers is that employed with the Double Conqueror 
hive. 
Empty sets of combs must be in readiness to give the 
bees where more room may be required, and when full 
* This item, given in the same words in my earliest and following 
editions of this work, has quite recently been offered in the American 
Bee Journals as a new method of removing surplus. 
T 
