BEE-spoke-data/bees-v0 huggingface dataset:
If it is spring when you commence, purchase a recent swarm just comfortably settled in a new live, weighing not less than four or five pounds, and for which you may pay, perhaps, ten shillings. This will be a first swarm, second swarms seldom weigh more than two pounds. If it be autumn, your best way will be to obtain a swarm of the same year, with all its "plant," as the commercial men say, of combs and brood ; in short, an established but still young colony. This should weigh from twenty-five to thirty pounds, and contain, according to the apiarian's not very flattering or poetical mode of calculation, about half a bushel of bees. For this you will not pay too much by an expenditure of twenty shillings. If you buy a colony of older date, you know not how undue may be the proportion of the "plant " over those who are to work it, and must not trust to weight alone in a stock-hive ; but see that the combs are of a pale colour, as dark ones show age, that they are worked down to the floor of the hive, and that the interstices of the combs are well filled with bees. These important particulars may be easily learned by gently turning up the hive at night when the bees are at rest.
If the footboard of the hive is not purchased at the same time, it will be found advisable to separate the live from its footboard by small wedges some few hours before it is intended to be removed. This precaution will prevent the bees from clustering on the floor, and will drive them to take refuge among the combs, together with which they are easily moved. The hive can then be placed upon its new footboard, and removed with it. Of course the entrance must be kept carefully closed during the process of removal, as the bees are generally very indignant at the unceremonious treatment they are experiencing, and if they should escape would soon use their stings with considerable effect. A piece of perforated copper, or tin, fixed against the entrance will readily effect this object, and at the same time afford sufficient ventilation. Devan also recommends that if the purchase is made in autumn, and the hive should be full of honey, it would be safest to
**Bisks.**
early it in an inverted position, to avoid the risk of detaching the heavily-laden combs. If the purchase is made in autumn, ascertain that the massacre of the drones has taken place, as if this has not happened there is something radically wrong in the live. In all cases the massacre of the drones is a certain sign that no more swarming is intended for that season. Never put a swarm into an old live, as it will be almost certainly infested with vermin, and particularly with the eggs of the insidious honey-moth, who will be ready enough to attack the hive, without having its eggs introduced where they can, as soon as they are hatched, set about their marauding inevings.
Winter management.
Supposing you commence in autumn, this will be one of the first things on which you will be anxious. First, as to their _food_ ; second, as to their _protection against cold_. If bees require feeding in the winter, it is because they have been wrongly deprived of the very stores they had laid by for that season. One of the advantages of all systems of double or treble lives, as we may call the junction of two or three hives or side-boxes together--in technical language storifying--is, that they allow the central or chief portion of the colony to remain permanently undisturbed, so that there is always food in it for the bees when required. If a hive weigh less than twenty pounds at the approach of winter, food should be given at once, so that there may be no disturbance in the hive in the periods of frost. The most natural of all modes, is to lay a piece of honeycomb in the hive about October or November. If that be not readily obtainable when wanted, honey in a plate will do, with short straws over it for the bees to alight on, or good sugar mixed with boiling water in equal weights. If necessary, the hive may be raised, to receive the plate or comb, by an eke--that is, a hive prematurely cut short, as it were, in the construction, at three or four rounds. This fits exactly the bottom of the hive, and forms a continuation of its edges. It will be good economy to repeat this feeding in spring, when the bees begin to stir about, but find the flowers not so early as themselves. The food inspring is placed, by some keepers, outside the hive, under the protection of an empty hive, or any other suitable cover. The policy of this advice is very questionable, as if the food, whether honey or sugar, is exposed outside the hive, the robber-bees are sure to find it out ; and there will, in all probability, be a constant warfare going on between the bees for whose benefit it was intended and the bees who intend to benefit themselves dishonestly. All this feeding, however, is quite unnecessary where bees are regularly well managed, and the hives have grown strong.
Feeding the bees by any process which requires the hive to be turned up, is at all times but a clumsy expedient, and more so, if feeding is required in winter-time, as if bees are suddenly exposed to severe cold they die instantly. To put a piece of honeycomb inside the hive is certainly the most natural plan; but as that cannot be done without turning up the hive, some other method must be discovered. There have been many most ingenious devices invented for this important purpose. Some hives are made with moveable drawers in the footboard, in which a saucer full of honey is placed, of course properly guarded by perforated card, or other material, and then introduced into the bottom of the hive. But to make the feeding apparatus as natural as possible, we must remember that the honey for the winter is not stored upon the floor, but in combs hanging from the roof, and we must, therefore, attempt as far as we can to imitate nature. The next best plan, as we cannot in most cases actually suspend a comb for the bees, is to place their food at the top of the hive, and not at the bottom. This, of course, cannot be done in an ordinary straw hive ; but in any of the carefully-made capped hives, whether of straw or wood, it is easily managed by placing the food upon the top of the hive, withdrawing the cork, or whatever obstacle is placed to prevent communication with the upper part of the hive. The bees soon find out their food, readily ascend, and carry it away into their combs. In this case no bees but those of the hive can obtain access to it, and the important point is also gained, viz., that of scarcely diminishing the temperature of the hive.
