424 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



PROPER SIZE OF HIVES. 



C. C. ALDRICH, MORRISTOWN, MINN. 



As there has been a discussion going on through the bee journals 

 as to the proper size of hives, and as I deem the subject of great im- 

 portance, I will give my views. 



By way of an introduction, I wish to say that I have kept bees in 

 Minnesota for twenty-six years. I commenced with the standard 

 hive, Langstroth pattern, and after having kept them five years I 

 purchased three hives of a neighbor in the fall. I wintered them 

 with iny own. The last of May they swarmed, casting three swarms 

 each, and the third swarm made twenty-five pounds of box honey 

 each, while the Langstroth hives did not swarm until July and made 

 scarcely any honey. The size of the hives bought were twelve in- 

 ches square, and fourteen inches high. With this experience, I de- 

 vised the hive I now use, and when I had fifty hives of the Lang- 

 stroth and fifty of my own, every one of my own swarmed before I 

 had any from the Langstroth. 



Now, don't think that I am writing this to sell my hives, as I have 

 no hives to sell. The patent has expired, and my health is such that 

 I cannot make them. The size of my hive is fourteen inches square 

 inside and eleven inches high. I am aware that where longer sea- 

 sous can be had a larger hive can be used. I also wish to say that I 

 am only writing of the body or brood chamber of a hive. Surplus 

 can be used according to the strength of the colony. My reasons 

 for believing that a small hive is best for Minnesota are: 



First. — -A hive should be no larger than to hold honey enough to 

 winter, and until honey can be gathered in the spring. 



Second. — That too much honey in the hive retards brood rearing, 

 as we all know that all depends upon having all of the brood we 

 can have hatched at the commencement of the honey harvest. 



Third. When we take into consideration the labor of handling 

 large and small hives and in putting them into and taking them out 

 of the cellar, large hives require two men, the sinaller, one man. 



While there are many other reasons, I have not the time to give 

 them. 



To Pkotect Cherries from Birds. — Of late years a new Ameri- 

 can mulberry tree has come into bearing, and it answers the pur- 

 pose beautifully. It never fails to bear, is a long time in fruit, and 

 the birds prefer its fruit to cherries and will go past the cherry 

 trees any day to get mulberries. The birds begin upon the berries 

 before they are ripe. This mulberry is a profuse bearer, the fruit is 

 13^ inches long and black when ripe, is good for family use, is not 

 so insipid as most mulberries and is especially good when mixed 

 with currants. One or two mulberry trees planted near the cherry 

 orchard makes the best safeguard against the depredations of birds 

 I know of.— N. S. Piatt, Connecticut State Pomologist. 



