HIVES. 53 



rob us of a goodly quantity of surplus honey, compel us to 

 hazard greater risk in wintering, and cause the consump- 

 tion of several pounds of honey for the renewal of a por- 

 tion of the comb every year. And what are our returns ? 

 In their most prosperous condition, some thirty pounds of 

 inferior liive honey. When properly managed, this same 

 colony would probably store a much larger amount of 

 pure surplus, the market value of which would be ten 

 times greater than that of the other. It will not do to 

 reckon the value of new cornbs as an equivalent for all this 

 sacrifice. I can assure the reader that there is no profit 

 in such frequent renewal of the combs. All experienced 

 and disinterested bee-keepers will bear testimony to this. 

 Bees hatched from combs used for breeding a dozen years, 

 are not dwarfed enough for the difference to bCperceived. 

 The bees seem, to make a provision for this emergency by 

 making the sheets of comb a little farther apart than ne- 

 cessary at first, and the diameter of the cell a little greater 

 than the young bee requires. The angles of the cells fiU 

 up in time, and as the bottom fills up faster than the sides, 

 the bees add a little to the length, until the ends of the 

 cells upon two parallel combs approximate so closely that 

 the bees can not pass freely ; before this time it is unneces- 

 sary to remove combs on account of age. 



I find it estimated by writers that twenty-five pounds of 

 honey are consumed in elaborating about one pound of 

 wax. This may be an over-estimate, but no one will deny 

 that some is used. I am satisfied from actual experience, 

 that every time the bees are obliged to renew their brood- 

 combs, they would make from ten to twenty-five pounds 

 of honey in boxes ; hence I infer that their time may be 

 much more profitably employed than in constructing brood 

 combs every year. 



Now, to have the bee-keeper deluded into the belief 

 that by paying for the privilege of injuring his bees, he is 



