Neighbour’s Improved Cottage Hive
Our Improved Cottage Hive is neatly made of straw, bound with cane, and therefore very durable.9 The lower hive is covered with a wooden top, having in it three holes, through which the bees convey their honey into three middle-sized bell glasses with ventilators, which, when filled, hold about 6 lbs. each. There is a hoop at the bottom, another round the top of the lower hive; to this the wooden crown-board is fastened. These hoops are a great improvement, and are less liable to harbour insects than if straw alone were used. The floor-board, as its name implies, is a wooden board one and a quarter inch thick, with a projection of three or four inches under the entrance to form an alighting place. This entrance is cut out of, or sunk in, the board.
There are three windows in the lower hive, each closed with a shutter; these are very useful and interesting for inspecting the progress made. Across the centre window is a thermometer, enclosed at the sides by slips of glass. The window shutters being painted green, add very much to its appearance. The upper hive, which is merely a cover for the glasses, is a conical-topped hive, also made of straw bound with cane; a hoop is worked into the straw, and made sufficiently large to allow the cover to drop over the top hoop of the lower hive, keeping the whole close, and preventing wet from drifting in. A zinc ventilator, ornamentally painted, forms the apex: this is useful in letting the confined hot air pass away in warm weather. The ventilator is opened by raising it. The dimensions of the lower or stock-hive are fifteen inches diameter, nine and a half inches deep outside; its weight, when empty, seven and a half pounds. The cover, or top hive, is twelve inches deep and fifteen inches in diameter; the ornamental zinc top being four inches deep. The whole is about twenty-four inches high. The weight of a hive packed, including glasses, &c., is about 18 lbs.
These hives have a tasteful appearance in the garden, but they require some further protection from the weather in the form of a cover or of a bee-house—contrivances that have yet to be described. In extreme cold weather, a little additional protection, by having matting folded round them, will be advisable.
One of the advantages this hive has over the common cottage hive is, that it affords opportunity for the humane management of bees. The owner has also the power of taking a glass of honey-comb of pure quality, free from the extraneous matter known as “bee-bread,” instead of combs that are darkened by having brood hatched in them. By this system, we have combs newly made and used only for depositing the honey first put into them; hence the name “virgin honey.” These glasses have a very pretty appearance, and, when nicely filled, are very convenient for home use or for making presents. The lower hive is the receptacle for the bees; when a swarm is placed in this hive, they immediately proceed to fill it with combs, in which to store honey for themselves, and for cells to breed in. This hive remains undisturbed.
The best mode of tenanting a hive of this description is by placing an early and strong swarm in it, which may be generally procured of a neighbouring bee-keeper; if from a distance, considerable care is necessary to admit plenty of air; the shaking attendant upon carriage irritates the bees so much, that, if not well ventilated, there is danger of the swarm being stifled, and the finer the swarm, the greater the danger. For the purpose of ventilation, remove the slides and substitute perforated zinc, wrapping the hive up in a coarse cloth of open texture (dispensing with the floor-board during transit when the distance is great).
It is necessary only to send the lower or stock hive to the party furnishing the swarm, taking the precaution to fix the slides at top with tacks, as the hive has to be inverted to receive the bees. They are shaken into it in the usual manner,10 as they cluster around the branch of the tree or shrub on which they may have chosen to alight. After the hiving is accomplished, the hive should be left near to catch any stragglers, for there will always be a few; towards evening, close the entrance, and remove them to the exact position they are intended permanently to occupy. Success depends on this, and also on their careful removal on the day or evening of swarming. The following morning the bees labour in the new location, marking well their habitation before they take flight, and to which they will not fail to return, loaded with luscious store.
A fortnight must be allowed for filling the stock-hive; then, if the weather be fine and warm, they will prepare to swarm again, as will be indicated by the thermometer rising rapidly to 100 degrees or upwards. One of the zinc slides on the wooden top must now be withdrawn, and a bell-glass put on, covered and protected by the upper hive; the other glasses may then be given in the same manner, a day or two after which, should the weather continue favourable, all signs of swarming will at once disappear, the bees now having increased store room, which they will readily fill with comb. It is often found useful to attach a piece of clean empty honey-comb to the ventilating tube of the glass; it is an attraction, and induces the bees to commence working in it sooner than they otherwise would do. The ventilator should always remain open during the day, to allow the hot air to pass away from the interior, thereby contributing to the whiteness and beauty of the work; the bees enjoy the refreshment of coolness thereby afforded, and they work the faster for it. At evening, all ventilation should be stopped, and the glasses wrapped round with flannel or some warm material, for the reasons mentioned at page 65.