As to the form of the feeding vessel, each bee-keeperwill probably invent his own. Those which are intended for the top of the hive generally have a hole through the centre to correspond with that which forms the communication with the cup or bell-glass, and through which the bees ascend. One form is that of a flat wooden basin of a soup-plate form, with a tube through the centre through which the bees pass, and a great number of concentric circular channels cut around the tube, the hollows of which were filled with honey, so that the bees could safely sit upon the ridges while they sipped their food from the channels. Perhaps the most ingenious plan is that of a French bee-keeper, who manufactures a paper comb, and places that upon the hive, so that the bees can take their honey almost as if they were drinking it out of real combs. This only difference is that the cells of the paper comb are cylindrical instead of hexagonal.
With regard to the material with which they are to be supplied, their natural nutrient honey, is, of course, the best ; but care must be taken that it has not been removed from a hive by means of sulphur, or the bees will be made most seriously ill by the tainted food, and probably lose many of their number. Above all things, take great care that the honey is not eandied; it not only is actually poisonous to the bees, but they also have often perished from daubing themselves with the candied honey, which they have in-dignantly cast on the floor of their hive, and through which they must pass whether they enter or leave the hive. Sugar, mixed with boiling water or beer, is an excellent substitute for honey. The best way of making this pseudo-honey, is by dissolving a bound and a half of sugar in a quart of ale, boiling it gently for about five minutes, carefully skimming off the seam. Some prefer adding a little salt when it is presented to the bees. If a real comb cannot be procured, or an artificial one take up too much time in making, a piece of thin wood or pasteboard, pierced full of holes, and laid on the surface of the food, will float there, and enable the bees to get at their food without daubing themselves in their attempts to feed.
## Chapter The Hive.
This should be formed of some material that will neither readily receive and conduct the summer's heat to the live, nor radiate its own heat away from it in winter. Straw and wood are both good non-conductors of heat, and are both much used. The common straw hive answers every purpose when bee-management in its simplest shape is desired; and if a more elaborate system is to be pursued, the same straw live is easily made the chief portion of a larger structure, having conveniences for facilitating artificial swarming, or preventing swarming altogether, so far as it can be prevented, or for removing the honey. The straw lives have one advantage over those of wood; they admit freer passage of air by insensible degrees into the hive, and of moisture out of it. It will save the bees time and trouble, _which to you micans honey_, if you take care the inner surface of the straw live is carefully freed from all roughnesses. India matting has been used with success for lining straw hives. But use no paint, nor washes, nor anything of the kind.
The ordinary bell-shaped straw hive is of course not to be thought of, but it may be made the foundation of an excellent single live by an hour's work. About one quarter should be cut from the top, and upon this a flat thick piece of wood be fastened, projecting about half an inch all round. In the centre of this wooden top, bore a hole with a large centre-lit, and you have the body of the hive. The lower rim of the hive should be protected by a wooden hoop, in which the entrance is not to be cut, but out of the substance of the footboard, which should be as thick as can conveniently be obtained, and always of wood. A bell-glass will go over the hole in the top of the hive, and a smaller live of straw, or a wooden cover will protect this and keep it dark, for the bees cannot bear light to intrude upon their labours. The hole should be kept closed with a bung until the bees begin to hang about the entrance of the hive, when the bung should be withdrawn, and the bell-glass with its cover be placed upon the hive. The bees finding more space for their labours will at once turn their attention to the interior of their hive, and the bell will speedily be filled with the most beautifully purehoney. When this is the case, a piece of thin metal should be slipped between the glass and the wooden top, so as to cut off the combs from their attachment to the floor, and at the same to prevent the bees in the interior from escaping when the glass is removed. This should not be done immediately, as the queen may be among those imprisoned in the glass, which will be known by the quiet behaviour of the bees already in the glass. If they become excited, the queen is sure not to be among them, and the glass may be taken off, and its place supplied by another. The full cap, being instantly wrapped in a cloth, should be taken to some distance from the hive, and on the removal of the cloth the imprisoned bees will take the opportunity of regaining their home. A cap thus treated may be sold at a high price, as the comb will contain no eggs, young, or bee-bread, and also forms a very pretty ornament to the table. I knew one case where a lady, a bee enthusiast, took a cap nearly three feet in height full of pure honey, and was so charmed with it that she kept it as a spectacle, and never could prevail upon herself to empty it. If this plan be adopted, the bees will find plenty to do, and you will not have a swarm until the hive is so strong that it can easily spare it, and at the same time the original stock of honey in the hive will be untouched, and may possibly afford another supply, although not quite so pure.
