HIVES. 



71 



The top or honey-board easiest made, is a board 21^ 

 inches long, by 14 wide, and three-fourths inch thick, 

 clamped at the ends, with inch holes for passages to the 

 boxes. Such boards are not reliable; notwithstanding 

 the clamps, they will sometimes warp sufficiently to let a 

 bee slip out. Another one that will keep its shape better, 

 is made of several pieces. Two of them are twenty-one 

 and a half inches long, by one and one-half wide ; the 

 others eleven inches long, two six inches wide, and two 

 four inches. They are naUed to- 

 gether in "this form. The open 

 Spaces are for the passages into 

 the boxes which set over them, 

 and are covered with a box that 

 fits the outside of the hive, rest- 

 ing on a piece one-half or three- 

 fourths inch square that is nailed 

 around the hive one inch from the top. 



This is the hive that I use principally, and like it rather 

 better than I do Mr. Langstroth's. He has fixtures about 

 his, that must be considered more ornamental than useful, 

 and for which the bees will not perform any extra labor. 

 I am not sure but there are other hives conforming to this 

 principle that would suit me on the whole as well as this. 

 There are some that seem to oifer greater conveniences, 

 but cost more. Had I begun with such, I should probably 

 have continued, instead of changing for the more simple 

 one that I have adopted. The convenience of having all 



Kg. 12.^H0NET BOAKD. 



storing winter supplies for tiiose tliat are deiicient. In sections wliere tliere is 

 considerable clover and buclcwlieat, it would be well to have them employed in 

 the hive during tlie yield of buckwheat, which is of inferior quality, and brings 

 less in market; and get as many combs made and filled as possible, that we 

 may give hives nearly filled, to swarms the next season. We may then put on 

 boxes at once, and there being but little room in the hive, the bees must of ne- 

 cessity store their lioney there. This will he the purest quality of clover lioney, 

 wliicli would otherwise have been used for the elaboration of wax to fill tho 

 hive with combs. 



