194 FORTY YEARS AMONG THE BEES. 



to leave them on for the later flow. I am not sure 

 whether this is wise, except in the few years in which 

 from some unknown source some exceptionally white 

 sections were secured at the Hastings apiary. In other 

 years at the Hastings apiary, and in all years at the other 

 apiaries, the honey stored during the cucumber flow is 

 rather dark in color, and is likely to have an unpleasant 

 appearance on the surface, as if lightly varnished with 

 bee-glue. The darkest of it is generally off in flavor; 

 but in the past two or three years the flavor was fine, al- 

 though the honey was dark. I don't know why. Pos- 

 sibly a greater proportion of sweet clover may have im- 

 proved the flavor. Although I think my bees get no 

 inconsiderable quantity of honey from cucumbers, I con- 

 fess I don't know what pure cucumber honey tastes like, 

 but I am afraid it does not rank very high in flavor. 



LATE HONEY. 



As I said, I am not sure that it is ever wise, except 

 in the Hastings apiary, to allow supers to stay on after 

 the white-clover harvest is over. True, a considerable 

 amount of honey may be got in sections from the late 

 flow, but it is not all of it of the best, and if it were stored 

 in brood-combs and saved as extra combs to be crowded 

 into the brood-chamber the next year before the begin- 

 ning of- the harvest, there might be nearly or quite as 

 many more sections of white-clover honey stored, to ofif- 

 set what was lost in sections in the fall. 



GETTING BEES OUT OF SECTIONS. 



For the purpose of getting bees out of sections I have 

 tried pretty thoroughly the Porter escape and other 

 escapes which work on the principle of allowing the 

 bees to go down out of the supers without the chance 

 of returning, but they do not work fast enough to suit 



