for March. 1920 



105 



Necessary Equipment for Bee Keepers 



HENRY W. SANDERS 



M 



■ < )ST beginners in Beekeeping are apt to place far 

 too much stress on the exact pattern of the hive 

 that they intend to use, forgetting that much 

 more depends u]>on the beekeeper than upon the hive, and 

 that this is at best only a tool, depending for its success 

 upon being operated by a skillful workman. Nearly every 

 writer on beekeeping strongly urges the_ novice to 

 commence his operation with standard equipment and 

 in this the writer most heartily concurs. It should 

 always be borne in mind, however, that the reason for 

 this advice is not that there is any essential superiority 





-1 



manipulated, and from this invention the history of 

 modern bee-culture may be said to begin. 



As will be seen in the picture, the modern hive con- 

 sists of a series of boxes, without bottom or top, that 

 sit one atop the other, and each contains 8 or 10 of 

 these movable frames hanging in a "rabbet." The 

 photo was taken during the active season when each 

 colony had two or three extra bodies ("supers") for 

 honey-storage. 



During the honey-flow the bees, if strong enough, 

 will fill "up many of the combs thus provided. It 

 would he perhaps more correct to say that they would 

 build the combs first, but as we use the same combs 

 over and over again, we think naturally of their work- 

 ing in a super of drawn combs, where the bees have 

 nothing to do but deposit the honey and ripen it. 

 Where there are no drawn combs available, we place 

 in the empty frames a thin sheet of beeswax, rolled in 

 such a way as to resemble the natural "midrib" of the 

 honeycomb, and held firmly in place by tight wires. 

 The bees soon transform this into a perfect comb. 



Towards the end of the season the first combs will be 

 ready for extracting, and care should be taken to see 

 that the combs are all sealed over before any honey 

 is taken. The nectar when first brought in is thin as 

 water, and until the bees have ripened it to the thickness 

 necessary, by ventilating the hive, it is in danger of 

 souring" in the containers. Bees are the best judg'es 

 of honey, and when they themselves cap it over, it 

 may be assumed that the ripening process is fully com- 

 pleted. 



in the eight or ten frame Langstroth hive — indeed 

 there are some well-founded arguments against the 

 size of frame used — but rather that the advantages of 

 interchangeability, of having frames of a size that new 

 ones may be bought from stock, and above all of buy- 

 ing and selling bees in these standards hives, are so 

 important as to outweigh any objections against the 

 hives named. 



A beekeeper who has a thorough knowledge of his 

 bees, and of the business of honey-production could 

 make money with "any old outfit," so long as it con- 

 sisted of some form of movable frame hive. On the 

 other hand, the most carefully manufactured apparatus 

 will not prevent the ignorant and careless beekeeper 

 from losing their bees by winter starvation or disease, 

 if they do not receive the needful care. 



Until 1850, when Langstroth invented the hive now 

 used almost all over the world, the beehive consisted 

 either of the straw "skep," with which we are familiar 

 in literature and art, or the box or log "gum" (so-called 

 from being frequently a section of gum-tree). Inside 

 these receptacles the bees built their combs, fixing 

 them firmly to the roof. The beekeeper had no 

 chance to examine the inside of the hive, and the 

 method consisted simply in allowing the bees to swarm 

 at will, hiving the swarms in empty hives, and then, 

 at the end of the season killing with sulphur the bees 

 in the heaviest of the hives, to rob them of their winter 

 stores. Langstroth invented a hive in which the bombs 

 are built in wooden frames that can he lifted out of 

 the hive and examined, transposed, or otherwise 



Interior of Extracting House. 



The combs are collected from the hives, the adher- 

 ing bees brushed ofi', and the honey placed in a bee- 

 tight box on a wheelijarrow, or some similar conveyor. 

 It is then taken to the "honey-house" of which the in- 

 terior is shown in the second picture. On the extreme 

 left will 1)6 seen a knife and tank. The comb is rested 

 on this tank and the waxen cappings sliced off with 

 the knife. 'I'hcy drop into the tank to drain off their 

 honey and then go to the beeswax melter. The comb 

 thus uncapped is placed in one of the swinging baskets 

 {Continued on page 121) 



