ADVANCED BEE CULTURE. 



31 



hive will almost unhesitatingly enter the 

 hive that has become the end hive in the 

 row. Two hives may stand side by side, 

 perhaps almost or quite touching each 

 other, and each bee has no diflSculty in 

 distinguishing its own hive. In a row of 

 three, four, or even five hives, the same 

 might be said, but as the number goes 

 beyond this, there is a little uncertainty 

 about the matter. When their hives are 

 in long rows, some bee-keepers arrange 

 them in groups of three or five in the row, 

 leaving a wider space between the groups 

 than there is between the individual hives 

 composing a gtoup. Arranging hives in 

 circles gives a greater individuality to 

 each hive than can be secured in almost 

 any other arrangement; that is, if the 

 entrances are faced directly into or out of 

 the circle; but my objection to this plan 

 is that it interferes with the proper use of 

 shade boards. 



The greatest objection to any unifor- 

 mity of arrangement that makes it dilE- 

 cult for the bees to "mark" their location, 

 is that queens may enter the wrong hive 

 upon their return from their "wedding 

 trip . ' ' With my method of management, 



in which the young queen is given a new 

 stand to prevent after swarming, a la 

 Heddon, this difficulty is easily remedied 

 by placing the hive in some location that 

 is easily marked, the end of a row for 

 instance. When this cannot be done, 

 the hives containing unfertile queens may 

 be marked in some conspicuous manner 

 that will easily enable them to distinguish 

 their own hives. I believe that where 

 foul brood is in the apiary, this regular- 

 ity of arrangement leads to a greater dan- 

 ger of spreading the disease by bees from 

 infected colonies entering some other 

 hive by mistake. 



In queen rearing it is important that 

 the small hives, containing the nuclei, 

 be scattered about promiscuously; the 

 greater the irregularity and oddity of ar- 

 rangement, the less will be the loss of 

 queens from their entering wrong hives; 

 but in a large apiary managed for honey 

 it is doubtful if there is a better arrange- 

 ment than that of placing the hives in 

 rows; audit seems to me that a little is 

 gained, and nothing lost, by having the 

 rows radiate from the honev house door. 



>'^-7^l^fi&t6^^^^<^ 



Separators. 



-(=;r>^ Y filling the frames with sheets 

 l_-i-^ of foundation we can secure 



□"^ perfectly straight and even 

 -^ combs in the brood nest. Why 



will not the same treatment of the sec- 

 tions result in straight combs ? Because 

 all combs in which brood is reared must 

 be of a certain thickness, while store 

 combs may vary in thickness from half an 

 inch to four inches. Bees place their 

 brood combs an inch and a half apart 



from center to center, and the nearer our 

 sections approach this width the more 

 perfect will be the combs when no sepa- 

 rators are used. It is well nigh impossible 

 to secure straight combs when the sec- 

 tions are two inches wide, unless sepa- 

 rators are used. When the sections are 

 only I ^ inches wide, fair success may. be 

 attained with no separators if other con- 

 ditions are right. When the sections are 

 scant i^, or seven-to-the-foot, but little 



