Volume 17 — Separators for Surplus Honey. JAMES HEDDON.

For the benefit of some who do not as yet understand all my argument against the use of separators I wish to add, that I am well aware that the system of sections within frames hung in a super, is entirely impracticable without the use of separators. I know too that, as Messrs. Greiner Bros. remark, bees take more kindly to wood than to tin or glass, and there is just where the trouble comes, as they sometimes kindly attach the sides of the combs to them. Some seasons, under peculiar circumstances, the loss of honey by the use of separators might, as Greiner Bros. say, be very slight, but in many seasons they will be found to be a serious detriment to the amount of surplus obtained. But why not use a system that does not need them, and is much handier than the super system besides?

I supposed that the younger bee-keepers, who keep posted, knew that many old producers on a more extensive scale never used separators at all, and of that class who did many others are laying them aside. Bees do finish up their combs full better with separators, because as the season draws to a close they are less inclined to start another comb in one of those little compartments, and as long as there is honey coming in they finish with it to keep from perfect idleness. I think the unfinished combs are just so much extra. If it is “strange” that I should declare against the use of all separators, while still many prominent bee-keepers use them, how dare you, Messrs. G., declare against tin, compared with wood, when you know that tin is the popular material? Galileo said, “The world is round;” all others said, “It is flat,” and there being more of the “flats” than Galileos, these “flats” put their greatest scientist behind the prison bars.

Before I close, I wish to call the attention of the readers of this paper to the able article of A. B. Weed, on “Queen and Supply Trade,” in the Bee Journal of March 23d. I think all bee-keepers, whether supply-dealers or producers strictly, if posted upon the points therein taken, will say, “Thanks to Mr. Weed.”

Dowagiac, Mich., March 26, 1881.

For the American Bee Journal.