14 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



January, 1918 



I 



INEXPENSIVE WINTERING 



ers the 

 An Ordinary Hire Packed Inside of 

 a Long Idea Hire; also a Regular 

 Hive on End. Inside of Three Supers 



By E. R. Root 



N these col- 

 umn a we 

 have f r e - 

 quently mention- 

 ed the Long Idea 

 hive as used by 

 the late O. 6. 

 Poppleton, f 

 Stuart,- Florida 

 — a hive that 

 has 24 or 30 brood-frames all in one story. 

 The advantages of this hive have been 

 pointed out — it has a large capacity, and dur- 

 ing the season there is no heavy lifting of 

 supers such as one encounters when run- 

 ning a three-story standard Langstroth hive 

 on the tiering-up principle. It will be re- 

 membeTed that Mr. Poppleton used this hive 

 because, as the season progressed, he could 

 expand the brood-nest without putting on 

 upper stories, so that during the entire ex- 

 tracting season it would not be necessary 

 for him to lift anything heavier than a 

 brood-frame or a hive-cover. A number of 

 writers have suggested that this big hori- 

 zontally expanded hive with only one story 

 would be excellent for wintering. All that 

 is necessary is to select in the fall of the 

 year the heaviest and best combs, contract- 

 ing the brood-nest down to about eight 

 combs. These are then put into an eight- 

 frame hive-body or an inner case set length- 

 wise in the big horizontal hive as shown in 

 Fig. 1. A suitable bridge or covered run- 

 way connects the inner and outer entrance 

 which may be at the side or the end. The 

 illustration, Fig. 1, shows the entrance at the 

 far end of the hive. 



A n ordinary 

 snper-cover cov- 

 ers the inner 

 hive, then pack- 

 ing material is 

 poured between 

 the outer and in- 

 ner hive. There 

 must now be pro- 

 vided a shallow 

 super made of cheap lumber to go on the 

 top of the outer hive, and to hold the pack- 

 ing on. (See Fig. 2.) This gives us a colony 

 well packed in a double-walled hive; and be- 

 yond the shallow rim, to told the packing oa 

 top, there is no other equipment required 

 provided one already has eight or ten frame 

 hives. If he does not have these, he can 

 make an inner case. In either case the ex- 

 pense of packing bees is very small. 



The colony can be left in the inner hive 

 till late in the spring or until the oees begin 

 to need room, at which time they can be 

 unpacked and the inner hive removed, when 

 the frames are turned around the other way 

 and additional combs given. The outer en- 

 trance and the outer appearance of the hive 

 remains just the same. 



With this hive, the beekeeper is in a posi- 

 tion to expand the brood-nest as much as 

 he pleases daring the entire season without 

 any heavy liftii'g — a feature taut will be 

 appreciated by women and oMer men who 

 cannot very well lift the heavy supers of 

 the ordinary ten-frame hive. 



We are trying some colonies on this plan, 

 and shall be able to give our readers a re- 

 port next spring. 



Fig. 1. — Long Idea Iiive serving as a winter case 

 for a single-walled eight-frame hive. 



Fig. 2. — Front view of the Long Idea hive with 

 an e.xtra rim set on to hold sufficient packing. 



