24 
THE AUSTRALIAN BEEKEEPERS’ JOURNAL. 
been made to yield profitable results in honey 
harvests. 
Fourthly. — We come to the class who form the 
greatest number of beekeepers, viz., those who 
keep bees to increase and help out their incomes; 
these are recruited from all classes of society, 
and we are glad to see the cottagers profiting by 
the experience of their neighbours. To this 
fourth section of those who keep bees a few 
words of advice may here not be out of place. If 
you wish to make your bees pay. and if you 
intend them to succeed, conduct your apiary on 
strictly commercial principles, leave the proving 
of new ideas to those who can afford it, and 
have the time : depend upon it if they are worth 
anything you will soon hear of it In the present 
day. by the aid of the various publications on the 
subject, you can with patience reap the 
experience of others’ experiments. Be careful ; 
but do not have a hive because it is inexpensive, 
such may prove “ cheap and nasty.” Bees are 
wonderful architects, very precise and exact in 
their work, requiring the interior arrangement 
of every to be exceedingly exact in measure- 
ment. If made with too much space between 
the side of hive and the movable frames, the 
bees will build c mb between the two. If too 
little space is Eft it will be filled by propolis 
which will also become a great objection to the 
beekeeper when requiring to remove any of 
the frames to find the bees have fixed them 
tightly (bv either comb or jn-opolis) to the sides 
ot the hive. Take full advantage of comb 
foundation, and do not neglect feeding when 
necessary, as such a principle would prove false 
economy. 
Fifthly and lastly. — We come to the man who 
makes beekeeping a specialty, devoting his 
entire time and attention to their management, 
making apiculture his sole source of income, 
either by selling swarms and queen raising, or 
by working his apiary exclusively for the pro- 
duction of honey ; or else, Avhen circumstances 
permit, he may iuclude all three in his scheme. 
We have thus briefly traced the five different 
reasons why people keep hives ; ” fn m whi* h 
it is easy to reply that bees are worth keeping. 
As a hobby and a study, the pursuit will ever 
bide ; but as a source of income the industry 
must ever continue to advance. Large apiaries 
are the rule in America and Canada, but with 
our exceedingly favourable climate such under- 
takings should be greatly adopted by us. Honey 
is steadily taking its right place as a household 
requisite ; it was. of' old, considered man’s proper 
food. Some authorities inform us that Phyth- 
goras, the philosopher, used to be contented with 
honey and the honeycomb and bread . — Mil dura 
Cultivator. 
BROOD COMBS— SOME PRACTICAL POINTS 
BY DR, C. C. MILLER. 
H > W MANY CELLS TO THE INCH ! HOW THICK I 
. ARE THEY ? HOW LONG DOES IT PAY TO 
KEEP THEM, ETC. 
On page 898. friend Root, you si raighhen me i 
up as to the size of worker-ceils, for which 1 am 
obliged. I had Cheshire’s book and the ABC 
for authority. Let me, then, amend the figures 
counting 24 cells to 5 inches. At that rate there 
are 26.6 cells to the square inch, so that it will i 
be nearer the truth to say there are 27 cells to 
the square inch than to call it 25. In order to 
make foundation which should contain 25 cells 
to the square inch, we must have 4.65 cells to 
the inch, or cells of such size that 23£ cells, side 
by side, shall measure 5 inches. These are not 
matters of the greatest importance, hut we may 
as well have them nearly correct. 
THICKNESS OF WORKER-COMB. 
How thick is it ? J have been very unfor- 
tunate in my search, or else the books are very 
silent upon this point. Dzierzon, in his book, 
calls it about an inch in thickness, and Prof. 
Cook in his Manual says, u The depth of the 
worker-cells is a little less than half an inch.” 1 
think in general it is considered about | of an 
inch, as nearly as T could tell with a common 
rule. Then 1 measured one, black with many 
years’ service, and it measured a full inch in 
thickness. In the first case the division wall 
was a very thin affair ; but in the old comb was 
an eigth of an inch in thickness, the additional 
thickness being made up of successive layers left 
by the many generations of brood. This differ- 
ence in thickness, along with some other things, 
makes me think it possibly worth while to re- 
consider the question. 
AT WHAT AGE SHOULD BROOD COMBS BE 
RESEWED ? 
I had laid this upon the shelf as a settled 
question, saying that I had used combs 25 years 
old, and could see no difference between bees 
raised in them and bees raised in new combs. 
But if, in the course of years, a lining is left in 
the cells sufficient to increase the division wall 
an eighth of an inch, may there not have been a 
difference in the size of the bees raised that 
would have been noticed by a more careful 
observer ? Not long ago a writer in 7 he Ladle* 
flame Journal advised, if 1 remember rightly, 
that brood combs more than two years old 
should be renewed. Undoubtedly that is rather 
wild advice ; but in the British liee Journal for 
November 10, 1887 (and the It. Ji . J. is not 
addicted to giving wild advice), occurs the 
following : — “ We may fairly suppose that three 
batches of brood are hatched from the same 
cells — taking the broad nest only— in every 
season. In five years, therefore, we shall have 
fifteen layers of exuviae in these cells, provided 
they are not removed by the bees, which 
experience seems to prove they are not. The 
brood -cells, consequently, are much reduced in 
size at this age, and the bees reared will be 
small in size. We have used the same eombs 
for fifteen years without a break, when the 
brood-cells become so diminutive that the bees 
hatched therefrom were a pigmy race, and the 
I combs were as black as Erebus, and pollen- 
! clogged. This was before the days of foundation. 
With our present advantages we do not think it. 
i profitable to use combs longer than four or five 
years.” Dzierzon, in his book, page 28, says. 
