A Description of the Bar-and-Frame-Hive Part 3

If the bees work a comb under the floor-board, as is sometimes the case, it is a sign they will not swarm; a more certain sign is when they throw out the young dead queens with the drone brood. When they retain the drones in the hives after August, it is a bad omen, as they are then reserved for the sake of the young queens, which they are expecting to raise; and the season being too far advanced, and their failing in the attempt, and being without a queen, the colony will most certainly dwindle away, before the next season.

Always choose a hive proportionable to the size of your swarm, and prepare to hive them as soon as possible, lest they should rise again.

It is not unusual to ring a bell or tinkle a bra.s.s pan, &c., at the time the bees swarm; it is also a common method to dress the hives with honey, balm, &c.

I mention these things, because they are customs of long standing: the tinkling of bells is of little use, as the bees will generally settle near the hive; and as to dressing the hives, I by no means recommend it, as the bees like a clean new hive much better, for it does not give them so much trouble to clean, &c.

If the swarm should rise in the full heat of the day, and the sun shine hot upon them, they will not continue long in their first situation; for when they find they have all got their company together, they will soon uncl.u.s.ter, rise again, fly to some particular spot which has been fixed upon for that purpose by detached parties of bees, who return and acquaint the swarm; therefore I would advise to hive them as soon as possible, and remove them in the evening to the place where they are to remain.

The supposed relative value of early and late swarms is thus mentioned in an old English proverb:--

A swarm in May, Is worth a load of hay.

A swarm in June, Is worth a silver spoon; A swarm in July, Is not worth a fly.

SWARMING AND HIVING THE BEES.

Every good swarm should weigh about 5 lbs., and according to the account given in Key's Treatise, would contain 23,000 bees. The manner of hiving them must be regulated chiefly by the places upon which they alight.

If they settle on a dead hedge, or upon the ground, set a hive over them, putting props under it if necessary, and, with a large spoon or brush of wet weeds, stir them softly underneath, and they will go in.

If they should happen to settle upon a small bough, you may cut it off, and laying it quietly on a cloth, place a hive over them; or if you cannot conveniently separate the bough from the body of the tree, you may shake or sweep them off into the hive.

If the sun shines hot upon it, shade it with a few boughs, &c., but let it remain near the place where the bees settled until the evening, at which time move it to the bee-house, or the place where it is to stand during the season, as just directed.

If the bees have hung a considerable time to the place where they first settled, you will, perhaps, find it difficult entirely to dislodge them, as they will neglect their labour and fly about the spot for many days afterwards. The best method to prevent this is, by rubbing the branches with rue, or any kind of herb disagreeable to the bees; but be careful not to hurt any of the bees.

Swarms seldom return home again, when they are well settled, and if you find them inclined to do so, depend upon it, some accident has happened to their queen, which you will easily ascertain by their making a murmuring noise, and running in a distracted manner over and about the sides of the hive. When you observe this, immediately seek about for her, beginning with the stock-hive from whence the swarm rose, and pursue the track they took at setting out; you will seldom miss finding her, for she is never alone, but generally encompa.s.sed with a cl.u.s.ter of bees, who would sooner perish than leave her in danger.

When you have found her, take her up gently, and put her to the swarm, and you will soon find the cause of their dissatisfaction removed by the arrival of the queen.

The greatest care must be taken to have your hive clean and sweet, free from loose straws or other obstacles, which will create great trouble and loss of time to the bees, if left to them to remove.

If bees have flowers suitable to their tastes, and no great distance to travel to them, they will fill their hives both with honey and wax, in about a month or five weeks, and, if the season has proved fair and pleasant, in less time; but the bee-keeper must expect four out of every five seasons to be unpropitious to his little charge, and, therefore, he must be on the watch to a.s.sist them with food in the time of need.

Scarcely has the swarm arrived at its new habitation, when the working bees labour with the utmost diligence, to procure food and build their combs. Their princ.i.p.al aim is not only to have cells in which they may deposit the honey and pollen, but a stronger motive seems to animate them; they seem to know that their queen is about to deposit her eggs; and their industry is such, that in four and twenty hours they will have made combs, twelve inches long, and three or four inches wide.

They build more combs during the first fortnight, than they do during all the rest of the year.

