ADVANCED BEE CULTURE. 51 



Comforts and Conveniences in tiie 



ApiarXo 



Y these are meant those things not absolutely essential to 

 X success, but that serve to render more smooth and pleasant 



J the somewhat "thorny" path trodden by the bee-keeper. 



To illustrate: Mr. H. R. Boardman, of Ohio, has a cart, 

 for carrying his bees to and from his bee cellar, with which there is 

 no necessity for even lifting the hives to place them on the cart. It 

 is made like a wheel barrow with two wheels, and having two long 

 prongs projecting in front. When the cart is wheeled up to a hive, 

 one prong goes one side of the hive and the other the other side, 

 when, by depressing the handles, the hive is lifted from the ground; 

 cleats upon the sides of the hive prevent it from slipping down be- 

 tween the projecting prongs. Then, again, Mr. J. A. Green, of 

 Colorado, has an arrangement for opening the honey house door by 

 simply stepping upon a pedal. When both hands are occupied with 

 tools, a case of honey, or something of that sort, such an arrange- 

 ment is quite a comfort. Mr. Green is also the man who keeps 

 kerosene oil in a spring-bottom oil can to squirt on the fuel in a 

 smoker when "firing up." 



Most of these comforts are comparatively inexpensive. To 

 think of them and secure them is often more work than to earn the 

 money with which to buy them; but their possession often makes all 

 of the difference between a season of pleasure and one bordering on 

 drudgery, to say nothing of the bearing they may have upon the 

 profits. These little helps and conveniences are, in one sense, the oil 

 that makes the great apicultural machine move smoothly, and I be- 

 lieve it worth while to enumerate a few of them. 



