Part 4

ON VENTILATING THE HIVE.

Graduate the bottom board and ventilator at pleasure, by means of the button or otherwise, so as to give them more or less air, as the circumstances may require.

REMARKS.

Bees require more air in order to enable them to endure the heat of summer and the severity of winter, than at any other time. If they are kept out in the cold, they need as much air in the winter as in the heat of summer. It is in a mild temperature only, that it is safe to keep them from the pure air. If placed below frost in a dry sand-bank, they seem to need scarcely more than is contained in their hive at the time they are buried, during the whole winter. If kept in a clean, dry cellar, the mouth so contracted as to keep out mice, gives them enough. But if they are kept in the apiary, there should be a slow current of air constantly pressing in at the bottom and off at the top thro' the ventilator.

RULE IV.

ON PREVENTING ROBBERIES.

At the moment it is observed, that robbers are within, or about the hive, raise the bottom board so near the edge of the hive as to prevent the ingress or egress of the bees, and stop the mouth or common entrance and ventilator. At the same time take care that a small space on all sides of the hive be left open, so as to afford them all the air they need. Open the mouth only at evening, and close early in the morning, before the robbers renew their attack.

REMARKS.

Bees have a peculiar propensity to rob each other, and every precaution necessary to prevent it, should be exercised by the cultivator. Families in the same apiary are more likely to engage in this unlawful enterprize than any others, probably because they are located so near each other, and are more likely to learn their comparative strength. I never could discover any intimacy between colonies of the same apiary, except when they stood on the same bench; and then, all the social intercourse seems to subsist between the nearest neighbors only.

Bees are not likely to engage in warfare and rob each other, except in the spring and fall, and at other times in the season, when food is not easily obtained from blossoms.

Bees do not often engage in robbery in the spring, unless it is in such hives as have had their combs broken by frost or otherwise, so as to cause the honey to drip down upon the bottom board. Much care should be exercised by the apiarian to see that all such hives are properly ventilated, and at the same time closed in such a manner as to prevent the entrance of robbers in the day-time, until they have mended the breach, so as to stop the honey from running.

Clear water should be given them every day, so long as they are kept in confinement.

I have known many good stocks to be lost in the spring, by being robbed; and all for want of care. Bees rob each other when they can find but little else to do; they will rob at any time when frost has destroyed the flowers, or the weather is so cold as to prevent their collecting honey from them. Cold, chilly weather prevents the flowers from yielding honey without frost, as was the case in the summer of 1835, in many places.

Bees need but little air at any time when they rob, and yet more is necessary for them when confined by compulsory means, than otherwise. When deprived of their liberty, they soon become restless, and use their best efforts to make their way out of the hive--hence the importance of leaving a small space all around the bottom, to admit air and to prevent their melting down.

RULE V.

ON EQUALIZING COLONIES.

Hive one swarm in the lower apartment of the hive; collect another swarm in a drawer, and insert the same in the chamber of the hive containing the first. Then, if the swarms are small, collect another small swarm in another drawer, and insert the same in the chamber of the hive containing the first, by the side of the second. In case all the bees from either of the drawers, amalgamate and go below with the first swarm, and leave the drawer empty, then it may be removed, and another small swarm added in the same manner.

REMARKS.

It is of prime importance to every bee cultivator, that all his colonies be made as nearly equal in numbers and strength, as possible. Every experienced bee-master must be aware that small swarms are of but little profit to their owner. Generally, in a few days after they are hived, they are gone;--no one can trace their steps: some suppose they have fled to the woods--others, that they were robbed: but after all, no one is able to give any satisfactory account of them. Some pieces of comb only are left, and perhaps myriads of worms and millers finish off the whole. Then the moth is supposed to be their destroyer, but the true history of the case is generally this: The bees become discouraged, or disheartened, for want of numbers to constitute their colony, abandon their tenement, and join with their nearest neighbors, leaving their combs to the merciless depredations of the moth. They are sometimes robbed by their adjoining hives, and then the moths finish or destroy what is left.

Second swarms are generally about half as large as the first, and third swarms half as large as second ones.

Now if second swarms are doubled, so as to make them equal in number with the first, the owner avails himself of the advantage of a strong colony, which will not be likely to become disheartened for want of numbers, nor overcome by robbers from stronger colonies.

It is far less trouble, and less expense, for the bee-owner lo equalize his colonies, than to prepare hives and drawers of different sizes to fit colonies.

When colonies and hives are made as near alike as possible, many evils are avoided, and many advantages realized: every hive will fit a place in the apiary--every drawer a hive, and every bottom board and slide may in any case be used without mistakes.

Swarms may be doubled at any time before they become so located as to resume their former hostility, which will not be discovered in less than three or four days. Bees are provided with a reservoir, or sack, to carry their provision in; and when they swarm, they go loaded with provision suited to their emergency, which takes off all their hostility towards each other; and until these sacks are emptied, they are not easily vexed, and as they are compelled to build combs before they can empty them, their contents are retained several days. I have doubled, at a fortnight's interval in swarming, with entire success. The operation should be performed within two or three days--at the farthest four days. The sooner it is done, the less hazardous is the experiment.

As a general rule, second swarms only should be doubled. Third and fourth swarms should always have their Queen taken from them, and the bees returned to the parent stock, according to Rule 10.

RULE VI.

ON REMOVING HONEY.

Insert a slide under the drawer, so far as to cut off all communication between the lower apartment and the drawer. Insert another slide between the first slide and the drawer. Now draw out the box containing the honey, with the slide that is next to it. Set the drawer on its window end, a little distance from the apiary, and remove the slide. Now supply the place of the drawer, thus removed, with an empty one, and draw the first inserted slide.