 Chapter 11 part 2 of Langstroth on the Hive and the Honey Bee. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Adam Marcicic August 2009 Alexandria, Virginia. Langstroth on the Hive and the Honey Bee by L. L. Langstroth. Chapter 11. The Beemoth and Other Enemies of Bees. Diseases of Bees. Part 2. Continued from Part 1. In order to ascertain all the important points connected with the habits of the Beemoth I have purposely deprived colonies in some of my observing hives of their queen and have thus reduced them to a state of despair that I might closely watch all their proceedings. I have invariably found that in this state they have made little or no resistance to the entrance of the Beemoth but have allowed her to deposit her eggs just where she pleased. The worms, after hatching, have always appeared to be even more at home than the poor dispirited bees themselves and have grown and thrived in the most luxurious manner. In some instances these colonies so far from losing all spirit to resent other intrusions were positively the most vindictive set of bees in my whole apiary. One especially assaulted everybody that came near it and when reduced in numbers to a mere handful seemed as ready for fight as ever. How utterly useless then for defending a queenless colony against the moth are all the traps and other devices which have been of late years so much relied upon. If a single female gains admission she will lay eggs enough to destroy in a short time the strongest colony that ever existed if once it has lost its queen and has no means of procuring another. But not only do the bees of a hive which is hopelessly queenless make little or no opposition to the entrance of the Beemoth and to the ravages of the worms but by their forlorn condition they positively invite the attacks of their destroyers. The moth seems to have an instinctive knowledge of the condition of such a hive and no art of man can ever keep her out. She will pass by other colonies to get at the queenless one for she seems to know that there she will find all the conditions that are necessary to the proper development of her young. There are many mysteries in the insect world which we have not yet solved nor can we tell just how the moth arrives at so correct a knowledge of the condition of the queenless hives in the apiary that such hives very seldom maintain a guard about the entrance is certain and that they do not fill the air with the pleasant voice of happy industry is equally certain for even to our dull ears the difference between the hum of the prosperous hive and the unhappy note of the despairing one is sufficiently obvious. May it not be even more obvious to the acute senses of the provident mother seeking a proper place for the development of her young? The unearing sagacity of the moth closely resembles that peculiar instinct by which the vulture and other birds that prey upon carrion are able to single out a diseased animal from the herd which they follow with their dismal croakings hovering over its head or sitting in ill omen to flocks on the surrounding trees watching as its life ebbs away and stretching out their filthy and naked necks and opening and snapping their bloodthirsty beaks that they may be all ready to tear out its eyes just glazing in death and banquet upon its flesh still warm with the blood of life. Let any fatal accident be fallen animal and how soon will you see them first from one quarter of the heavens and then from another speeding their eager flight to their destined prey when only a short time before not a single one could be seen or heard. I have repeatedly seen powerful colonies speedily devoured by the worms because of the loss of their queen when they have stood side by side with feeble colonies which being in possession of a queen have been left untouched. That the common hives furnish no available remedy for the loss of the queen is well known. Indeed the owner cannot in many cases be sure that his bees are queenless until their destruction is certain. While not unfrequently after keeping bees for many years he does not even so much as believe that there is such a thing as a queen bee. In the chapter on the loss of the queen I shall show in what way this loss can be ascertained and ordinarily remedied and thus the bees be protected from that calamity which more than all others exposes them to destruction. When a colony has become hopelessly queenless then moth or no moth its destruction is absolutely certain even if the bees retain their wanted industry in gathering stores and their usual energy in defending themselves against all their enemies their ruin could only be delayed for a short time. In a few months they would all die a natural death and there being none to replace them the hive would be utterly depopulated. Occasionally such instances occur in which the bees have died and large stores of honey have been found untouched in their hives. This however but seldom happens for they rarely escape from the assaults of other colonies even if after the death of their queen they do not fall a prey to the bee moth. A motherless hive is almost always assaulted by stronger stocks which seem to have an instinctive knowledge of its orphanage and hasten at once to take possession of its spoils. See remarks on robbing. If it escaped the silla of these pitiless plunderers it is soon dashed upon a more merciless shrubdis when the miscreant moths have ascertained its destitution. Every year large numbers of hives are bereft of their queen and every year the most of such hives are either robbed by other bees or sacked by the bee moth or first robbed and afterward sacked while their owner imputes all the mischief that is done to something else than the real cause. He might just as well imagine that the birds or the carrion worms which are devouring his dead horse were actually the primary cause of its untimely end. How often we see the same kind of mistake made by those who impute the decay of a tree to the insects which are banqueting upon its withering foliage. When often these insects are there because the disease of the tree has both furnished them with their proper element and deprived the plant