134 FORTY YEARS AMONG THE BEES. 



cappings of the sections white. At one time I had wide- 

 frames of sections facing brood-frames (the brood-frames 

 were used to bait the bees up into the supers), and if the 

 brood-frames were left there till the sections were sealed, 

 the sealing would be almost if not quite as dark as the 

 sealing of brood-combs. The bees seem to carry bits of 

 the old, black brood-combs to use in capping the sections. 

 So the thick top-bar increasing the distance of the sections 

 from the brood-combs helps to keep the former whiter. 



NO EXCLUDER UNDER SECTIONS. 



"Before putting on the super, would you advise me 

 to put a queen-excluder (Fig. 56) over the brood-cham- 

 ber?" It would increase the space between the brood- 

 combs and the sections, and in that way would be a 

 further help toward prevention of dark cappings on the 

 sections, and it would make a sure thing as to preventing 

 burr-combs on the bottoms of the sections. But I don't 

 believe there would be enough advantage in both ways to 

 pay for the excluders. 



I think I hear you say, "But wouldn't it pay to use 

 excluders for the sake of keeping the queen out of the 

 supers?'' I may repl}^ that the queen so seldom goes up 

 into a super that not one section in a hundred, sometimes 

 not more than one in a thousand, will be found troubled 

 with brood. So on the whole I hardly think that all the 

 advantages to be gained from using excluders would pay 

 for the time and trouble of using them. I need not con- 

 sider so ver}' much the cost of them, for I have a lot on 

 hand lying idle. At one time I thought I had a plan for 

 prevention of swarming by the use of excluders, and was 

 so sanguine about it that I got 150 of them. I think a 

 great deal of queen-excluders, and wouldn't like to do 

 without them, but I did not need 150 of them, for my ex- 