Another very excellent way is to form the top of the hive of loose bars, instead of a solid board. This not only admits of capping, by placing over the bars a board perforated in the usual manner, but allows the bee-keeper to remove any comb at pleasure. This is a most useful power, as old combs can in that manner be removed, or unsound portions cut away without disturbing the remainder of the live. Each bar should be loosely placed in notches cut in the top of the hive, and always laid from front to back. The bees can be easily induced to follow the direction of the bars by placing a piece of guide-comb upon each bar. This is done by taking a piece of pure, clean comb, some of which should always be kept for the purpose, rubbing it on a smooth piece of iron, and then immediately pressing on the bar, to which it will adhere with tolerable firmness, and the bees will of their own accord fix it quite tight. This should be done to each bar. A small piece of comb will suffice, as all that is required is to give the bees the direction in which to work. The comb must be carefully cut, in order to preserve its original inclination. The distance of the bars from each other should be about half an inch, and their width one inch and one-eightth. These proportions should be carefully observed, and then ample room will be given for the variation in the thickness of the comb that bees constantly produce. The brood cells, as they are to hold young bees, are always the same depth, but the honey or store cells are often lengthened very considerably.
The power of thus removing a single comb will be found most advantageous when the comb begins to blacken by age. After a few years the successive generations of young bees leave so many of their exuvie and shrouds in the cells, that they become too small to receive young any more, and are often used for containing honey. The honey of these cells is sure to be very poor, and they hardly contain any wax at all. I have now in my possession several series of silicon cocoons which I have taken from old cells. They fitted one inside another, like a series of thimbles, and were easily withdrawn after a careful maceration.
The hive should always be placed upon a stand of a single log, the footboard projecting as far as possible, in order to keep off mice, rats, and other vermin. Care must be taken that when the wooden top to the hive is first fixed, all space between the straw and the wood should be carefully filled up with putty, or better with Roman cement, or the bees will fill up the spaces themselves with propolis, and waste much time in so doing. The same remarks will apply to the wooden hoop at the bottom of the hive, which should also be carefully smoothed so as to fit the footboard us closely as possible.
A Glass Window should be let into the back. This is not merely an agreeable adjunct, as admitting you when you please to a certain degree of familiarity with the bees, but often proves of use in questions of pure business-management. Bees, however, if they courteously answer your courteous mode of approaching them (which is, by gently breathing only through your nostrils, and with an easy noqchalant air, that seems to say, I don't care for the bees, and they have
devouring the honey. The cement has also the advantage of being cheap, and greatly assists in fixing windows and other appliances. The coating should be tolerably thick, and then not even the insidious moth can obtain an entrance except through the door, where the bees will keep a good watch, and the hive will lose less heat in winter, and gain less in summer than can be managed even by the most careful dressing and undressing the live with straw bandages. If the hive is as it should be, placed in a shed, the bees may be considered as quite secure from cold.
If the stock does not appear strong enough, another should be added to it, and the conjoint stocks will not require an ounce more honey than the original inhabitants. One foe, not the less dangerous from being unsuspected, is an internal dampness, which gives no outward sign, but has caused the destruction cf many a hive of bees, much to the astonshment of the owner, who has probably bestowed great care on them. A very effectual method of preventing this misfortune is to place over the aperture in the top of the hive a bell glass, covered with flannel or cloth, and wiping away the moisture as it appears on the inside of the glass. This precaution is more necessary in a wooden than in a straw hive, as the latter partially absorbs the vapour. In all probability bees sustain the severity of a Russian winter better than they do our comparatively mild season, because the air is much more dry than in England.
Several experiments have been tried, some very successfully, many completely the reverse, upon the apparently murderous plan of burying the hives in the winter, only leaving a tube to communicate from the mouth of the hive with the air. In or two cases the bees survived through the whole winter, and only consumed a few ounces of honey, but in many other cases, the experiments were terminated by the death of the bees.
When the spring begins to appear, the lives should be still more carefully shaded from the sun's rays, and if they should begin to swarm about the entrance, a shower from a watering-pot will lead them to believe that it is raining, and that they had better go on with their work within the live.
