1900 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



875 



my apiary, either as complete hives or extract- 

 ing-supers. 



1. The Bingham hive complete ; 2. The 

 Heddon hive and the Shirley hive, which I 

 use as supers mostly. 



The Bingham first. I begin with the frame 

 as being the most essential part of any hive. 

 The frame consists of a top bar 20 inches long, 

 ^ in. square ; end-pieces 6>2 in. tall by 1^ 

 wide and ^ thick. The end-pieces are nailed 

 to the top-bar so that one corner of the bar 

 comes to the middle of the top of the ends, 

 and the opposite corner is down for the comb 

 or foundation to be attached to. The bees 

 also attach the combs to the ends of the frames 

 as well. The front of the brood-nest is a 

 board or frame 21 in. long and 6>< wide. The 

 entrance is 20 in. long by 3^ high. 



4^X2 in. with separators. Sections stand 

 crosswise of the frames. For extracting — 

 well, any old straight combs I have in full 

 sets, on top of queen-excluder of course. 



The Heddon hive is different, as shown in 

 cuts 1 and 2, to compare the brood-chambers 

 of each hive. The frame is 18,^ long by 5^ 

 deep. Eight of these frames fit in a case which 

 is 534'' deep, leaving a bee-space over the 

 frames. Two of these cases make a hive, 

 with 8 of these shallow frames in each case, 

 and a bee space through the middle, unless 

 the bees chuck it full of brace-comb, which 

 they often do. The hive stands on a bottom 

 with cleats y% thick along the sides and back, 

 leaving the front open for an entrance. As 

 seen in the cut, this bottom may be reversed 

 for winter, and has 1 i<-iuch cleats on the oth- 



FIG. 1 — HEDDON AND BINGHAM HIVE. 



The front and back panels have each a strip 

 y% in. thick nailed up and down each end (in- 

 side) so as to keep a full bee- space for outside 

 combs. These parts all stand on a level bot- 

 tom long enough to project ^ in. beyond the 

 total of the front porch, so as to allow of an 

 outside case over all. 



I prefer the cases a little wider, to shed the 

 weather. The front board of this case is 2 in. 

 narrower at the bottom, leaving a porch 2 in. 

 high, sloping to a ^-inch doorway. 



As can be seen, this hive may be used with 

 10, 11, or 12 frames in the honey season, by 

 moving the back board back ; or take out 

 combs and move the back up close if a small- 

 er brood-chamber is wanted (even to a nu- 

 cleus). 



It can accommodate almost any size of super 

 up to 17 by 20 inches — i. e., inside measure. 

 I use one for sections holding 86 of the 4^ X 



er side. This hive takes the same size of su- 

 pers as the L. 

 ; New Richmond, Mich., Sept. 19-. 



[The Bingham hive, a cut and description 

 of which in its more modern form we gave on 

 p. 297 of the current volume, is something like 

 the Quinby closed-end-frame hive. The ends 

 of the frame constitute the ends of the hive. 

 The two open sides are closed up by means of 

 two panels as described These panels and 

 the frames are squeezed together at each end 

 by means of wire loops in connection with 

 stretcher-sticks. As Mr. Shearman points 

 out, such a hive is very cheaply constructed, 

 and is decidedly on the expansion order, for 

 the brood-nest can be reduced to one, two, or 

 increased to as many frames as the bottom- 

 board will accommodate. Mr. Bingham now 

 uses a bottom-bar to his frame, and his frame 

 is mad-^ ex^ctlv like the H^f^rion 



