1870.] 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



105 



frames, frames for surplus honey may be put in 

 each end, for emptying with tlie extractor. —3d. 

 It can be easily made a two-story hive, with 

 frames in the upper story the same size as in 

 the lower one. — 4th. By having movable side- 

 boards, it may be made a non-swarmer on Mr. 

 Quinby's and Mr. Alley's principle, and piles 

 of honey boxes may be put on the sides and top. 

 I have one made this way with thirteen frames, 

 sixteen live pound boxes form the sides, and 

 three twelve pound boxes on toj), all enclosed in 

 a suitable case. This is made somewhat like 

 Mr. Alley's hive ; but I think is better than his. 

 To avoid one extreme — the flat form, he has 

 gone to the other, and has his hive too tall and 

 too narrow. From all that I have read from 

 our best German and American writers on the 

 subject, I think I have hit the "golden mean" 

 of Avidth and depth. The great beauty of it is 

 that the same frame can be used in all the dif- 

 ferent styles ; and that we may have a variety 

 of hives with but one size of frame. 



I call this hive, with its non-swarming and 

 box arrangement, the "QuiisQUEPI.exal-Dii- 



PLEX-COMBIN ATION-ISTON-FATIiNTED - SUPE KFLU- 



ous-HoNEY-PRODUCiNG-HiVE. " It is Said "there 

 is nothing in a name,," but if I could only get 

 friend Price's "Beversible-Revoloable^^ attach- 

 ment, with the privilege of adding the name, 

 there would be considerable imin-ovement in 

 adopting this compellation for the modified 

 arrangement. 



Thaddeus Smith. 

 Pelee Island, Ontario, Sept. 10, 1870. 



[For the American Bee Jourual.] 



The Thomas Hive. 



Mr. Editor : — I wish, with your permission, 

 to correct some few errors which have ajipeared 

 in the Journal with regard to the Thomas hive 

 in Canada. 



Mr. J. H. Thomas, in the July number of the 

 Journal, says — "It is the principal hive in use 

 in Canada." Again, in the correspondence of 

 the Bee Journal, Sei^tember No., page 71, Mr. 

 H. Lipset says — "The Thomas hive is all the go 

 in Ontario." How is it that men will nrake such 

 extravagant statements? Now for a few facts, 

 as the bee-men say. 



One of my neighbors, an intelligent and scien- 

 tific bee-keeper, having been bred to the business, 

 received a hive from Mr. Thomas, and after giv- 

 ing it four or five years' ti'ial, says he would not 

 use the hives if he could get them for nothing. 



A Mr. Conger, of this county, whose son was 

 an agent for the Thomas hive, told me lately 

 that he had thrown the Thomas hive aside, in 

 favor of a hive similar to Langstroth's shallow 

 fonn. 



Mr. Walter Taylor, of Fitzroy Harbor, Onta- 

 rio, formerly an agent for the Thomas hive, 

 wrote me last winter that he would get his bees 

 out of the Thomas hive as soon as possible, as 

 he had found the shallow Langstroth hive was 

 "just the thing." 



I know of no person, making bee-keeping a 



"business," who uses the Thomas hive. After 

 all, the Canadian bee-keepers ought to feel proud 

 of having a man among thenr who has produced 

 the "best bee hive in America." Where are Dr. 

 Conklin, D. L. Adair, and J. M. Price with his 

 revolvable, reversible — and so on to the end of the 

 chapter? Echo answers — nowhere ! 



This has been a good year for bees in this part 

 of Ontario. Yet a man living five miles from 

 here, and using the Thomas hive, says it has 

 been a very bad season. 



I commenced in the spring with forty-five 

 hives, several of them being very weak from want 

 of honey. I now have eighty-seven good stocks 

 and sixteen hundred (IGOO) i>ounds of box honey, 

 besides about ten frames full. TwJfetocks that 

 did not swarm produced eighty-five (85) ]iounds 

 each, of box honey. My first swarm of the sea- 

 son, which came off June 13th and was put in 

 an empty hive, stoied sixty-six (60) jjounds of 

 honey in boxes, besides losing a frame of honey 

 which melted down with the extreme heat which 

 prevailed this summer. 



The foregoing, of course, does not come up to 

 the big stories we read in the Journal ; but it is 

 veiy good for this section of Ontario, and pays 

 very well. 



My hives contain nine frames, 16| inches long 

 and 85^ inches deep, inside. The frames run 

 from front to rear. The hive is similar in shape 

 to Langstroth's shallow form. I obtain earlier 

 swarms and more surplus honey than any other 

 person in these parts using a deeper form of 

 hive. While I put boxes on the top I would not 

 use any other form of hive. I think that Alley's 

 new style of Langstroth hive is the best for ob- 

 taining surplus honey in boxes that was ever in- 

 vented. I constructed two hives last year, as an 

 experiment, similar to Mr. Alley's. One of 

 these gave me the sixty-six pounds before men- 

 tioned. 



W. Baker, in the September correspondence of 

 the Journal, says that his bees swarmed without 

 making any preparation. ]\Iany of mine did the 

 same thing this summer. In opposition to this, 

 on examining a hive five days after a swarm left 

 it, I found a laying queen, and from the number 

 of eggs I saw, I should think she had been lay- 

 ing twenty- four hours at least. 



In looking over the Bee Journal, I am sur- 

 prised to see that so many bee-keepers still use a 

 pan of chips, old rags, rotten wood, &c., with 

 which to smoke their bees. I use a pipe, which 

 for convenience and efficiency, I think cannot be 

 surpassed, notwithstanding Mr. Thomas to the 

 contrary. It consists of a tin tube, six inches 

 long and one inch in diameter, having a funnel 

 soldered to the inside, about 1^ inches from one 

 end, as shown in the annexed figure : 



The funnel or cone is punched full of small holes. 

 Into each end of the tube a bored plug, a and b, 

 is nicely fitted. The plug b is cut so as to be 

 easily held between the teeth. To get the smoke, 

 draw out the plug b, fill the space c with some 



