The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1888-11-03
VALUE OF HoNEY-COMBS.
The PracticabiIity of Saving Them FOl
Several Years Operation.

The PracticabiIity of Saving Them for
Several Years Operation.
1t has long been a question with bee
keepers whether honey-combs could
not be used for repeated filling, thus
saving much time to the busy insect.
A correspondent of the Germantown
Telegraph considers the question as set
tied, for he has thoroughly tested the
experiment in his own apiary. He
says: "a beehive should contain
about eighteen hundred or two thou
sand cubic inches in the brood cham
Der, which will require one and a
quarter pounds of combs to fill it Gf
properly arranged as the bees will do),
this being a fact as every one who
any thing can testify. 1t requires at
least twenty-five pounds of liquid,
sweet or honey as the case may be, to
make the one and one-quarter pounds
of combs, which it also requires at
least fifteen days time for a good
swarm of bees to gather and secrete
into wax in order to build the combs
from, which is to supply the brood
chamber. 1t is also fact, not success
fully controverted, that good swarm
of bees, say twenty thousand strong,
will gather at least eight or ten pounds
of honey in a day if the honey season
is a good one. We have often had
swarms gather double that amount in
a day.
At first thought, those who think but
little about the true value of combs
can hardly believe that it takes twenty
five pounds of honey for the bees TO
produce a pound and quarter of
combs, yet this statement is true, and
any one who can figure will find that
bees will store at least one hundred
pounds of nice honey in a season in
combs given them to start with, and
not compel them to use up the best and
most valuable honey for making their
combs. We have often contended and
are still of the opinion that the best
honey is gathered about the time that
fruit blooms come out, and especially
when the white clover and other
earliest blooms are in full vigOr, which
is usually the time our bees here in the
North do their swarming. They are
too often placed in an empty hive or
gum to build new combs and shift
for themselves, or, as it is usually
called, luck, while we are very sure
the old sinner luck has for many years
been a failure. AS before stated, the
first honey is our best, and in order to
procure the best we must save
our combs from stocks that may have
died or in some other way left their
hive which is done too often by spring
dwindling. These combs are truly
valuable to the live bee-keeper and can
be turned to good account by saving
them for another years operation.
Don't melt them up for wax, for surely
there is but little pay in the wax to the
producer at twenty and twenty-three
cents per pound, while the combs in
many instances can be turned to good
account by giving them (nicely trans
lCIIcu 6tllu lelSuclSu Ill IIlON CtDIC IEdLuCSJ
to the bees, which which will soon fill
them with the best of all sweets-that
of honey-which you can with very
little expense extract and return the
combs to the bees for reflling, and thus
make a saving of at least one hundred
pounds of nice extracted honey worth,
as rule, fifteen cents per pound.
ave know whereof we speak when
we state that in the year 1882 we took
from one stock Of Cyprian bees 718
pounds of nicely extracted honey, which
Melted us twenty cents per pound; this
we could not have done had we not
have saved our best combs and used
them as before stated, saving both time
and honey in the early part of the
season, giving the bees the full benefit
of a splendid honey harvest. Again
let me say look well to your bees and
they in return will richly repay you for
all the trouble you may be at in their
care. Time in Bookkeeping may be as
valuable as any other calling ON earth,
and he who will not heed its demands
must expect to make slow progress. :"