of the vigor necessary to enable it to resist their attack. The beekeeper can easily gather from these remarks the means upon which I most rely to protect my colonies from the bee moth. Knowing that strong stocks supplied with a fertile queen are always able to take care of themselves in almost any kind of hive I am careful to keep them in the state which is practically found to be one of such security. If they are weak they must be properly strengthened and confined to only as much space as they can warm and defend and if they are queenless they must be supplied with the means of repairing their loss or if that cannot be done they should be at once broken up see remarks on queenlessness and union of stocks and added to other stocks. It cannot be too deeply impressed upon the mind of the beekeeper that a small colony ought always to be confined to a small space if we wish the bees to work with the greatest energy and to offer the stoutest resistance to their numerous enemies. Bees do most unquestionably abhor a vacuum if it is one which they can neither fill warm nor defend. Let the prudent bee master only keep his stocks strong and they will do more to defend themselves against all intruders than he can possibly do for them even if he spends his whole time in watching and assisting them. It is hardly necessary after the preceding remarks to say much upon the various contrivances to which so many resort as a safeguard against the bee moth. The idea that gauze wire doors to be shut daily at dusk and open again at morning can exclude the moth will not weigh much with one who has seen them flying and seeking admission especially in dull weather long before the bees have given over their work for the day even if the moth could be excluded by such a contrivance it would require on the part of those who rely upon it a regularity almost akin to that of the heavenly bodies in their courses a regularity so systematic in short as either to be impossible or likely to be attained but by very few an exceedingly ingenious contrivance to say the least to remedy the necessity for such close supervision is that by which the movable doors of all the hives are governed by a long lever in the shape of a hen roost so that the hives may all be closed seasonably and regularly by the crowing and cackling tribe when they go to bed at night and open at once when they fly from their perch to greet the merry morn alas that so much ingenuity should be all in vain chickens are often sleepy and wish to retire some time before the bees feel that they have completed their full day's work and some of them are so much opposed to early rising either from ill health or downright laziness that they sit moping on their roost long after the cheerful sun has purpled the glowing yeast even if this device were perfectly successful it could not save from ruin a colony which has lost its queen the truth is that almost all the contrivances upon which we are instructed to rely are just about equivalent to the lock carefully put upon the stable door after the horse has been stolen or to attempts to prevent corruption from fastening upon the body of an animal after the breath of life has forever departed are there then no precautions to which we may resort except by using hives which give the control over every comb certainly there are and i shall now describe them in such a manner as to aid all who find themselves annoyed by the inroads of the beamoth let the prudent bemaster be deeply impressed with the very great importance of destroying early in the season the larvae of the beamoth prevention is at all times better than cure a single pair of worms that are permitted to undergo their changes into the winged insect may give birth to some hundreds which before the close of the season may fill the apiary with thousands of their kind the destruction of a single worm early in the spring may thus be more efficacious than that of hundreds at a later period if the common hives are used these worms must be sought for in their hiding places under the edges of the hive or the hive may be propped up on the two ends with strips of wood about three eighths of an inch thick and a piece of old woollen rag put between the bottom board and the back of the hive into this warm hiding place the full grown worm will retreat to spin its cocoon and it may then be very easily caught and effectually dealt with hollow sticks or split joints of cane may be set under the hives so as to elevate them or may be laid upon the bottom board and if they have a few small openings through which the bees cannot enter the worms will take possession of them and may easily be destroyed only provide some hollow inaccessible to the bees but communicating with the hive and easily accessible to the worms when they want to spin and to yourself when you want them and if the bees are in good health so that they will not permit the worms to spin among the combs you can with ease in trap nearly all of them if the hive has lost its queen and the worms have gained possession of it you can do nothing for it better than to break it up as soon as possible unless you prefer to reserve it as a moth trap to devastate your whole apiary i make use of blocks of a peculiar construction in order both to entrap the worms and to exclude the moth from my hives the only place where the moth can enter is just where the bees are going in and out and this passage may be contracted so as to suit the size of the colony the very shape of it is such that if the moth attempts to force an entrance she is obliged to travel over a space which is continually narrowing and of course is more and more easily defended by the bees my traps are slightly elevated so that the heat and odor of the hive pass under them and come out through small openings into which the moth can enter but which do not admit her into the hive these openings which are so much like the crevices between the common hives and their bottom boards the moth will enter rather than attempt to force her way through the guards and finding here the nibblings and pairings of comb and bee bread in which her young can flourish she deposits her eggs in a place where they