38 THE BOOK OF THE HONEY BEE 



Metal Ends — Spacing Frames. — The combs in the brood 

 chamber require to be accurately spaced I^ of an inch 

 apart from centre to centre. This is generally attained 



by the use of " metal 

 ends." Those due to the 

 inventive genius of Mr 

 Carr, and known as the 

 "W.B.C." ends, are to be 

 preferred, and, in fact, 



" W.B.C. METAL END '^ , . ,, . 



are almost universally used. 

 They are stamped out of one piece of tin, and in 

 practice are slipped, one at each end, over the top 

 bars of the frames. 



For shallow frames many beekeepers use the wide 

 W.B.C. end. The use of this end gives a space of 

 if of an inch, the idea being that with increased space 

 the bees construct deeper cells, thus increasing the 

 honey capacity of each comb, whilst economising founda- 

 tion and labour in extracting. 



It sometimes happens that in using these wide ends 

 the bees will draw out the combs irregularly. To 

 obviate this, use the ordinary - sized ends until the 

 combs are filled with honey and sealed, when, after 

 extracting, the normal ends may be replaced by the 

 wide ones, and the combs be returned to the bees, 

 when regularly drawn-out combs will result. 



Comb Foundation. — Foundation, as its name would 

 indicate, consists of sheets of pure beeswax, "honey- 

 combed" all over by having been passed through 

 suitably engraved rollers. Not only are the sheets 

 indented with the bases of the cells, but sufficient wax 

 is left surrounding each cell to enable the bees to draw 

 out the combs to their full extent. 



Further, by the use of foundation we are enabled 

 absolutely to control the direction in which the bees 

 shall build their combs, and also to provide that the 



