20 
THE AUSTRALIAN BEEKEEPERS’ JOURNAL. 
super of the usual number of sections with 
starters, or full sheets of foundation, but the 
central row should be filled with clean comb 
with a little honey in it. (some partly tilled 
sections of the last season are useful for this) 
and if honey is coming in you will find your 
bees filling in the sections at once. If no comb 
can be obtained it will be be t to put into the 
centre of the super only 2 or 3 rows of section 
boxes, and cover them and the open parts over 
the side frames with a warm mat ; the bees will 
often take to a few sections snugly covered, when 
they would refuse to enter a super full of boxes 
with only starters in. Beekeepers will find 
however, a decoy comb with a little honey in a 
wonderful help' in getting our little friends to 
commence storing upstairs. 
Many beekeepers experience a difficulty in 
getting their sections off the hive on account of 
brace combs, this is chiefly duo to the space 
between the. tops of the frames and the bottom 
of the section boxes being too little or too great ; 
if too small the boxes are glued to the frames 
by propolis, if too great brace-combs filled with 
honey are the result, and in either case- it is 
difficult to remove the sections. The proper 
space to allow is a bare quarter (3-16) which 
will be generally kept pretty clear of both comb 
and propolis. A proper crate for sections should 
rest on the frames at a few points only, and a 
clear full 3-l(i space be left between the bottom 
of sections, or of the crate slots everywhere else. 
If this is done the trouble complained of will be 
reduced to a minimum. If orates are not used 
some form of honey board by which the exact 
space named is provided for will do equally well. 
If supering with deep or shallow frames instead 
ot sections, the same precautions as to the space 
above the frames in the brood chamber must be 
taken, and it will be wise to use some kind of 
honey board, with full 3-16 of an inch between 
it and the frames, both below and above. W e 
were very successful last year in getting our 
bees storing early in super frames, for extracting 
by simply putting the central frames full of 
clean comb with a little honey in it, and we arc- 
certain the result pays for the trouble ten times 
over. 
Careful watch should be kept for any appear- 
ance of foul-brood, and timely action taken at 
the first signs. The various methods of treat- 
ment have been fully described in the earlier 
numbers of this Journal, but our own 
experiences leads us to advise the “ begin 
afresh” method, i shaking the bees off the 
combs, and from the hive into a box or hive, 
and from thence into a new or clean hive sup- 
plied with new frames with starters only. 
Before shaking off the bees remove the hive 
from its stand some little distance away, putting 
the new hive with frames and starters in its 
place. After the bees are in their new hive they 
must be fed freely with good syrup either with 
or without a little silicylic acid or phenol, until 
they have stored enough food to keep them 
going. 
- SPURIOUS AND ADULTERATED 
HONEY. 
The trade in spurious honey is still carried ! 
ou to a great extent, although a little more 
cautiously ; the same vile compounds which 
were gaily labelled “ Pure Gardeu Honey,’’ 
or “ Pure Honey from Orange Flowers,” 
“ Pure Meadow Honey,” &c., are still 
exposed in shop windows, bereft of their 
lying labels so as to avoid the penalties 
under the 35tli clause of the Health Act. 
Not only is this glucose and corn syrup 
imitation largely offered for sale, but is 
extensively bought for its cheapness, and, 
during the cold weather, because of a popular 
notion that all crystallised honey is adul- 
terated with sugar, and that the beautifully 
labelled fluid corn syrup, which does not 
crystallise, must therefore be pure honey. 
Fraudulent imitations and spurious manu- 
factures require both rogues and fools to 
render them profitable. 
Already one or two prosecutions have 
been carried out by the authorities, but 
failed because the right delinquents were not 
cited. It is to be hoped, however, the next 
action taken in this direction will be more 
successful. 
Some amusing correspondence has taken 
place lately in one of the Melbourne papers, 
The Svening Herald , in connection with 
this subject ; and we find an analytical 
chemist who reports, in support of one of 
these “ Bogus Honey' Bees,” that he took as 
a standard pure Californian honey in the 
comb. It was his standard of purity— pure 
comb honey — and because it contained a 
large proportion of glucose, assumed that 
pure honest honey always did so. Poor 
fellow ! he must be very simple to take 
imported Californian comb honey as his 
standard of purity. If there is a game some 
exporting Californian’s understand, it is the 
one of feeding bees on pure pale corn syrup 
at the time when the true honey flow is 
falling off, and so inducing them to store it 
in their combs for export to the heathen 
Chinee and the little less heathen Australian, 
and so supplying a real standard of pure 
honey for our unsuspecting analysts. Let 
our analytical friends try the samples in the 
polarescope, and condemn every sample that 
is right-handed , whether it comes from 
Californian comb honey or from anywhere 
else. A simple chemical analysis of honey 
is a complex and ticklish job, but the detec- 
tion of a large adulteration with glucose oi 
corn syrup is easy and certain enough. 
While on this subject we may refer to an 
article in the New Zealand bee paper, the 
Australasian Bee Journal , of Septembe), 
which deals with the article on “Bogus- 