Other bees are at the same time busy in stopping all the holes and crevices they happen to find in their new hive, in order to guard against the entrance of insects which covet their honey, their wax, or themselves; and also to exclude the cold air; for it is indispensably necessary that they be lodged warm and secure from damp, &c.

A second swarm scarcely is, and much less are the third ones called _casts_ worth keeping single, because, being few in number, they cannot allow so large a proportion of working bees to go abroad in search of provisions, as more numerous swarms can, after retaining a proper number for the various works to be done within the hive.

Bees sometimes swarm so often that the mother-hive is too much weakened or reduced in population. In this case they should be restored; and this should also be done when a swarm produces a swarm the first summer, as is sometimes the case in early seasons.

The best way, indeed, is to prevent such swarming, by giving the bees more room; though this, again, will not answer where there is a prolific young queen in the hive; as she well knows that her life is the forfeit of her remaining at home.

Before the union of one or two casts or late swarms is made, it is better to kill one of the queens, if possible, to prevent the queens destroying one another.

If an old hive is full of bees, and yet shows no disposition to swarm, puff in a little smoke at the entrance of the hive, then turn the hive up, and give it some slight strokes on the sides so as to alarm the bees. They will immediately run to the extremities of the combs, and if you then attentively examine them, you will, in all probability, perceive the queen-bee the foremost amongst them. Seize her between your fore finger and thumb, and confine her in your hand till most part of the bees take wing; let her then go, the bees will soon join her, and settle on some branch of a tree. Put them into an empty hive. Restore the old hive in its place, that the bees which have been out in the fields may enter it on their return, and having allowed them to remain there an hour or two, place it upon another stand near or next to its own.

The hive having what may now be called a swarm in it, is then placed on the stand of the old stock; and if the bees in both hives work regularly, carrying in loads of pollen on their thighs, all is well.

Bees are not apt to sting when they swarm naturally, therefore, it is not necessary then to take extraordinary precaution against them; but when any of these violent and artificial modes are attempted, I should advise the operator to be well guarded at all points.

Wildman weighed bees and found it required 4,928 bees to make a pound of sixteen ounces, but the different circ.u.mstances in bees may occasion a considerable difference in their weight. When the bees swarm, they come out loaded with wax secreted in their wax pockets and honey in their honey bags, and would weigh heavier than bees taken for that purpose by chance; and, therefore, the number of the bees is not to be thus computed, from the weight of the swarm; for one fourth of the number at least should be deducted, in lieu of the wax and honey they have brought off with them. There is also another allowance to be made, namely, that when alive, they do not probably weigh so heavy as when dead.

The person who intends to erect an apiary, should purchase a proper number of hives at the latter end of the year, when they are cheapest.

The hives should be full of combs, and well stored with bees.

The purchaser should examine the combs, in order to know the age of the hives. The combs of that season are white, those of a darkish yellow are of the previous year; and, where the combs are black, the hives should be rejected, because old hives are most liable to vermin and other accidents.

If the number of hives wanted were not purchased in the autumn, it will be necessary to remedy this neglect after the severity of the cold is past in the spring. At this season, bees which are in good condition, will get into the fields early in the morning, return loaded, enter boldly, and do not come out of the hive in bad weather; for when they do, this indicates that they are in great want of provisions.

They are alert on the least disturbance; and by the loudness of their humming, you can judge of their strength. They preserve their hives free from filth, and are ready to defend it against every enemy that approaches.

But the better plan is at once to commence with new hives, and purchase the first and strong swarms to put into them, and introduce them into the bee-house.

There are various substances found in a hive, such as the _wax_, with which the combs are built, the _honey_, the _farina_ or _pollen_, with which the bee-brood is fed, and _propolis_.

_Honey_, is a fluid or semi-fluid substance, the materials of which are collected by the bees, from the nectaries at the base of the corollae of flowers, where this vegetable production is secreted.

It cannot be said to be a purely vegetable production when found in the combs, for after being collected by the insect by means of its proboscis, it is transmitted into what is called the honey bag, where it is elaborated, and, hurrying homewards with its precious load, the bee regurgitates it into the cell of the honey comb. It takes a great many drops to fill a cell, as the honey bag when full does not exceed the size of a small pea.

When the cell is full, it is sealed up with a mixture of of wax and pollen, and reserved for future use in winter and spring.

