1878. 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



189 



These cuts in the sidhig are made with a 

 very thin saw, and in such a way as to be 

 least liable to break ont. The tin allows the 

 thin pieces of pine to shrink and swell with- 

 out any danger of checking, and yet no wa- 

 ter can, by any possibility, get into the 

 inside of the hive. The tins may be made 

 of the cheap rooHug tin, or of scraps that 

 tinsmiths would otherwise throw away. If 

 tliey should tit so loosely, that there may be 

 danger of their falling out, a slight bend in 

 them will make them stick securely. 



As the rim that holds the cover is on a 

 bevel, we wish the strip that goes under tlie 

 eaves, as well as the gable end piece with 

 the ventilating hole in it, to be beveled at 

 their lower edges also ; the former we make 

 of thick pieces of siding, by splitting them 

 in two on the proper bevel. As these are to 

 hold the nails along the eaves, they should 

 be at least I thick. For the gable ends, we , 

 adopt a little different line of management, 

 and, as the principle is a very important one, 

 I will take a little space to explain it. ; 



Much time is occiipied in handling all 

 these little bits of lumber, and to employ a | 

 strong man to handle little bits of pine, and | 

 turn them end for end, when he could, I 

 without fati'-;ue, handle a dozen or a hundred 

 just as well, is something that should be 

 avoided as much as possible. The same 

 idea was brought out very strongly in mak- ' 

 ing section boxes; but to make irregular 

 forn^s is a little more difficult. Even if we 

 oan accomplish no more tliau to have two of 

 tlie pieces attached, so that tlie workman \ 

 can perform two operations on them, while \ 

 the stuff is right in his hands, it is quite a j 

 saving. This gable end piece, you see below. 



GABLE EXD TO CHAFF HIVE COVER. | 



You will notice, that each piece has a | 

 tapering cut at each end ; that it has a bevel j 

 at the lower edge ; and that it has a hole j 

 bored through it. To pick it uj) and lay it ! 

 down for each of the four operations, espe- 

 cially, if you are one of the awkward kind 

 tJiat have to tiuii around and stoop over' 

 every time they lay a piece down and pick 

 ;inother up, requires a good deal of time. 

 If we should take a piece of 3 inch plank, 

 we coidd cut tlie tapers, and bore the holes, 

 in at least si-x pieces at once, for tliey need 

 not be over |, and then we could saw off the 

 pieces after all was done. But 3 inch plank 

 is pretty expensive, because there is so little 

 demand for it. If we can buy 2 inch plank 



I at a low figure, it may do to use this, but, 

 j even if we do. after boring the holes and 

 cutting the tapers, we would better cut them 

 in two in the middle first, so as to have 

 about inch pieces, as you will see. Very 

 likely, it will be best to use your culls, so we 

 will get out a piece of inch stuff planed a 

 thick as it will work, 5 inches wide, by 224 

 long. This piece will make 4 gable ends, by 

 running your saw through tiie dotted lines, 

 as shown below. 



HOW TO MAKE THE GABLE ENDS. 



First we take off the corners, A A : then 

 bore the holes ; next we cut from B to ( ' 

 and from D to E ; lastly, split them through 

 the middle, and they are finished all but 

 planing. The ventilating hole shoidd be 

 about H inches in diameter, and should be 

 covered with wire cloth, on the inside. It is 

 never safe to omit these ; for a strong colony 

 will exhale so much moisture from tlie 

 breath of the bees, as to cause drops of wa- 

 ter to hang on the roof boards, and large 

 icicles to form in the winter. I have win- 

 tered bees in the chaff hives, without the 

 ventilating holes, but was obliged to open 

 them occasionally during very severe weath- 

 er, to let the roof and cusliions dry out. 



1 am yrcaVy disappointed in '*^Directions for Mak- 

 ing Hives": you had promised to give directions in 

 the May number; imagine my disappointment on 

 opening the paper, to tind that, if I made a hive ac- 

 cording to your instructions. I must pay $150 for a 

 two horse power engine, and about as much more 

 for saws, planers, and other "flxins," before I 

 could make a hive. I expected that your instruc- 

 tions would inform me how to make a hive with 

 hand saw, jack plane, and pruning knife. Not 10 in 

 100 of youro,0<X) subscribers are benefited by the 

 instructions in this No. Can you not tell me how 

 to do it, without paying out so much money to get 

 ready? or do you expect every man that keeps liees 

 to buy his hives from you, and a few othrrs, that 

 "are getting so much money from the jieople that 

 you don't know what to do with it"V 



Please tell us how to do it, or place me in the 

 "Growler Corner". Success to Gi^kanings notwith- 

 standing. J. G. Rice. 



Peosta, Iowa, May 16th, 1878. 



I think you do mistake, my friend, but for 

 all that, I thank you for reminding me that 

 it is but a little while, since I made all my 

 hives by hand, and wanted just such in- 

 struction as you ask for. Let us go over it 

 again, briefly. 



You can make yoiu' hives of lumber that 

 is not planed at all, but as this is necessari- 

 ly of all kinds of thicknesses, I can hardly 

 tliink you, or any one else, could ajj'ord such 

 hives. If we plane it, it should be planed to 

 an exact thickness ; and as this is almost an 

 impossibility by hand, I think we would 



