28 ALEXANDER’S WRITINGS ON PRACTICAL BEE CULTURE 
taken from the cellar. After I questioned him some he told me that he 
had about 150 heavy combs that he had saved from last season to give 
to his bees in the spring to stimulate early breeding as some recom- 
mended. These he distributed among his hives, so as he thought he 
would surely have strong colonies ready for the first flow of nectar. 
But here he was disappointed. His bees would not work in the supers, 
neither for comb nor extracted honey. He went so far as to unite sev- 
eral colonies, putting the bees of from two to five colonies all in one 
hive in order to get up a working force. I asked if those hives were 
not crowded with honey which caused them to be weak in worker bees. 
He said he had not thought of that, but they certainly were very heavy. 
I asked him about how much brood they had. “Oh! not much,” he said. 
Some had five and six combs partly filled, and some had only four combs 
containing any; but every thing was full of honey, and he could not 
understand why the bees did not uncap that honey and carry it above. 
Now, my friends, is it any wonder that he did not secure a good 
surplus, and that he thought it the poorest season he had ever known? 
I can not understand why a man of experience should have allowed his 
bees to get in such a condition. If, about the first of May, he had 
extracted those heavy combs he foolishly put into his hives, and also 
extracted the capped honey that was already in the hives, he would 
have had much honey to his credit, and his hives full of maturing brood 
which would have given him a surplus of early honey. I honestly think 
a moderate use of the extractor through the latter part of May and fore 
part of June, especially when running an apiary for comb honey, would 
be the means of many bee-keepers securing twice as much surplus as 
they usually do. Here at the North, May is the month of all the year 
when our bees require the closest attention. It is then that we should 
care for them so that every inch of comb in the hive is utilized for 
brood-rearing that can possibly be used for that purpose. Bring your 
extractor into use, cleaning your hives of nearly all capped honey, and 
see to it that every queen in the apiary is doing her very best to crowd 
the combs with brood; then you will soon have those strong colonies 
that will give you a fine surplus, and at the end of the season you will 
hardly believe it when told that the summer has been a poor one for 
the production of honey. Spring feeding has never received the atten- 
tion that such an important subject should. We have been taught that 
honey is the proper food for winter use, and that, if a colony were short 
of it in the spring, just give them a heavy comb, and that was all that 
was necessary to do through the whole spring season. But experience 
has taught many of us that honey is not the best winter food, and that 
to give our bees heavy combs of old capped honey in the spring is one of 
the poorest ways imaginable to stimulate early breeding. 
In conclusion, I repeat that a moderate use of the honey-extractor 
during early summer is very beneficial in preparing bees for the sum- 
mer harvest. 
November, 1907. 
