Book III. 



APIARY. 



545 



1 745. Management of bees. Being of opinion that the common straw or Scotch hive 

 is the best for general purposes, we shall give Dr. Howison's mode of management as 

 the simplest and most effectual for the common end in view. If the lives of the bees 

 are to be saved, then some of the others may be tried ; and the most suitable for this 

 purpose, we think, is the Polish hive, and the next best that of Howison. The 

 most ingenious, and the fittest for an amateur, is no doubt that of Huish. The latter 

 autlior justly remarks, that " there is no certain method, nor will one be ever dis- 

 covered, by which a great harvest of wax and honey, and great swarms, can be ob- 

 tained at pleasure : these are chimerae, which it is folly to pursue ; because the former 

 depends on the seasons being more or less favorable to the secretion of honey, on 

 the countries which the bees inhabit being more or less wooded and covered with 

 flowers, and the latter on the fecundity of the queen. Hence that annual difference 

 between the harvest of honey and wax, and the largeness or smallness of the swarms 

 which is found in all countries. To the same causes may be attributed the fact, 

 that a mode of treatment, which has succeeded one year, will not succeed the 

 next, although the circumstances be almost the same in appearance. It is these dif- 

 ferences and variations, which, for the period of fifty-five years, have given rise to hives 

 of different forms and materials, which have only tended to instruct us, that bees can 

 inhabit, work, and collect provisions in vessels of every form, from the excavated trunk 

 of the tree, as it is used in Poland and the northern countries, to the expensive and 

 useless glass hive, or to the hive of Du Hamel ; and, where no hollow trunk of the tree 

 can be found, in the holes of walls, in chimneys, and under the roofs." 



1746. Choice of bees. To the common observer, all working bees,'as to external appearance, are nearly 

 the same ; but to those who examine them with attention, the difference in size is very distinguishable ; 

 and they are in their vicious and gentle, indnlent and active natures, essentially different. Of the stock 

 which I had in 1810, it required 250 to weigh an ounce ; but they were so vicious and lazy, that I changed 

 it for a smaller variety, which possesses much better dispositions, and of which it requires 296, on an 

 average, to weigh an ounce. Whether size and disposition are invariably connected, I have not yet had 

 sutticient experience to determine. 



1747. Materials and size of hives. Hives made of straw, as now in use, have a great advantage over 

 those made of wood or other materials, from the effectual defence they affbrd against the extremes of heat 

 in summer, and cold in winter. That the hives in size should correspond as nearly as possible with that 

 of the swarms, has not had that attention paid to it which the subject demands, as much of the success in 

 the management of bees depends on that circumstance. From blind instinct, bees endeavour to fiU with 

 combs whatever hive they are put into, before they begin to gather honey. Owing to this, when the hive is 

 too large for its inhabitants, the time for collecting their winter store is spent in unprofitable labor : and 

 stan^ation is the consequence. This evil also extends to occasioning late swarming the next summer ; it 

 being long before the hive becomes so filled with young bees as to produce a necessity for emigration, 

 from which cause the season is too far advanced for the young colonies to procure a winter stock. I should 

 consider it as a good rule in all cases, that the swarm should fill two thirds of the hive. The hives used 

 by me for my largest swarms, weighing from five to six pounds, will contain two pecks' measure of corn, 

 and will yield, in a good season, eight Scots pints of honey, and for smaller swarms in proportion. Hives 

 with empty combs are highly valuable for second swarms, as the bees are thereby enabled much sooner to 

 begin collecting honey. 



1748. Feeding of bees. Near the sea little honey is collected after the first week in August ; but in 

 high situations, where the flowers are later and heath abounds, the bees labor with advantage until the 

 middle of September. These are the proper periods, according to situation, for ascertaining if the hives 

 intended to be kept, contain a sufficient winter stock. The killing of the drones perhaps marks this time 

 with more precision. If a large hive does not weigh thirty pounds, it will be necessary to allow it half a 

 pound of honey, or the same quantity of soft sugar, made into a syrup, for every jxiund that is deficient 

 of that weight ; and, in like proportion to smaller hives. This work must not be delayed, that time may 

 be given for the bees to make the deposit in their empty cells before they are rendered torpid by the cold. 



1749. Preparing sugar for bees. I must here notice, that sugar simply dissolved in water (which is 

 a common practice), and sugar boiled with water into a syrup, form compounds very differently suited for 

 the winter store of bees. When the former is wanted for their immediate nourishment, as in spring, it 

 will answer equally as a sjTup ; but if to be laid up as a store, the heat of the hive quickly evaporating the 

 water, leaves the sugar in dry crystals, not to be acted upon by the trunks of the bees. I have known several 

 instances of hives killed by hunger, while some pounds' weight of sugar in this state remained in their 

 cells. The boiling of sugar into sjTup forms a closer combination with the water, by which it is prevented 

 from flj-ing off, and a consistence resembhng that of honey, retained. I have had frequent experience of 

 hives not containing a pound of honey, preserved in perfect health through the winter, with sugar so pre- 

 pared, when given in proper time, and in sufficient quantity. 



1750. Covering the hives. Bees are evidently natives of a warm climate, a high temperature being ab- 

 solutely necessary to their existence ; and their continuing to live in hollow trees during the severe win- 

 ters of Russia and America, must depend on the heat produced from the great size of the swarms which 

 inhabit these abodes. From my own obsen^ation, the hives which are best covered during winter, 

 always prosper most the following summer. In consequence, about the end of harvest, I add to the thin 

 covering of straw put on the hives at the time of swarming a thick coat, and shut up the aperture through 

 which the bees entered, so that only one can pass at a time. Indeed, as a very small portion of air is 

 necessary for bees in their torpid state, it were better, during severe frosts, to be entirely shut up, as num- 

 bers of them are often lost from being enticed to quit the hive by the sunshine of a winter day. It will, 

 however, be proper at times to remove, by a crooked wire or similar instrument, the dead bees and other 

 filth, which the living at this season are unable to perform of themselves. 



1751. Treatment during the breeding season. To hives, whose stock of honey was sufficient for their main- 

 tenance, or those to which a proper quantity of sugar had been given for that purpose, no further atten- 

 tion will be necessary, until the breeding season arrives. This, in warm situations, generally takes place 

 about the beginning of May, and in cold, about a month after. Owners of hives are often astonished; 

 that, at this advanced season, when their bees had, for weeks preceding, put on the most promising ap- 

 pearance, after a few days of rain, they become so weak and sickly as to be unable to leave the hive, and 

 continue declining until they at last die. From paying attention to this subject, I am convinced that the 

 cause is as follows : The young bees for a short time previous to their leaving their cells, and some time 

 after, require being fed with the same regularity that young birds are by their parents ; and if the store 

 in the hive be exhausted, and the weather such as not to admit of the working bees going abroad to col- 

 lect food in sufficient quantity for themselves and their brood, the powerful principle of affection for their 



