The American Apiculturist. 



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ENTERED AT THE POST-OFFICE, WENHAM, AS SECOND-CLASS MATTER. 



Published Monthly. Philip H. Moeant & Co., Publishers and Prop'rs. 



WENHAM, MASS., JUNE i, 1886. 



VOL. IV. 



No. 6. 



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To each new subseriher and to those who 

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 send likenesses of Rev. L. L. Langstroth and 

 the late Moses Quinby. 



For the American Apiculturist. 



AN EXPERIMENT. 



By S. Corneil. 



One reason why some beekeep- 

 ers prefer having their hives closely 

 sealed above in winter is because 

 they believe that a solid board 

 cover confines the heat of the clus- 

 ter better than a quilt of wool, or 

 any other porous substance. The}' 

 say that the warm air rises to the 

 top and escapes through the po- 

 rous cover, and of necessity there 

 must be a loss of heat which with 

 a solid board cover would be re- 

 tained. 



According to Sir Wm. Thomp- 

 son's Table of Thermal Conduc- 

 tivities in the Encyc. Brit. 9th ed., 

 wood conducts heat nearl}' five 

 times as fast as does carded wool. 

 To test the matter practically I 

 15 



took two eight frame Langstroth 

 hives without either bottom or top 

 and removed the frames. One of 

 these I covered with a pine board 

 of seven-eighths stuff, but before 

 screwing the cover down I inserted 

 rubber packing in the joints to 

 make them air tight. I covered 

 the other hive with a quilt of wool 

 18x20 inches and weighing a pound 

 and a half. Strips were fastened 

 above and below the quilt to press 

 the wool together. In each of 

 these covers I inserted the stem of 

 a thermometer so that the bulb 

 just came through on the lower side. 

 I next spread about two inches of 

 granulated cork in the bottoms 

 of two of the outside cases of 

 my Quinby hives. These cases 

 were six inches longer and eight 

 inches wider than the Langstroth 

 hives. In each of the Quinby 

 hives I placed two covered honey 

 pails, filled with hot water, and as 

 quickly as possible I placed the 

 bottomless Langstroth hives over 

 the pails and packed between the 

 walls with granulated cork. Each 

 pail contained seven and one-half 

 pounds of hot water. My object 

 was to place in each hive the same 

 amount of heat and as far as pos- 

 sible to prevent its escape in every 

 direction except through the covers, 

 in order to observe whether the air 

 would cool faster in the hive cov- 

 ered with a quilt of wool or in the" 

 hive covered with a board. The 

 thermometers used were a pair be- 

 longing to a Mason hygrometer 

 made by Nigretti and Zambra, 

 London, and were not marked for 

 any higher degree than 112. On ac- 

 (125) 