The directions for taking honey are much the same as before mentioned. Some apiarians, however, consider that deprivation is more easily accomplished by disconnecting the super over night, in the manner described at page 58. The bee-keeper, equipped with bee-dress and gloves, must first raise the glass of comb, and, blowing a little smoke to intimidate and drive back the bees, wedge it up all round, an inch or so from the crown-board, by means of three or four blocks, thus to remain all night. This operation is best performed a little before dusk. Bees are then less likely to come out, and if they should do so, will speedily return. The opening in the crown-board remains unclosed, to afford the bees the opportunity of descending, and joining the stock-hive below, which they will naturally do for warmth. The upper straw-hive, or cover for the glasses, is better placed on for the night. Early in the following morning, before the bees are much about, the super will be ready for removal. The few bees that remain within may be speedily induced to quit, and will fly to the entrance. The slides covering the holes in the crown-board must be inserted, or an empty glass can be put on, to take the full one’s place. A slide seven and a half inches square is furnished with the hive; this is useful to remove the glass upon.
The holes in the wooden top of this hive are of a peaked shape, to act as a preventive against slaughtering any bees whilst pushing the slide in for the purpose of removing the glass when full. The tacks before alluded to should be removed from the slides when the hive is fixed in its place; they are now in the way of cutting off the glass. The entrance slide is very serviceable during the winter months, to lessen the passage way, thereby’ preventing the admission of too much cold air: it is also occasionally useful on a summer evening, to lessen the entrance when moths are troublesome; for if there be only a small opening, the bees can guard it, and easily repulse intruders. During the time of gathering, they require the whole width to remain open.
When the weather is so unfavourable as to prevent the bees leaving home for a few days after being hived, it will be necessary to feed them. Bees should not be fed in the midst of winter; the proper time is in the autumn or in the spring.
The best mode of feeding is at the top of the stock hive. This is done by using the round feeder.
The bottle feeder may be used instead of the round feeder, and in the same place, by those who give the preference to that method.
Whilst on the subject of feeding, it may be well to suggest to the bee-keeper, that, after the honey harvest, he should ascertain the state of the stock-hive, because we have sometimes found that hives which were very strong during summer, and which have yielded a good supply of honey, have been left rather poorly off for the winter. No doubt, under the impression that those nicely-filled supers which the bees intended for themselves would be amply sufficient for their sustenance, they have, for the most part, devoted the space below to the queen for breeding, little imagining that the precious store would be taken away, and consequently have left themselves too small provision for autumn and winter.
The apiarian having, therefore, so richly reaped the fruit of his bees’ labours, it is but right that he should guard against the labourers themselves suffering any want therefrom. The state of the interior of the hive may be ascertained by applying a weighing machine, and the requisite supply administered by feeding. Both weighing machine and feeder are described further on.
The simplicity and easy management of this hive have deservedly rendered it an especial favourite, combining, as it does, real utility with many conveniences to satisfy the curious. Not a few bee-keepers desire to unite the two qualifications, and no hives combine these advantages in a greater degree than Neighbour’s improved cottage hive.
Notes
9 This is the hive referred to by the Bee-Master of the Times, when he says:—“The second kind of hive I alluded to is made of straw, and may be purchased at Neighbour’s, in Holborn.... It is so well made that it will last very long. I have had one in constant use during ten years, and it is still as good as when it was bought.”
10 Sometimes swarms alight on trunks of trees or on walls, where it may be difficult to shake or brush them off. In the Journal of Horticulture, Mr. Woodbury mentions an instance of this kind, which he experienced last summer:—“A swarm clustered among the large branches of a pear-tree, just at their point of union with the trunk. In this case he merely supported a straw hive just over the swarm with the left hand, whilst he struck the trunk of the tree with the open palm of the right. The vibration thus produced sent the bees up into the hive with great rapidity, and the entire swarm was speedily hived in the most satisfactory manner.” A few whiffs of smoke will accelerate upward movement of swarms in such circumstances.