COMB HONEY. 



435 



•supers, over it. The honey contained in the brood chamber, 

 which is always placed above and be- 

 hind the brood, safe from pilfering in- 

 truders, is now at the bottom, near the 

 entrance. The cells are wrong side up 

 (fig. 190), and the most watery honey 

 is in danger of leaking out. Hence 

 an uproar in the hive, and the imme- 

 diate result is, that the bees promptly 

 occupy the upper story, and store in it 

 all this ill-situated honey. The result 

 is so radical, that "reversing bee-keep- 

 ers" admit that their bees have to be 

 fed in the Fall, as too little honey is 

 left in the brood chamber for the hives 

 to winter on. In the box-hive times, 

 the following was already the almost 

 unanimous report of bee-keepers on 

 the results of "reversing." The re- 

 cruiting and feeding for Winter of 

 reversed colonies being considered too costly and risky, the 

 apiaries were supplied every year with new colonies bought 

 from bee-keepers whose business was to raise swarms to sell. 



' ' If you want the greatest quantity of honey, reverse your 

 colonies; but if reversing was practiced everywhere, we would 

 diminish the number of our colonies, and would finally even 

 destroy the race of bees, for as far as bee reproduction is con- 

 cerned the 'reversing Apiarist' reaches the same result as the 

 ^brimstoning Apiarist.' " — French Apiarian Congress, Paris 

 1861. L ' Apioulteur, Volume, 6, page 175. 



In the present state of progress in bee culture, "reversing" 

 is less damaging, but its disadvantages to the bees cannot over- 

 balance its advantages, unless it is practiced very cautiously 

 and sparingly. 



727. Yet this practice is sufficiently enticing— as it forces 

 the bees to occupy the supers so quickly— to have caused the 



Fig. 190. 



SLOPE OF THE CELLS 

 WHEN INVERTED. 



