Page:How to Keep Bees.djvu/147

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DETAILS CONCERNING HONEY
111

to be avoided in tiering up is a surplus of partly filled sections, and the way we avoid this is not to interpolate a super until the one on the hive is at least three-fourths filled.

STAINED SECTIONS

A regular part of bee exercise consists of promenading up and down and across the sealed honey; the bee has not as yet, unfortunately, attained the fastidiousness which leads her to wipe any of her six feet carefully before entering her domicile, consequently the sections of honey thus walked over may be stained and unmarketable. There is no remedy for this except to look after the supers carefully, and take out the sections before they are soiled.

Some sections may look dirty because old wax is used in making the caps. If such is the case, and it is simply yellow, the wax may be bleached by standing it in the sun or by subjecting it to sulphur fumes. Some apiarists have special rooms and others tight boxes for the sulphur bleaching. Only two things are necessary to accomplish this successfully; first, that the room or box be tight; second, that the sulphur placed in an iron dish be heated so that the fumes are strong and all-pervading. Some say that the sulphur should be heated so that if a match be touched to it it will flame. The combs need not be subjected to such fumes more than a half-hour to become as white as they can be bleached.