Mysteries of Bee-keeping Explained Part 3

But when the combs do actually need removing, I prefer the following method of pruning, to driving the bees out entirely, as has been recommended. It can be done in about an hour. As we are comparing the merits of different methods of getting rid of old combs, I shall give mine here, notwithstanding it may seem a little out of place.

The best time is a little before night. The first movement is to blow under the hive some tobacco smoke (the best means of charming them I ever found); the bees, deprived of all disposition to sting, retreat up among the combs to get away from the smoke; now raise the hive from the stand and carefully turn it bottom upwards, avoiding any jar, as some of the bees that were in the top when the smoke was introduced, and did not get a taste, will now come to the bottom to ascertain the cause of the disturbance; these should receive a share, and they will immediately return to the top, perfectly satisfied. When so many bees are in the hive, as to be in the way in pruning, (which if there is not it is not worth it,) get an empty hive the size of the old one, and set it over, stopping the holes; now strike the lower hive with a hammer or stick, lightly and rapidly, five or ten minutes, when nearly all the bees will be in the upper hive, and set that on the stand. There being now nothing in the way, except a few scattering bees, that I will _warrant not to sting, unless you pinch or get them fast_.

[Ill.u.s.tration: TOOLS FOR CUTTING OUT COMB.]

The broad one is very readily made from a piece of an old scythe, about 18 inches long, by any blacksmith, by simply taking off the back, and forming a shank for a handle at the heel. The end should be ground all on one side, and square across like a carpenter's chisel. This is for cutting down the sides of the hive; the level will keep it close the whole length, when you wish to remove all the combs; it being square instead of pointed or rounded, no difficulty will be found in guiding it,--it being very thin; no combs are mashed by crowding.

The other tool is for cutting off combs at the top or any other place.

It is merely a rod of steel three-eighths of an inch diameter, about two feet long, with a thin blade at right angles, one and a half inches long, and a quarter inch wide, both edges sharp, upper side bevelled, bottom flat, &c. You will find these tools very convenient; be sure and get them by all means, the cost cannot be compared to the advantages.

Now with the tools just described, proceed to remove the brood-combs from the centre of the hive. The combs near the top and outside are used but little for breeding, and are generally filled with honey; these should be left as a good start for refilling, but take out all that is necessary, while you are about it; then reverse the hives, putting the one containing the bees under the other; by the next morning all are up; now put it on the stand, and this job is done without one cent extra expense for a patent to help you, and the bees are much better off for the honey left, which has to be taken away with all patent plans that I have seen, and this, as has been remarked, is not worth much, occupied as it is with a few coc.o.o.ns and bee-bread. It is worth much more to the bees, and they will give us pure comb and honey for it.

USE OF TOBACCO SMOKE.

"I would not do it for fifty dollars, the bees would sting me to death." Stop a moment, if you never tried the efficacy of tobacco smoke, you know nothing of a powerful agent; this is the grand secret of success; without it, I admit it would be somewhat hazardous; but with it, I have done it time after time without receiving a single sting, and no protection whatever, for either hands or face.

But is there no difficulty with our sectional or changeable hive, when this feat is to be performed? The combs will be made in the two drawers similar to the dividing hive, brood-combs in one side, and store-combs in the other. We wish to remove the one with brood-combs of course, (as that is the one where the combs are thick and bad, &c.) Where will the queen be? With the brood-comb, where her duty is most likely to be; well, this is the one we want, and we take it out. How is she to get back? She must go back, or we have three chances in four of losing the stock; but her majesty will remain perfectly easy, as well as some of the workers, wherever you put the drawer.

FURTHER OBJECTIONS TO A SECTIONAL HIVE.

I can see no other way but to break the box, look her up, and help the helpless thing home, (the chances of being stung may be here too.) Now, for a time at least, they must use the other drawer for breeding, where most of the cells are unfit. There is altogether too great a proportion of drone-cells; these, as well as the other size, will nearly all be much too long, and will have to be cut off to the proper length, a waste of wax as well as labor. Another thing might be set down per disadvantage of Mr. Cutting's hive; the job of getting a swarm into such hive, at first, I fancy would not be desirable to many. Now, when we strike the balance, putting expense, difficulties, and perplexities on one side, and simplicity and economy on the other, it appears like a "great cry for little wool." But stop a moment, four other advantages are enumerated in its favor: second, third, and fourth are borrowed from the common hive, or are all available here when required. But fifthly, allows a "column of air between the drawers and outside of the hive, is a non-conductor of heat and cold," &c. This is an advantage not possessed by the common hive; neither does the common hive offer such advantages to the moth, by affording such snug quarters for worms to spin their coc.o.o.ns, when they cannot be destroyed without considerable trouble.

