Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume II.djvu/485

 BEE-KEEPING 465 Chamber Hive. places of noxious insects and vermin. The hives should be on separate stands, to prevent the bees from running from one hive to another, and should be of different, not glaring colors, as guides to the bees. The chamber hive is made with two apart- ments the lower for the residence of the bees, the upper to hold the boxes in which the bees put their honey after having filled the lower part. These hives are sometimes made several inch- es narrower from front to rear at the bottom than at the top, to prevent the comb from slipping down. They are also sometimes fur- nished with inclined bottom boards to roll out the worms that fall upon them, or are driven down by the bees. To protect the bees from ver- min, several kinds of suspended hives have been contrived with inclined movable bottom boards. The dividing hives are made with several compartments, so as to multiply at the will of the bee-keeper the number of colonies, without the trouble and risk of swarming and hiving. By means of these hives, the partitions of which are supposed to divide the brood combs, a part of the bees and of the combs are removed and placed by themselves to go on making honey, and multiplying in every re- spect like a natural swarm. In many in- stances, however, where a swarm is divided, Tapering Hives. Dividing Hives. in one apartment there will be no brood from which to raise a queen. Several inventions have been made to enable the bee-keeper to change the combs and get the honey with- out driving out or destroying the bees. Change- able hives are made in sections, generally three drawers placed one above another, with holes to allow the bees to pass. When the boxes are all filled, and it is desired to change the combs, the upper box is removed, and its place supplied by a new one put in at the bottom. It is held that there is a necessity for changing the brood combs, because the larvie hatched from the eggs and sealed up in the cells there spin their cocoons, which re- Changeable Hive. main when they go out, upon the walls of the cells. This deposit, although extremely thin, diminishes the size of the cell, affording less room for each succeeding generation, thus causing the bees to gradually deteriorate in size. On the other hand, it is denied that de- terioration is caused in the bees by the filling up of the brood cells, even if the same combs are hatched from 12 years, and time and honey are therefore needlessly wasted by keeping the bees constantly making new brood comb. It is estimated by some writers that in elaborat- Comb. ing a pound of wax the bees will consume 25 Ibs. of honey, besides losing the time when they might be laying up further stores. The difficulty of putting the swarms into these hives, and the many lurking places they afford to the bee moth, and also the difficulty of pro- curing, in this method of taking away honey, that which is good and free from cocoons and bee bread, more than counterbalance, in the opinion of many bee-keepers, their advantages. Swarming hives are sometimes used. They are made with sections, so that by closing all or a part of them the space which the bees oc- cupy is lessened, and they are crowded out, and their swarming hastened. Non-swarmers are arranged so as to allow the bees to go on accumulating honey and increasing in number, and in theory not swarm at all. A hive of bees is put into a bee house, and empty hives connected with it, so that as soon as one be- comes filled the bees pass to the adjoining ones. In some instances more surplus honey has been obtained by this method ; but giving the bees