94 Advanced Bee Culture 



The bee-escape is an important linlc in this chain ; but there is an- 

 other one equally important, and that is, the use of artificial heat in 

 warming honey so that it can be extracted when taken off late in the 

 season bv the use of escapes. Honey left on the hive all the season 

 becomes well ripened and thick, and the cool weather makes it still 

 thicker and stififer ; and it would be difficult to extract if the work were 

 done immediately upon its removal. If taken off in large quantities 

 by the use of escapes it would be simply impossible to extract it 

 without warming it up. When it is properly warmed up to the right 

 degree it can be extracted more readily, easier, and cleaner than when 

 taken right from the bees in hot weather. As such honey is thoroughly 

 ripened, there is no necessity for an\- settling-tanks ; the honey can be 

 run right from the strainer into the cans or barrels. 



Perhaps this system of management might be called the gentleman's 

 system. It certainly is an easy, pleasurable, leisurely way of producing 

 large quantities of first-class honey at a low cost. There is no hurry, 

 hurry, hurry to get the honey extracted because the bees are needing 

 more room ; and there is no shaking and brushing of angry bees out in 

 the boiling sun. 



ONE DRAWBACK TO THE PLAN. 



There is just one kind of locality where this plan will not work 

 out so satisfactorily, and that is where the white-honey harvest is fol- 

 lowed b}- a dark flow. We have one apiary in such a location — one 

 where the flow from buckwheat is likely to start in before that from 

 the berries is finished, and we have to watch it ver\- closelv and hustle 

 oft' the white honey the very day that the bees show a tendency to begin 

 work on the buckwheat. It does not take vcr\' much dark honey to give 

 some color to a whole lut of white honew Work it the best we can, 

 there will always be some berry honey not ready to extract, and we are 

 compelled to leave it on the hives to go in with the buckwheat. A fall 

 flow of honew even if dark, is considered a great advantage, and usu- 

 ally it is, but I am not certain but I should prefer a locality without 

 the fall flow, simply because it would allow me to put in practice my 

 system of management whereby I could take care of so many more 

 apiaries than with the management that requires the removal of the 

 wdiite honey before the close of the harvest. 



Having gone briefly over the plan, and shown that the principal 

 features of the combination are plenty of combs and supers, and the use 

 of bee-escapes and artificial heat in extracting, let's go back to the 

 beginning of the season and take up the work, step by step, and give 

 the more important details. 



