BEE-spoke-data/bees-v0 huggingface dataset:
The method, or the hives in use when honey was designated by qualifying terms have not been handed down to us. Kitto, in his "Natural History of the Holy Land,"' says that "'In many parts of that country bees are still numerous, and are reared (kept) with great success." Hasselquist describes the inhabitants of Sepphoris as "breeding a great number of bees to their considerable advantage, and with very little trouble. They make their beehives of clay, 4 feet long and half a foot in diameter, as in Egypt. Ten or twelve of these are placed on the bare ground without anything under them. They are covered with a roof which gives them the appearance of dog kennels. In those in which the bees are at work the opening is closed up, leaving only small apertures through which the bees may pass in and out." The people of these countries are as primitive to-day as they were 2,000 years ago. These clay hives are only a modification of those described by other writers as built by bees with clay against the face of rocks, and must be regarded as one of the very first steps to the hive of the present day. Naturally, wood would be considered superior to sun-dried clay. In China, hollow logs and boxes are still in use for bee-keeping. The boxes have no alighting board. Instead thereof numerous half-inch holes are made in the sides of the boxes to imitate knot-holes, &c. Straw and wooden hives of these primitive patterns, with the addition of au alighting-board, must have remained without further development for centuries. The clay tubes, the straw skips, and the box hive were only an improvement upon the home found by the bees at their own sweet will. They were superior in that they were close at home and the honey could be obtained without searching in the wilds. From all these artificial bee-homes the honey was obtained exactly by the same methods as by the felling of trees or the bursting of rocks. The bees had to be driven from their comb or smothered by sulphur fumes. In either case the destruction of the brood comb (young brood are always the most important part of the inhabitants of a bee community) was inevitable. For the humanitarian part of bee-keeping nothing was done. It did not appear to enter into their calculations that the destruction of the bees was killing the hen that laid the golden egg.
## Early Writers on the Natural History of Bees.
The natural history of the bee had engaged the attention of scientists from before the days of Pliny and Aristotle down to today. England has given us Dr. John Hunter and Dr. Bevan; Switzerland, Bonnet; Holland, Von Swammerdam; France, Reau
mur; Sweden, Linnaeus; but the question of the study of bee-life for the purpose of a food supply by the development of hives that could be handled and attended to as other domestic animals did not commence till the latter part of the 18th century or the beginning of the 19th. Thomas Nutt was one of the first Englishmen to condemn the brutal custom of the destruction of the bees for the purpose of securing the honey. The introduction of supernumerary reciprocals to box and skips for the purpose of storing of surplus honey, _i.e.,_ honey over and above that required for the bees' winter use, was a step towards a much higher development. Under the old system of bee-keeping the loss entailed upon the bees by the destruction of comb was not understood.
The bar-frame, as we now have it, was not the invention of any one person. The nuclei were narrow bars that rested on rebates on two sides of the hive. To these the bees attached their combs and fixed it to the sides of the hive. Both sides of these combs had to be cut away before they could be removed. There appears to be no record of the person who introduced these movable slots. The very slight advantage obtained by their use never made them general. The knowledge of this slight improvement remained without further development for fully a century, when Francois Huber (Huber the elder) invented his renowned book hive, a hive that worked the same as a book is opened or closed. This invention was not for the purpose of aiding in the saving of bee life, or an increase in the honey supply, but for observation and scientific research. Yet Huber's invention and the one bar or slot already referred to were the parents of the complete frame we now have. Langstroth was well acquainted with both of these improvements. At the time he, in America, was thinking out and perfecting the ideal hive that is now in almost universal use, with practical bee men, Dzieron, in Germany, was engaged in a similar research. The latter was trying to improve upon the one bar system, where all combs had to be more or less cut away. The main difference in these hives while the two men were engaged in perfecting similar thoughts was Langstroth's hive worked from the top and Dzieron's from the back. Langstroth's hive, in the earliest stages of its development, was far more workable than Dzieron's. In the former any comb could be removed singly; whereas in the latter to get at any particular comb all those intervening between the worker and the required comb had to be removed--thus if the tenth frame was required nine others had to be removed, and suspended before the one wanted could be obtained.
After Langstroth had patented'his hive, whereby everyone possessing his patent rights were excluded, "'Ministers of the Gospel excepted," Baron Von Berlepsch invented frames of a similar character. This was an improvement upon Dzierzon's complete hive, but it did not do away with the inconvenience of removing nine frames to get at the tenth. Still, both these men have their disciples, but the Berlepsch hive is fast falling into disuse.
Since these hives of various complication have been placed before the public, all claiming to have more or less greater advantages over those already referred to, which, perhaps, goes to show that we have not, as yet, arrived at human perfection as it regards bee-keeping, I suppose no industry in so short a period has produced such a host of improvers. "Amateur bee-keepers are great inventors."
