20 
BEES AND BEE-KEEPING. 
Where hives are rather crowded together, the opera- 
tions of the apiary (often involving the removal of 
a hive from one spot to another) will be greatly 
facilitated by having interchangeable roofs, made as 
dissimilar as possible in tint, while the whole of the 
hives are alike. Where a hive is removed, the roof 
remains, and so no difference is made in outside 
appearances, the bees, as a consequence, returning 
unhesitatingly to their old station, and entering the 
new hive as we desire. This object is achieved in 
some small apiaries, where tasteful arrangement is 
much considered, by having what may be termed 
loose boxes. These are each just large enough to 
receive a single-sided hive, and have a porch and 
alighting-board in front, with a door behind, and a 
hinged roof. The hives are carried from one to the 
other, as occasion may require. The loose boxes, being 
arranged at the first, remain always in situ, giving 
no indication of the disturbance practical operations 
involve, the bees, being, of course, cheated into the 
acceptance of any home we may choose to place in 
the loose box, which they have from use regarded 
as their own. While it is occasionally necessary that 
the bees should thus lose the identity of their hives, 
it is equally important that the bee-keeper should 
never do so ; and, to that end, every hive body should 
bear a number with which it can be always associated 
in the mental or book notes made respecting it. 
Frames pass also constantly from hive to hive, and 
the bee-keeper should therefore carefully avoid odd 
sizes, which will actually deprive him of half the 
advantages of the movable comb system. 