NON-SWARMERS.

Here I will endeavor to be brief; I feel anxious to get through with this disagreeable part, where every word I say will clash with somebody's interest or prejudice. The merits of this hive are to obtain surplus honey with but little trouble, which often succeeds in satisfying people of its utility. The princ.i.p.al objection is found on the score of profit. Suppose we start with one, call it worth five dollars in the beginning, at the end of ten years it is worth no more, very likely not as much, (the chances of its failing, short of that time, we will not take into the account;) we might get annually, say five dollars worth of surplus honey, amounting to fifty dollars.

CONTRAST OF PROFIT.

The swarming hive, we suppose, will throw off one swarm annually, and make us one dollar's worth of surplus honey, (we will not reckon that yielded by the first swarm, which is often more than that from the old stocks,) about one third of the average in good seasons. The second year there will be two to do the same; take this rate for ten years, we have 512 stocks, either of them worth as much as the non-swarmer, and about a thousand dollars worth of surplus honey. Call these stocks worth five dollars each, which makes $2,560, all added together will make the snug little sum of about $3,500, against $55. It is not to be expected that any of us will realize profits to this extent, but it is a forcible ill.u.s.tration of the advantages of the swarming hive over the non-swarmer.

PRINCIPLE OF SWARMING NOT UNDERSTOOD.

But many of these non-swarmers, 'tis said, can be changed to swarmers to suit the convenience of the apiarian--Colton's is one. It is a.s.serted that it can be made to swarm within two days at any time, merely by taking off the six boxes or drawers that are very ingeniously attached; as this contracts the room, the bees are forced out. Now I will candidly confess that I could never get this thing to work at all.

Of this I am quite positive, that he (Mr. Colton) is either ignorant of the necessary and regular preparations that bees make before swarming, or supposes others are. Mr. Weeks has advocated the same principle: he says, "There is no queen in any stage of existence, in the old stock, immediately after the first swarm leaves it." I have examined this matter till I am satisfied I risk but little in the bold a.s.sertion, that not one stock in fifty will cast a swarm short of a week after commencing preparations. This opinion will be adopted by whoever will take the trouble to investigate for themselves. (The chapter on swarming will give the necessary instructions for examining this point, if you wish.)

NOT TO BE DEPENDED UPON.

Further, these non-swarmers are not always to be depended upon as such.

They will sometimes throw off swarms when there is abundant room in the hive as well as in the boxes.

HIVES NOT ALWAYS FULL BEFORE SWARMING.

I know Weeks, Colton, Miner and others, tell us the hive _must be full_ before we need expect a swarm; but experience is against them. Bees do sometimes cast a swarm before filling the hive. From close observation, I find when a hive is very large, say 4,000 cubic inches, and is filled with comb, the first season, that such seldom swarm except in very good years.

SIZE OF HIVES NEEDED.

But if such hive is only half full, or 2,000 inches, it is very common for them to swarm without adding any new comb; proving very conclusively that a hive that size, is sufficient for all their wants in the breeding season. When about 1,200 inches only had been filled the first year, I have known them to add combs until they had filled about 1,800, and then cast a swarm, proving also that a little less than 2,000 will do for breeding. I have tested the principle of giving room to prevent swarming, a little further.

AN EXPERIMENT.

In the spring of '47, I placed under five full hives, containing 2,000 solid or cubic inches, as many empty ones, the same size, without the top. I had a swarm from each; but two had added any new comb, and these but little. If these hives had been filled to the bottom with comb in the spring, it is very doubtful whether either of them would have swarmed. The only place we can put a good stock and not expect it to swarm in good seasons, is inside a building, where it is perfectly dark, and even here a few have been known to do it. If we could manage to get _a very large hive_ filled with combs, it would perhaps be as good a preventive as any. All the bees that could be reared in one season, would have sufficient room in the combs ready made for their labors, and there would be no necessity for their emigration. "But what becomes of all the bees raised in the course of several years?" To this question I shall not probably be able to give a satisfactory answer at present.

BEES DO NOT INCREASE, IF FULL, AFTER THE FIRST YEAR, IN SAME HIVE.