BESS WORKING IN THE OPEN.
The illustration shows a swarm of bees hard at work in the bush on which they alighted. They were discovered in June, 1894, near Sutherland, working on a geebung-bush (_Personia linearia_) about 3 feet from the ground, by Messrs. Bloxham Brothers, of Peel and Cheshire Creek Apiaries. It is very rare that bees prefer to work in the open with no other protection than that offered by foliage and twigs. In the Northern District I found a swarm working on the underside of the ledge of an overhanging rock. Although the combs were clearly visible from some distance they were well protected from rain and sunshine. Another I was shown in a hollow log. It was fully exposed to view. The combs were narrow, and the longest about 20 inches in depth. The swarm working on the rock had been there at least two winters. The winter climate of the Clarence is more genial than that of Sutherland. Whether these could have so wintered it is hard to say. I one time saw a swarm in the Goulburn district that had taken possession of the thickest part of a sweet-briar bush. It was late in autumn, and the stores they possessed would not have carried them nearly through the winter months of that bleak district. I have more than once seen bees build underneath gin-case hives for want of room above. In one instance in the cold district of Queanbeyan. But, as the cold increased and the stores in the upper part of the hive were used up, the stores underneath were carried above.
The accompanying illustration is the most perfect and visible
I have ever seen or heard of, and the discoverers did wisely in securing a photograph of it.
Bees at work in the open, as there shown, must have been the first step in the direction of the bar-frame hive of to-day. In bee-nests so built the combs are attached to sticks. In some cases these sticks are horizontal, or nearly so, as before shown.
A bee-keeper of keen observation and a little in advance of his brethren finding a comb so constructed, \(i.e.\), in the open, and removing it for the sake of its honey, or perhaps to secure the bees, and finding the combs built on parallel sticks could not be otherwise than struck with the convenience of so constructing a hive when removing the bees home on the sticks whereunto the combs were attached, if only for exhibition purposes. Under such circunstances, what great amount of thought would be needed to place them in a box and so work them. The arrangement of other straight sticks would be only a sequence of the first discovery.
The bar-frame, as I have already said, was not the invention of any one person. It has developed stage by stage. The first idea, as I have already pointed out, was revealed to man by Nature. Finding that bees in a state of nature always built their combs parallel, and having discovered honey combs built on sticks, the idea of a top bar would naturally suggest itself. The selection of the straightest sticks for trial purposes was as natural as the removal of the combs found on sticks in a state of nature and carried to an artificial bee home. Finding that these straight sticks arranged parallel on the top of a box, were utilised by the bees for the purpose of fixing their combs thereto, and that the honey could be more readily obtained than when the bees worked in boxes according to their own will--what would be more natural than to follow up this first idea? It is much more simple to obtain straight sticks or slots artificially than to find them in a state of nature. These slots were another step towards perfection, followed by their resting on rebates or grooves, so that the whole, with the bees, could be enclosed as within a box. There was an advantage in this. The bees attached their combs to these slots, but the combs were fixed to the sides of the hive, and both sides had to be cut away before the combs could be removed. There appears to be no record of the person who first removed the combs built on sticks in the open or of the individual who introduced these movable slots. The very slight advantage obtained by their use never became general, and the reason is not intricate to discover. To arrange sticks or slots so true and parallel as is necessary with the frames, so that the bees shall confine themselves to the top bar must have been, may indeed was, the greatest problem to be solved. If, in the first attempts in the use of slots the bees worked from them in parallel succession, it must have been more by chance than design. We know that the slight improvement obtained by these slots or top bars remained without further development for fully a century. And no wonder, for where one swarm of bees would attach their combs to parallel bars without wax guides of some kind or other, and continue them parallel with the sides of the boxes--a hundred swarms would build at right angles to the bars or diagonally to the box.
_Spacing.--_So the further development of improvements in beehives, in the direction of the removal of the combs without their entire destruction, remained until the days of Huber. Was it anything to marvel at that it should be otherwise! Yet, with all the advantages we have obtained from the thoughts and experiments of others, we find many beginners in bee-keeping stopping short at the difficulties they find in overcoming the first principles of success, \(i.e.\), the knowledge in the correct spacing of the bar-frames, the necessity for the whole of them to be placed parallel to each other, at the same time perpendicularly true, and the securely fixing of the starters or foundation comb. They give up bee-keeping in disgust, and vote it a hobby or an industry that can be successful with but few and a certain failure with the many. But such reasoning is not correct. Patience and observation are the only ingredients necessary for success to cover the difficulties the bee-keepers of last century had to stumble against.