_Wax_. There are several varieties of this substance, but bees-wax is a secretion of that insect from its ventral scales. With this substance the comb is constructed; it takes the bees, according to Huber's account, twenty-four hours to secrete the six laminae of wax in the wax pockets, which may be seen to exude between the segments of the under side of the abdomen of the bee. For the purpose of the formation of wax, the bees have to cl.u.s.ter and form themselves into festoons from the top of the hive, and after the elapse of the necessary period, the wax scales are formed, with which the bees commence immediately to build their combs, and the various cells for the reception of the brood or food, according to the season of the year.

_Propolis_, is a tenacious, semi-transparent substance, having a balsamic odour; which the bees gather from the buds of certain trees in the spring, such as the horse-chestnut, the willow, the poplar, and the birch.

This tenacious substance is employed by the bees to attach more firmly the combs to the top or foundation, and also the edges of the combs to the sides of the hive or box, to stop the crevices, and fasten the hives or boxes to the floor-boards, and in forming barriers against the intrusion of enemies.

_Farina_, or _Pollen_, is the dust or minute globules contained in the anthers of flowers, and is the fertilizing property of flowers, which the bees thus a.s.sist to carry, whilst travelling from flower to flower, without which the flowers would not fructify. The bees have been found to continue collecting pollen from the same species of flowers, and prevent the multiplication of hybrid plants. They collect and carry this substance on the outer surface of the tibia, or the middle joint of the hinder leg; this part of the leg is broad, and on one side it is concave, and furnished with a row of strong hairs on its margins, forming as it were a natural basket, well adapted for the purpose. This substance mixed with honey, forms the food of the larvae or young brood, after undergoing, perhaps, a peculiar elaboration by the working or nurse bees.

Having thus mentioned the different substances found in a hive, it only remains to add a short history of the inmates of the hive. Every swarm of bees comprises three distinct kinds of the same species, namely, the _female_ or _queen_, the _neuter_ or _worker-bee_, and the _male_ or _drone_.

As there is only one _queen-bee_ in each swarm or colony, she is seldom to be seen amidst the thousands of other bees; but she is easily distinguished from the rest by her slower movements, her greater length and larger size; and the general appearance of her body, being of a more dark orange colour, and her hinder legs having neither brushes nor pollen baskets upon them, although longer than those of the worker-bee; her wings also appear stronger, and she possesses a more curved sting, which she seldom uses, except when a.s.serting her rights to the sovereignty of the hive.

Without a _queen-bee_ no swarm can thrive, for she is not only the ruler, but chiefly the mother of the community in which she dwells, and wherever she goes, the greatest attention is paid her. In the hive, the utmost solicitude is evinced to satisfy her in every wish; wherever she moves the bees anxiously clear away before her, and turn their heads towards their sovereign, and with much affection touch her with their antennae, and supply her, as often as she needs, with honey or other delicacy which their own exertions, or those of their fellow labourers, have gathered for her use.

The queen-bee is said to live four or five years, and is generally succeeded on her throne by one of her own descendants duly brought up for the purpose; but in the event of her untimely decease, the workers have the power of raising a sovereign from amongst themselves, and fitting her for the station she is intended to occupy; this they do by selecting one of the larvae of the worker-bee of a certain age, and, enlarging the cell which it is to occupy, supplying it with a nourishment different from that which they give to the worker and drone-brood.

A _queen-bee_ takes seventeen days to arrive at maturity, that is to say, from the egg-state to the fully developed queen, but this period will vary as a sudden change of temperature will prolong the interval; and this also applies to the perfect _queen_ herself, who will not deposit her eggs in the cells, when any severe weather happens at the period she may be expected to produce the eggs.

The fecundity of the queen-bee is very great, for it is estimated that during breeding time, unless prevented by the cold weather, she lays at the rate of from one hundred to two hundred eggs a day, causing an increase of not less than eighty thousand worker-bees, and drones included, in a season when circ.u.mstances are favourable.

The cells formed for the royal brood are very different from those of the males or the workers, and are generally suspended from the sides or edges of the combs; in shape they are very much like a pear, the thickest end joining the comb, and the small end having the mouth or entrance to the cell, and hanging downwards, and being almost as large as a lady's thimble.