126 Bottom and Alighting Boards. 



decided advantage. Bees can never cluster under it while 

 being manipulated in summer, and in winter by simply turn- 

 ing it over and partially filling with chaff, or saw-dust, we 

 help to. protect against cold and damp and give more room 

 below the frames. 



THE ALIGHTING BOARD. 



This should be separate from the bottom board (Fig. 40, e). 

 It is made by sawing a piece of two-by-four scantling, eight 

 inches long, diagonally across from two of the shortest edges. 

 These two pieces (Fig. 40, d) thus formed become rests for a 



Fig. 40. 



Eti 



a— Bottom board. 6, 6 — Supports, 



e — Alighting board. <J— Supports. 



board eight inches square (Fig. 40, c), it may be longer as 

 in the cut, which is nailed on to the sawed surfaces. We thus 

 have a slanting alighting-board separate from the hive. 



Should the apiarist desire his bees to enter at the side of 

 the hive, the alighting-board (Fig. 40, e) should be changed to 

 the side (Fig. 41). I have tried both, and see no difference, 

 so the matter may be controlled by the taste of the apiarist. 



For an opening to the hive (Fig. 41), we may bevel the 

 middle of the edge of the bottom boq,rd, next to the inclined 

 board. At the edge, this bevel should be three-quarters of 

 an inch deep and four inches wide. It may decrease in both 

 width and depth as it runs back, until at a distance of four 

 inches it is one-half of an inch wide and five thirty-seconds of 

 an inch deep. This may terminate the opening, though the 

 shoulder at the end may be beveled off if desired. 



With this bottom board the bees are near the ground, and 

 with the slanting-board in front even the most tired and 

 heavily-laden will not fail to gain the hive, as they come in 

 with their load of stores. In the spring, too, many bees are 

 saved, as they come in, on windy days, by low -hives and an 