Correct spacing was one of the first and greatest difficulties to be overcome. In a state of nature, brood combs are built 1 3-16 inch from midrib to midrib, or centre to centre. In comb built for storage, it is frequently otherwise, and unless the slots were so placed the bees would build despite them. If eight slots only were so placed in the hive and evenly spaced, and there was room for nine combs, or if there were nine slats used where there was only room for eight combs, the bees would attend to their own spacing irrespective of the bee-keeper's ignorance. This is actually one of the great difficulties of the beginner of to-day, \(i.e.\), arranging for the exact bee space between the frames and getting them all parallel to the sides of the hive.
In the early times when slats were in use it was not known that bees always build their combs according to certain guides. The first bee amongst the wax-workers that is ready with her pellet of plastic wax attaches it to the roof, or something corresponding thereto. No studied direction is chosen. It is fixed haphazard; and whatever direction is taken by the bee for the first comb is the line on which all the other brood combs are constructed parallel with it. Frequently when a swarm takes possession of a new home, natural or artificial, where no bar frames are provided, two or even more wax-workers will start at different points, and all other combs started on either side of these will follow the direction of the one they are nearest to, although at a different angle to others that have been already started, until they gradually approach. Then they are curved and ultimately connected, still maintaining the parallel. This accounts for the bent combs frequently met with when transferring from the gin-case hiva to a bar-frame one.
### Bar-Frames.
The rise and progress of the bee-hive as we now see it having already been dealt with, it is here proposed to treat with the various styles of frames and hives that have been the outgrowth of the keen obesrvation of thinking men. After the first successful steps were taken, difficulties presented themselves and had to be overcome. The form the frames should take, the size most convenient to manipulate, and the number of frames the hives should contain, were some of the problems to be solved. Not only was the convenience of the beekeeper to be considered--he could vary his wants according to circumstances; but would all shapes and sizes be acceptable to the little workers themselves? These were things to be taken into serious consideration when beekeeping was first entered upon, with the idea of obtaining the greatest profit with the least labour, and the smallest amount of suffering from the defensive weapon of the bees themselves. The shape and size of the hives is of paramount importance Notwithstanding that bees in a state of nature adapt themselves to circumstances, and vary their work according to the home chosen, in an artificial state the requirements are different. In choosing a natural home, bees do not always appear to act with marked judgment, as the queer places selected by them and already referred to proves; but wherever they work, the fixing of the comb securely is always one of the chief considerations of the bees. If the home only admits of securing the comb by the upper edge, then, as a rule, it is built longer than it is deep, and the heaviest part of it (that containing the honey) is close to the attachment. Each comb tapers off at the edges, wedge shape. The size of the comb depends on the size of the cavity chosen. The brood comb is generally in the centre of the nest, and if the comb is large, it is generally found in the centre of it. If it be the spout of a tree, where it is liable to oscillate, brace combs are built in the bee space between each comb, and the centre of the comb is always better braced than are the sides. Where the combs are long and pendulous they are, of course, more liable to vibrate with the oscillation. Owing to their fragile nature, virgin combs, under such circumstances, would be liable to fracture; and where they cannot be properly and firmly fixed at the sides, and where the superficial area of the combs is great, these brace combs are used in greater numbers. When combs are built where they are not likely to be shaken, few, if any, brace combs are used. From this it will be noted that the shape of combs requires some bee-thought to protect them from injury under different circumstances. In the construction of the hive, and with it the frame, these points must be considered. If the frames are too large every way, the bees will attach the comb only to the top bar; where narrow and deep, they will seldom build down to the bottom bar.
Now, the more insecurely the comb is fastened to the sides of the frame the more liable it is to accident. No matter how great an adept the manipulator may be in technically handling them, the shape of the frame and its attachment have a good deal to do with success.
These matters--_i.e.,_ the suitability of the design of the frame for manipulative purposes--have given rise to the many designs or forms of hives brought before the public, each one claiming to have some special advantage to aid in the work of beekeeping. From the very beginning difficulties presented themselves. The cause of these had to be discovered and remedies devised. It is evident the problem as to the proper depth of the frame is still unsettled. The Heddon frame is one of the latest introduced. It has a depth of only \(4\frac{1}{4}\) inches and in width is \(17\frac{3}{8}\) inches--an area of nearly \(74\) square inches internal measurements. Of course, in the construction of a frame the outside measurements are the ones that must be adhered to, so that any variations in the thickness of the timber used shall not interfere with the internal measurements of the hives. In the dimensions of a _hive_ they are calculated from internal measurements--the opposite to that of the frame. The shallow frames, now so frequently found in use in the supers of the Langstroth hive are internally about \(4\frac{3}{8}\) inches x 16\(\frac{3}{8}\) inches,the superficial measurement being about 12 inches less than that of the Heddon, that is, about 62 inches.
