A YEAR'S WORK IN AN OUT-APIARY 59 



that gathered from the field to the sections, this causing the immediate 

 drawing-out of the foundation in the sections, other than the haits, so 

 that there is a start made all along the road toward success within one 

 hour after the bees are shaken from their brood. Here is one of the 

 great advantages of this plan, and one of the things original with it. 

 And I did not realize till one year later, 1906, that, if the bees con- 

 tracted the swarming fever before they were shaken sufficiently to cause 

 the queen to slacken her laying, that it, in a measure, detracted from 

 the plan by her not filling every empty cell with eggs as fast as the 

 bees removed the honey from them to the sections; for till sickness 

 prevented me from doing the "shook swarming" in time I had had 

 no such slackening, as no colonies had advanced far enough for the 

 queen to stop laying in preparation for her flying with the swarm. 

 Therefore, I consider all of the advice given in the past, "to wait about 

 shaking till preparations for swarming are made," as decidedly wrong. 

 But the upper hive of combs keeps the desire to swarm down till it is 

 time to shake for the clover harvest, so there is no need of a failure 

 here if we do our "shook swarming" when it ought to be done. 



Another thing, which I see I failed to mention in any of the ac- 

 counts given of the different visits, which I consider a great help In 

 any apiary, is shade-boards. I am convinced that a colony of bees will 

 do much better work where the hive stands right out in the sun dur- 



A DOOLITTLE SHADE-BOABD. 



ing the whole season, except as it is shielded during the middle of the 

 day by a shade-board. I make this board of half-inch lumber, 20 Inches 

 long, nailed to two strips % thick by 1% wide by 28 inches long, cover- 

 ing the whole with a sheet of 20x28 tin. Roofing-paper will answer 

 nearly as well as the tin, if kept painted. Near one end of the shade- 

 board, and before putting on the tin, I nail, on the under side, a piece 

 of % stuff 6 inches wide by 20 long, nailing down through the board 

 into the edge of this twenty-inch piece. When the board is on the 

 hive, this last-named piece rests, by its lower edge, on the back part to 

 the cover to the hive, while the cleats rest on the front part to the 

 cover. This gives this shade-board a "pitch" towards the front, or south 

 side of the hive, so it will carry off all rain, shade the hive mostly from 

 10 A.M. to 2 P.M. each day, and allows the air to circulate freely all over 

 and about the top of the hive, so that the bees are never driven out of 

 the sections through extreme heat, as is often the case where hives 

 stand in the sun without any shade, even though the cover is painted 



