1909 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



169 



FIG. 3. — INTERIOR OF SORTER'S HOUSE-APIARY. 

 The colonies are arranged along the south wall on the left. The rest of the building is used for empty supers, supplies, etc. 



ceedingwith them. Although the general opin- 

 ion is that house-apiaries cost more in the long 

 run than the plan of keeping the hives on sepa- 

 rate stands, and that they are less convenient, still 

 we believe that there is a place for them in modern 

 bee-iceeping, as the history of the industry has 

 shown. 



A great many who have not studied the sub- 

 ject deeply are carried away, so to speak, by the 

 thought of putting up a cheap building to shelter 

 the hives, thinking that by so doing the hives 

 may be constructed of thin cheap material, and 

 that the colonies can be easily protected in the 

 winter w;ith but little expense. There are many 

 things to take into consideration, however, as the 

 following letter shows: 



I have a boase-apiary 12 ft. square. It is provided with a dou- 

 ble floor with paper between the boards. The walls are covered 

 oo the outside with patent clapboards, and are sheathed up on the 

 inside, the space between being filled with fine hay chaff. I 

 have wintered colonies in this building for three years, and 1 find 

 that they consume about the same amount of stores as those win- 

 tered omside in the yard. They do about as well, so far as mak- 

 int surplus honey is concerned, as those outside. 



During the three years that I have had bees in this building I 

 have lott forty-three queens as against only two lost from the 

 same number of colonies in the yard. I would not advise any 

 one to build a house-apiary, for a good one costs about one hun- 

 dred dollars, and the colonies do no belter than those outside on 

 ieparaie stands. Minott C. Young. 



Rutland, Vi. 



The above letter shows pretty conclusively one 

 of the greatest disadvjinf.ages of the house-apiary; 



that is, the fact that many young queens are lost 

 by getting into the wrong entrances when return- 

 ing from the mating-flights. However, this loss 

 can be overcome to a considerable extent by 

 painting around the entrances with different colors, 

 or by changing the appearance in some way so 

 that the bees may more easily mark their own en- 

 trances. 



Mr. W. C. Sorter, of Wickliffe, Ohio, felt 

 that he was obliged to erect some sort of shelter 

 for his apiary; and since he needed a building al- 

 so, for supplies, storage room, etc., he decided 

 to construct one that could be used for the bees 

 as well. He therefore put up a building about 

 30 ft. long, facing the south, the wall on the 

 south side near the ground being left open to ac- 

 commodate a row of hives. The other side of 

 the building was used for a storage-room; and 

 the wall on that side, instead of being solid, was 

 made so that it could be opened up on hot days 

 in the summer in order to prevent too high a tem- 

 perature. To provide the proper amount of 

 open ing, the ventilators at the back were construct- 

 ed 18 inches wide by 14 ft. long. After a trial 

 of this building Mr. Sorter was so well pleased 

 with it that he extended it to a length of 60 ft. 

 The illustrations show the front (south) side of 

 this house-apiary. As the building now stands, 

 there are three 14-ft. ventilators on the back 

 (north) side, which, with the windows, give all 