Aspect.--A north, north-east, or north-west aspect is
with honey-dew, and the bees frequent them in such numbers, that to pass under an avenue of limes when the honey-dew is on them, is like walking amid innumerable swarms of bees unsettled as to their future destination. All evil-scented places, such as brick-kilns, tan-yards, or boneerushers', should be avoided ; and the careful bee-keeper will cautiously shun factories or mills, whether worked by steam or water, as the bees have a peculiar objection to noisy neighbourhoods, and always prefer trees to chimneys. Richardson advises that if your bee-shed or stand is placed against a wall, it will be necessary to ascertain that there is no dunghill against its opposite side, as he found his boxes deserted by the bees, who have a decided objection to a permanent residence in such an unsavoury locality, although they frequently pay visits to dung-heaps, for the purpose of drinking the moisture which drains from then. This may, however, be avoided by placing salt in the supply of water near the hives, as has been described.
## collateral, nadir, and super hives.
So far for the simple single hive. We will now describe shortly the compound hives. These are chiefly of three sorts, the Nadir, Collateral, and Super. The Nadir hives are those where the additional hive is placed under the original ; the Collateral, those where, as the name implies, the hives are placed side by side. Of these, the Collateral are much to be preferred, as in the Nadir hives the bees are exposed to many inconveniences, among which may be reckoned the labour of mounting up through two hives, to deposit the honey or pollen which they have brought home, a task which to an already wearied and heavily laden bee would be an addition to its labours. Moreover, the brood combs are apt to be distributed unequally, so that the bee-master is never sure of getting a hive full of pure honeycomb, as he can in the collateral living. Super-hiving is where the additional hive or box is placed above the mother hive. To this nearly the same objections apply as to the nadir system, and I shall, therefore, merely describe the collateral system. This may be accomplished either with straw hives or wooden boxes. Straw hives, however, are not very manageable, or at Bees.
least do not answer for the centre box, and the description will, therefore, be only of boxes. It is not to be expected that every one will be able to purchase the somewhat expensive series of hives described by Mr. Nutt, but it is hoped that his description of a "set" of collateral hives will be sufficiently clear to enable any man of tolerable ingenuity, and moderately acquainted with the use of tools, to construct a set for himself, even though he be no joiner or carpenter. He need not expend his time upon the external ornament of the hives, or make quite as elegant a set as depicted by Mr. Nutt, but if he only takes care to have the _interior_-smooth, and carefully worked, using well-seasoned wood, against which the rays of the meridian sun, the drenching-summer showers, or the frosts of the winter months, may beat in vain, his hives will answer as well if not better than many an elegant and carefully finished bee-palace such as are frequently reared.
Mr. Nutt's description of the proper form and materials of the collateral boxes is as follows :--
"The best wood for them is, by some, said to be red eedar ; the chief grounds of preference of which wood are, its effects in keeping moths out of the boxes, and its being a bad conductor of heat. But of whatever kind of wood bee-boxes are made, it should be well seasoned, perfectly sound, and free from what carpenters term _shales_. Good, sound, red deal, answers the purpose very well, and is the sort of wood of which most of my boxes have been made hitherto. The sides of the boxes, particularly the front side, should be, at the least, an inch and a half in thickness ; for the ends, top, and back parts, good deal, one inch thick, is sufficiently substantial ; the ends that form the interior divisions and openings must be of half-inch stuffs, well dressed off, so that, when the boxes and dividing tins are closed--that is, when they are all placed together--the two adjoining ends should not exceed five eighths of an inch in thickness. These communication-ends, the bars of which should be exactly parallel with each other, form a communication or division as the case may require, which is very important to the bee, and by which the said boxes can be immediately divided without injuring any part of the combs, or deluging the bees with li-void honey, which so frequently annoys them, in extractingtheir sweets from the piled or storified boxes. This is not the only advantage my boxes possess; the receptacles or frame-work, for the ventilators, must be four inches square, with a perforated flat tin, of nearly the same size; and in the middle of that tin must be a round hole, to correspond with the hole through the top of the box, in the centre of the frame-work just mentioned, an inch in diameter, to admit a perforated cylinder tin ventilator, nine inches long. This flit tin must have a smooth piece of wood, well made to fit it closely, and to cover the frame-work just mentioned, so as to carry the wet off; then placing this cover over the square perforated tin, your box will be secure from the action of wind and rain. The perforated cylinder serves both for a ventilator, and also for a secure and convenient receptacle for a thermometer, at any time when it is necessary to ascertain the temperature of the box into which the cylinder is inverted. Within this frame-work, and so that the perforated flat tin described may completely cover them, at each corner make a hole with a three-eights centre-bit through the top of the box. These four small holes materially assist the ventilation, and are, in fact, an essential part of it.