February 11, 1886. ] 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
121 
as to obtain the amount from each stock which may rightly 
be expected. Either a swarm is thrown and thus the supers 
emptied, or the queen enters and appropriates to her use for 
e gg laying some of the cells, and so spoils the beauty of the 
comb and the value of the super as a whole. 
It is perhaps useless to attempt to say which kind of super 
is the one which is most suitable; each one must judge for 
himself, and as he finds the glass, the divisional, the 
Stewarton, or the section most readily saleable must adopt 
that form in all cases when he desires to dispose of his pro¬ 
duce. Most probably, however, the 1 lb. section is the most 
popular super ; the size is convenient, neither too large nor 
yet too small, and the cost of the section itself is nominal. 
The hive is to some extent an important factor in obtain¬ 
ing a good yield of super honey; but I am not disposed to 
lay too great a stress upon any particular form of hive, nor 
yet to say that either straw, or Stewarton, or bar-frame will 
in the hands of a competent man far exceed one another in 
their yield of super honey. All hives, however, should be 
deep enough to allow some sealed honey to intervene between 
the brood nest of the hive and comb of the super ; the 
chance of the queen going up into the latter will thus be 
much smaller than if the brood nest extended to the top of 
the hive, so that the queen would at times be so near that 
if cells were prepared and empty, eggs might be laid and 
the super ruined. It is, however, not of the hive but of the 
art of supering of which I desire now to write. 
In order to obtain supers the stock must be strong in bees 
and contain a good fertile queen. Now every stock ought to 
be ready for supering as soon as there is honey in sufficient 
quantity to fill the supers ; every day lost then is a day wasted 
and profit gone. In most seasons honey may in favourable 
districts b9 gathered in quantity from the end of April, and 
at that time stocks, if properly managed, will be ready for 
extension. The precise time to place supers must b 9 ascer¬ 
tained by experience; but if the bees are covering all the 
combs, or if there seems to be a great overcrowding at the 
entrance, more room is required. Now it is essential to re¬ 
member that if a super is not placed when required—even a 
day may make a serious difference—preparations will be 
made for swarming, and if these preparations are once made 
it is almost impossible, and it is certainly not wise, to 
try and prevent the issue of a swarm. How, then, is this 
difficulty of neither putting on the supers too soon nor delay¬ 
ing too long to be overcome ? A beginner may venture to try 
whether the bees are ready without doing mischief if he will 
take care not to allow too great an escape of heat from the 
hive. 
If a stock is supposed to be ready for a super let a super 
be placed on it and warmly covered up about ten o’clock on 
a fine warm sunny day ; if the bees are ready for it they 
will soon take possession, and all is safe. If, however, in a 
few hours’ time no work has been commenced and no bees are 
seen in the super the stock may be judged to be unprepared, 
and a few days may be allowed to elapse, when a second trial 
must be made; but if the super is not taken possession of in a 
few hours it should be removed, because any vacant space over 
the brood nest must of necessity cause the loss of heat and so 
throw the stock back, thereby causing loss of time. Supers 
must be wrapped up very warmly; but here again discretion is 
necessary. After the first glass or box is being worked, if no 
increase is desired, a second super must be placed under or 
above the first, when the latter is crowded with bee 3 and 
comb-building is going on extensively, and so super must be 
added to super until the close of the season, when no more 
must be given, but the energy of the bees be the rather 
directed to the finishing of those already partially filled. 
Each super, as the comb is filled, must be removed, and so 
fresh room being given, ventilation being by this means 
afforded, the desire to increase is prevented, unless owing to 
the death or disablement of the queen, and super honey in 
abundance is gained. If sections are used they must be 
worked in a crate, and if this crate of sections is treated as 
one super, and each box is removed as finished, no loss will 
result, but rather a gain, for each removal of filled sections 
must, if the piling system is adopted, cause great annoyance 
to the bees, and loss of time when every hour is precious. 
There has been no little discussion as to whether in piling 
the empty super should be placed above or below the par¬ 
tially filled one. If, however, it is placed below, the first- 
placed one will generally be first completed, while if the 
empty one is placed on the top the completion of the first- 
named one may be delayed to some extent. In hives, how¬ 
ever, where there is no breadth of sealed honey between the 
brood nest and the supers I would allow the first-placed 
super to remain at the bottom, so acting as a zinc excluder, 
only much more advantageously, until completed, when it 
may be removed. It is possible that some of the inner sec¬ 
tions may be discoloured, but the beauty of those above will 
compensate. If, again, this desired breadth of honey is 
given in the stock I would place the empty super beneath 
the partially filled one, thus keeping the first-placed one 
always at the top, until ready for removal. 
It is necessary at times to have supers able to contain 
over 100 lbs. of honey on a stock at once, so heavily do the 
bees work, and so quickly does comb-building go on at the 
height of the season. The honey gathered has to lie for a 
period to evaporate its moisture and ripen before it can be 
sealed, so that the bees, if stinted of room and finding no 
employment in the direction of comb-building to engage 
their attention, turn their thoughts to swarming when their 
combs are sealed or filled with honey not yet ripe enough for 
covering. True, bees will swarm at times in the hands of 
the most careful bee-keeper, but if they do it can generally 
be traced to some little act of negligence or the presence of 
a poor queen, either disabled by accident or partially so by 
age. Sufficient room in advance of the wants of the bees 
must be given if fine super honey in quantity is desired. 
Supers must be warmly wrapped up and never interfered 
with, unless absolutely necessary in order to remove them 
or to alter something wrong. If not taken possession of 
they must be removed. Heat must be conserved, stocks kept 
strong in bees, rich in stores, in roomy hives, well made and 
admitting of piling. These points being attended to success 
is assured, and an abundant crop of comb honey, which at 
present realises the highest prices, will reward the bee-master 
for his care and judgment. —Felix. 
THE PAST HONEY SEASON—THE DARK SIDE OF 
BEE-KEEPING. 
So much has been written in favour of bee-keeping, and 
such reports of honey and profit (?) obtained, that I am in¬ 
duced to give my experience for the past season as a find of 
antidote to some of the assertions made by “ A Surreyshire 
Bee-keeper ” and others, that every cottager who can eught 
to keep bees 
The spring opened cold and dull, feeding light stoc'-s 
being general till May 26th, when the first honey was gathered 
here, but barely sufficient to maintain brood-rearing until the 
Sycamores were all over near my home apiary. Just then a ten- 
days hot spell came, when bees three or four miles away on the 
hills, almost on a level with the Heather, and where every¬ 
thing blooms two weeks later, had a fine time of it, first 
swarms yielding 20 lbs. of surplus honey. This hot weather 
hurried all up in the valleys; then came a dull time, with a few 
heavy showers, until haytime As soon as the weather came 
fine again the mowing machines were brought out, and in 
three days’ time all the White Clover bloom was cut and dry¬ 
ing for hay near home ; while on the hills, a. ain, the bees had 
two weeks’ good work before any was cut, when every hive got 
from 20 to 30 lbs. heavier. 
We had no more honey after the middle of July, though we 
always expect some till the middle of August, no sun, every 
day being either windy, wet, or cloudy until October On 
August 12th I took twenty-seven stocks to the Heather, all very 
strong, one a 16 lb. lot of driven black bees hived on eight 
empty combs, with a lot of supers above gathered sufficient to 
carry them through the winter till April. They worked some 
of the foundation out in each section (36 lbs.), this lot with 
