16 



ADVANCED BEE-CULTURE. 



far as excluding the queen from the su- 

 pers was concerned, they were a success; 

 the greatest drawback being the fact that, 

 when the slats were placed so close to- 

 gether bees filled the spaces between 

 them with hard wax. It is also some 

 trouble to place the slats exactly 5-32 of 

 an inch apart and fasten them in such a 

 manner that they will remain exactly 

 that distance apart. I next tried to make 

 a wood queen-excluder by substituting a 

 thin board (3-16 of an inch) for the slats 

 and then perforating it with a small cir- 

 cular saw exactly 5-32 of an inch in thick- 

 ness. Such excluders worked better, 

 owing, I think, to their being thinner; 

 still, the bees plugged the perforations to 

 such an extent that it became necessary 

 to clean out the hard wax each spring. 



The G. B. Lewis Co., of Watertown, 

 Wis., is now making an all- wood queen- 

 excluder similar to this ; the only differ- 

 ence being that the perforations are made 

 across the grain. If some enterprising 

 manufacturer will invent a machine to 

 countersink the openings, that is, cham- 

 fer oif the wood around the openings un- 

 til the edges are only about 1-16 of an 

 inch in thickness, I believe that in this 

 manner an all-wood queen-excluder could 

 be made a success. It is my opinion that 

 across the grain is the proper direction in 

 which to make the perforations. The 

 edges would be less likely to be injured 

 or to be gnawed by the Dees 



WOOD-ZINC HONEY BOARD. 



At piesent, the best queen-excluding 

 honey board is the wood-zinc. It is sim- 

 ply the Heddon slatted honey boardwith 



saw kerfs in the edges of the slats, and 

 strips of perforated zinc slid into the 

 kerfs, between the slats. To Dr. G. L. 

 Tinker belongs the honor of having been 

 the first to introduce strips of perforated 

 metal, in this peculiar manner, between 

 the slats of the Heddon honey board. 



Whole sheets of zinc have been used as 

 honey boards. The greatest objection 

 seems to be that such large sheets are 

 lacking in rigidity. They are likely to 

 sag, or bend, or kink, thus destroying 

 the perfection of the bee-spaces. If a 

 sheet sags, the space above becomes so 

 large that there is a likelihood of comb 

 being built therein; while the space be- 

 low becomes so small that propolis is 

 placed between the zinc and the top of 

 the brood frames. The wood-zinc honey 

 board is free from this defect. 



During the last year or two there has 

 been an effort made to do away with 

 honey boards. It has been found that 

 wide, deep, top bars, accurately spaced, 

 have, at least, a great tendency to reduce 

 the building of brace combs. The spaces 

 between the top bars should be as near 

 5-16 of an inch as is practical. If greater 

 than this, the danger of comb building is 

 greatly increased; if less, there is a ten- 

 dency to plug the spaces with hard wax 

 — not comb, but hard, solid wax. With 

 the ordinary hanging or open end frame, 

 it is not practical to space the frames 

 suflficiently accurate to prevent the brace 

 comb nuisance; that is, not unless some 

 spacing device is used. Closed-end 

 frames are the best adapted to bring 

 about the necessary accuracy of spacing. 



When there is any necessity for the 

 use of a queen-excluder, the only practi- 

 cal way in which it can be used is in the 

 shape of a honey board. In raising 

 comb honey there is little need of a 

 queen-excluder over an old established 

 colony, but when a swarm is hived in a 

 contracted brood chamber, and given the 

 supers from the old hive, a queen-exclud- 

 er is almost a necessity. In raising ex- 

 tracted honey, queen-excluders are a 

 great convenience. If they are not used. 



