The Cecil Whig., 1875-04-24
M'ht EARN.
HIVES AND PREPARATIONS FOR.
SWARMIXG OF BEES.

he bet,erao, to let his bees swarm natur-
ally, it becomes him to ask what are the
reasonable rules to be observed for sue
cess. Let me lay down few:
First Provide during the leisure of
the Winter previous to swarming, all
the hives necessary. Don't wait until
they begin to swarm before you provide
the hives | make it rule to have dou-
BILE the number of hives need on hand.
That is, if l have forty swarms, l
have eighty empty hives on hand
Hence | have so far ever had surplus,
and this year when l took them out of
my house garret, where keep them
stored, they were marked 1866, 1871,
1858, and other years, showing that
some of them had been on hand long
time unused Now this is not absolutely
necessary, but is better than to have
hurry and confusion at the time of
swarming. At least provide for your
apiary one and ahalf hives to every hive
YOU expect to Winter. That is, if you
Winter twelve hives, then by May lst
have eighteen well-made and nicely
painted hives on hand ready for your
swarmS.
Second. Using old hives This can
be readily done; but prepare them care
fully. Scrape them clean with an old
knife or tool made on purpose, and then
scald them out thoroughly with plenty
of boiling water. Stop all holes and
cracks and thoroughly repaint them.
Hives, if thoroughly nailed when first
made. will be found in better order when
they are reftted for second or subsequent
use. So | recommend sound lumber,
tight joints, close and what seems to be
over-nailing of the parts of the hive to-
gether, puttying and painting thorough
". A hive ought to last forty years.
Say six or eight years for the first
swarm put in it j.; then cleaned, repainted
and used from four to ten years for the
second swarm, and so on at least forty
wears. Paint hives of different colors;
green is good color, as is yellow,
white and brown. The so-called rail-
road, mineral and other colors are excel
lent in shades of coloring, but not as
durable as white lead But white lead,
colored by green and other colorS, is apt
to become dingy in a few years by the
color washing out by rains.
Third Having said this much on
making hives and using them repeated
ly, let me say as thirdly, use nothing in
any hive when YOU put your swarm
into it. Now all clean, nice, experience
ed bee-keepers know the reason Of this.
Ii is because just as the bees are about
to swarm they swallow all the honey,
bee-bread, or other supplies of food they
can possibly eat, and stuffed with about
weeks food they do not want any more
to eat | have had q rainy, cold time
come, with no harm to the swarms, of
three, six, and in one instance eight
days, so wet and cold that hardly bee
out of the hive holding the new swarm
Hence l say the supply of food taken
by new swarm is about weeks sup
ply So if you now rub honey, molas-
scs, mint, or anything in your hives, you
only insult your bees As well might
you ask stuffed boy to eat his supper
on top Of his Thanksgiving dinner, as
to ask an overgorged bee to lick up your
supposed nice things put in your hive.
You ought to know better than to do
such silly thing, reader, yet whisky
and molasses, bee-mint, honey and
water, vinegar and sugar, salt and alum,
and know not what are put into hives
by thoughtless, silly bee-keepers, who
want to do something" they know not
what. Now all say is. that since 1851
l have kept bees, and never yet had
a swarm leave a hive and go off to the
woods and believe one reason of sue
cess to this absolute extent is that l
never soil and make my hives foul with
honey, salt, molasses or anything. l
give the hives clean and sweet and the
bees never yet told me that they want
ed anything more You farmers raise
pork, wheat, eggs, oats and beef Now
suppose you move out of your old house
into your new house, and your neigh
bors have gone the night before and mix
ed up eggs, wheat, lard, tallow, oats and
beef and daubed your floors, walls and
windows with the mixture, just to please
you. How would you like it? So you,
for the neatest of all insects, bee, put
honey to walk on, mint to smell of, and
molasses to clean up, on the walls of the
new hive for bees 1t must be as pleas
ant to them as to you to find lot of
eggs and lard and wheat on the floors
of your new house. No! All you ask
and the bees ask is clean house to 60
into.
Fourth. Supplies ofswarming imple-
ments. These are the hive, clean and
neatly made, clean and neat inside,
dry and cool; next piece of cheap
stout linen cloth, large enough to tie
over the top of the hive so closely that
not q bee can get out when tied lad
der as tall as are the apple or other
trees near your apiary, few pieces of
stick or lumber one and ahalf inches
wide, and one or one and quarter i'll
inches thick; few pieces of board four
feet long and half an inch thick, and ten
inches or SO wide, and perhaps few
pieces triangular in shape to put under
your hive. Then add bee-veil ofcom-
mon black lace, rope twenty feet long
and neat, clean halfbushel round 5as-
ket. If your apiary is large you may
want two hiving-cloths, and second
set of boards and sticks The use of
the hive needs no explanation; but the
boards and long sticks are to build
platform in the top of any tree, or to lay
on the ground to hive there If your
swarm lights on the top of a tree, as
mine often do, twenty-five feet from the
ground, it is in vain to shake them off
in your halfbushel basket and bring
them down and hive on the ground; or
at least it will take halfhour longer to
do it than on the ground. Hence l
prefer to run the ends of the long sticks
among the branches, rest the ends on
the ladder, lay on the sticks the boards,
hiving-cloth and hive, and proceed to
hive them in top of the tall tree Thus
| can hive Them in twenty minutes, in
stead of the hours time of reluctant