These shallow frames that are used in the supers of the Langstroth are becoming more and more general every season, and for the reason it is not far to look. The internal heat of a hive has much to do with its success. Roofs that are leaky and sides that are cracked, so as to admit cold draughts of air to circulate within, are always detrimental to early brood development. In the early days of a coming honey flow, bees take more readily to shallow fremes than to those of deeper construction. The reason is, the artificial starters are near the young brood. The more compactly both the brood and the workers engaged in comb-building and storage are, the more is the heat generated. It is estimated that from 70\({}^{\rm o}\) to 80\({}^{\rm o}\) of heat are necessary for the secretion of wax. Heat ascends; therefore the shallower the space the greater are the conditions for the secretion of wax and the development of brood. These are two important points in successful bee-keeping.
Again, one of the early difficulties with all frames, no matter under what name or what the shape may have been, was that of inducing the bees to attach the comb firmly to all four sides. The more securely the comb within the frame is, the more is the danger of breakage minimised. To overcome this difficulty starters of foundation comb have been used on the bottom bar similar to those on the top one to induce the bees to continue the comb there. Full sheets of foundation are also used towards the same end. Of course the primary use of full sheets of foundation is the saving of labour with the bees. The only alteration that the bottom bar has undergone is that of from the full width to narrow. Blee space, or a little more, must be left between the bottom bar of the frame and the bottom board of the hive. Where the wide bar is used it intercepts the vision of the comb-building bees, for it is directly in a line between the fine edge of the comb in course of construction and the bottom board. In a state of nature there is always bee space beneath every finished comb. The wide bottom bar to the vision of the bees is virtually the bottom of the hive. The narrower, therefore, this bar is the less is the vision of the comb-building bees obstructed. Shallow frames with narrow bottom bars are great aids in obtaining this consideration--that is in securing all sides of the comb to the sides of the frame. Securing the brood comb to the bottom bar is not so essential as in the frames used in the supers, the amount as well as the method of handling the frames used in these two portions of the hive differ greatly.
The ends, too, have undergone various modifications with the view of obtaining the greatest amount of ease in working and aiding the bees in their labours, and at the same time giving them man's ideas of what bee comforts and ease should be. At one time we had what was termed Quinby's close-end frames. These were similar to the Heddon frames that are now struggling into use, but differed in measurement. The Heddon ends are 5\({}^{3}\) inches long, and full width throughout. The Quinby differs from it only in being nearly double the length (11 inches.) The latter rested on the bottom boards, leaving bee-space beneath the bottom bar, and, like the former, fitted closely to the sides of the hive. The supposed advantage of the close-ends is correct spacing throughout the entire depth of the frame. Oftentimes if frames are not put together correctly they twist, and although they may be correct at the top, they are many degrees out of plumb at the sides. In this manner, although the bars may be properly spaced, the bottom bars frequently touch. Under such conditions bees unite the combs, thus greatly obstructing the free removal of the frames. One of the uses of the closed ends was to mitigate this, but unless the hive stood perfectly level it would fail in that one object.
The Quinby oblong hive differs from the modern Langstroth only in length, being 7\({}^{1}_{8}\) in. shorter but 2 in. deeper--that is, nearly 48 in. less in superficial measurement. Its depth is the principal objection.
The Adair is another frame of the Langstroth type. In length it is 13\({}^{3}_{4}\) in., and 11\({}^{1}_{2}\) in. deep, or superficially about 48 in. less than the Langstroth--the same as between the latter and the Quinby, and, of course, on account of its depth has the same objection.
The Gallup and the American are identical in shape, both square, the latter being 12 in. by 12 in., and the former 11\({}^{1}_{4}\) in. by 11\({}^{1}_{4}\) in. What the advantage is in the difference of \({}^{3}_{4}\) in. every way is hard to guess.
There is another frame, similar in form to these two latter,named the Munday. It has a full-width top bar. It has a few advocates in the Hunter River district, where it first saw light.
One of the most queerly-formed frames is Abbott's Standard. The internal measurement of the top bar is \(16^{1}_{2}\) in., the bottom one 15 in., and each side 10 in. long. As will be seen from the diagram, the angles at the top are acute, and those at the base obtuse. It, like many of the others, is now obsolete. However, in all my travels amongst the beekeepers of New South Wales, I never saw one in use. One of the advantages claimed for it was that of causing the bees to attach their comb more securely to the ends.
The British Association standard frame was brought out by the British Beekeepers' Association in 1886. A Mr. Lee is said to have been the inventor. The advantages claimed for it were the simplicity in affixing foundation comb; antipropolising metal ends; the metal ends were also self-spacing. The top bar is two longitudinal pieces of equal size. The foundation was placed between these and secured by clamping the pieces together by means of metal ends. It never came much to the fore. It is too complicated for one thing, and too expensive for ordinary pockets, especially where bee-keeping was carried on in a large way.
The frames of the Combination Hive or the Long Idea differ in nothing from the Langstroth, and will be described under "'Hives."