I only will notice the fact, that the bees somehow disappear, and there is no more at the end of five years than at the end of one. A stock of bees may contain 6,000 the first of May, and raise 20,000 in the course of the year; by the first of the next May, as a general thing, not one more will be found, even when no swarm had issued.

GILLMORE'S SYSTEM DOUBTED.

Now this fact is not known by a recent patentee from the State of Maine, (else he supposes others do not,) as he recommends placing bees in a house, and empty hives in connection with the one containing bees, and in a few years all will be full. He has discovered a mixture to feed bees, (to be noticed hereafter); this may account for an unusual quant.i.ty being stored by an ordinary sized family. He said another thing, that is, each of these added hives would contain a queen! This would seem to explain away the first difficulty of the continued increase of bees, and so it would if it did not get into another equally erroneous; one error never made another true. This idea of bees raising a queen, merely because they have a side box to the main hive, is contrary to all my experience, and to the experience of all writers (except himself) that I have consulted. If the principle is correct, why not sometimes raise a queen in a box on the top or side for us? I never discovered a single instance, where two perfect queens were quietly about their duties in connection with one hive. The deadly hostility of queens is known to all observing apiarians. Not having the least faith in the principle, I will leave it.

UTILITY OF MOTH-PROOF HIVES DOUBTED.

As for moth-proof hives, I have but little to say, as I have not the least faith in one of them. When I come to speak of that insect, I will show, I think, conclusively, that no place where bees are allowed to enter is safe from them.

Several other _perfect hives_ might be mentioned; yet I believe that I have noticed the principles of each. Have I not said enough? Such as are not satisfied now would not be if I filled a volume. Our view of things is the result of a thousand various causes; the most powerful is interest, or prejudice.

It is said that in Europe, the same ingenuity is displayed in twisting and torturing the bee, to adapt her natural instinct to unnatural tenements; tenements invented not because the bee needs them, but because this is a means available for a little change. "Patent men"

have found the people generally too ignorant of apiarian science. But let us hope that their days of prosperity in this line are about numbered.

INSTINCTS OF THE BEE ALWAYS THE SAME.

Let us fully understand that the nature of the bee, when viewed under any condition, climate, or circ.u.mstance, is the same. Instincts first implanted by the hand of the Creator, have pa.s.sed through millions of generations, unimpaired, to the present day, and will continue unchanged through all future time, till the last bee pa.s.ses from the earth. We may, we have, to gratify acquisitiveness, forced them to labor under every disadvantage; yes, we have compelled them to sacrifice their industry, prosperity, and even their lives have been yielded, but never their instincts. We may destroy life, but cannot improve or take from their nature. The laws that govern them are fixed and immutable as the Universe.

Spring returns to its annual task; dissolves the frost, warms into life nature's dormant powers. Flowers with a smile of joy, expand their delicate petals in grateful thanks, while the stamens sustain upon their tapering points the anthers covered with the fertilizing pollen, and the pistil springs from a cup of liquid nectar, imparting to each pa.s.sing breeze delicious fragrance, inviting the bee as with a thousand tongues to the sumptuous banquet. She does not need an artificial stimulus from man, as an inducement to partake of the feast; without his aid or a.s.sistance she visits each wasting cup of sweetness, and secures the tiny drop, while the superabundant farina, dislodged from the nodding anthers, covers her body, to be brushed together and kneaded into bread. All she requires at the hands of man, is a suitable storehouse for her treasures. In good seasons, her nature Will prompt the gathering for her own use an over supply. This surplus man may appropriate to his own use, without detriment to his bees, providing his management is in accordance with their nature.

PROFIT THE OBJECT.

To give the bees all necessary advantages, and obtain the greatest possible amount of profit, with the least possible expense, has been my study for years. I might keep a few stocks for amus.e.m.e.nt, even if it was attended with no dollar and cent profit, but the number would be _very small_; I will honestly confess then, that _profit_ is the actuating principle with me. I have a strong suspicion that the majority of readers have similar motives. I am sure, then, that all of us with these views, will consider it a pity, when a stock produces five dollars worth of surplus honey, to be obliged to pay three or four of it for patent and other useless fixings.

COMMON HIVE RECOMMENDED.

I would not exchange the hive I have used for the last ten years for any patent I ever saw, if furnished gratis. I will guarantee that it affords means to obtain surplus honey, as much in quant.i.ty and in any way which fancy may dictate, whether in wood or gla.s.s, and what is more than all, it shall cost nothing for the privilege of using.