may be reached and destroyed all this is on the supposition that the hive has a healthy queen and that the bees are confined to a space which they can warm and defend if there are no guards and no resistance or at best but a very feeble one she will not rest in any outer chamber but will penetrate to the very heart of the citadel and there deposit her seeds of mischief these same blocks have also grooves which communicate with the interior of the hives and which appear to the prowling worm in search of a comfortable nest just the very best possible place so warm and snug and secure in which to spin its web and bide its time when the hand of the bee master lights upon it doubtless it has reason to feel that it has been caught in its own craftiness if asked how much will such contrivances help the careless bee man i answer not one iota nay they will positively furnish him greater facilities for destroying his bees worms will spin and hatch and months will lay their eggs under the blocks and he will never remove them thus instead of traps he will have most beautiful devices for giving more effectual aid and comfort to his enemies such persons if they ever attempt to keep bees on my plans should use only my smooth blocks which will enable them to control at will the size of the entrance to the hives and which are exceedingly important in aiding the bees to defend themselves against moths and robbers and all enemies which seek admission to their castle let me however strongly advise the thoroughly and incorrigibly careless to have nothing to do with bees either on my plan of management or any other for they will find their time and money almost certainly thrown away unless their mishaps open their eyes to the secret of their failure in other things as well as in beekeeping if i find that the worms by any means have got the upper hand in one of my hives i take out the combs shake off the bees route out the worms and restore the combs again to the bees if there is reason to fear that they contain eggs and small worms i smoke them thoroughly with sulfur and air them well before they are returned such operations however will very seldom be required shallow vessels containing sweetened water placed on the hives after sunset will often entrap many of the moths pans of milk are recommended by some as useful for this purpose so fond are the moths of something sweet that i have caught them sticking fast to pieces of moist sugar candy i cannot deny myself the pleasure of making an extract from an article from the pen of that accomplished scholar and well-known enthusiast in bee culture Henry K. Oliver Esquire quote we add a few words respecting the enemies of bees the mouse the toad the ant the stouter spiders the wasp the death head moth sphinx a tropos and all the varieties of galinacious birds have each and all a sweet tooth and like very well a dinner of raw bee but the ravages of all these are but a baby bite to the destruction caused by the bee moth tenea melonella these nimble-footed little mischievous vermin may be seen on any evening from early may to october fluttering about the apiary or running about the hives had a speed to outstrip the swiftest bee and endeavoring to affect an entrance into the doorway for it is within the hive that their instinct teaches them they must deposit their eggs you can hardly find them by day for they are cunning and secrete themselves they love darkness rather than light because their deeds are evil they are a paltry looking insignificant little gray-haired pestilent race of wax and honey eating and bee destroying rascals that have baffled all contrivances that ingenuity has devised to conquer or destroy them your committee would be very glad indeed to be able to suggest any effectual means by which to assist the honey bee and its friends against the inroads of this its bitterest and most successful foe whose desolating ravages are more lamented and more despondingly referred to than those of any other enemy various contrivances have been announced but none have proved efficacious to any full extent and we are compelled to say that there really is no security except in a very full healthy and vigorous stock of bees and in a very close and well-made hive the door of which is of such dimensions of length and height so that the nightly guards can effectually protect it not too long a door nor too high if too long the bees cannot easily guard it and if too high the moth will get in over the heads of the guards if the guards catch one of them her life is not worth ensuring but if the moths in any numbers affect a lodgeman in the hive then the hive is not worth ensuring they immediately commence laying their eggs from which comes in a few days a brownish white caterpillar which encloses itself all but its head in a silken cocoon this head covered with an impenetrable coat of scaly male which bids defiance to the bees is thrust forward just outside of the silken enclosure and the gluttonous pest eats all before it wax pollen and exuviae until ruined to the stock is inevitable as says the prophet joel speaking of the ravages of the locust the land is as the garden of Eden before them and behind them a desolate wilderness look out brethren bee lovers and have your hives of the best unshaky unnadi stock with close fitting joints and well covered with three or four coats of paint he who shall be successful in devising the means of ridding the bee world of this destructive and merciless pest will richly deserve to be crowned king bee in perpetuity to be entitled to a never-fading wreath of budding honey flowers from sweetly breathing fields all murmuring with bees to be privileged to use during his natural life night tapers from their wax and thighs best wax candles two to the pound to have an annual offering from every bee master of ten pounds each of very best virgin honey and to a bodyguard for protection against all foes of thrice ten thousand workers all armed and equipped as nature's law directs who shall have these high honors end quote it might seem highly preposterous for me at this early date to lay claim to them but i beg leave to enroll myself among the list of honorable candidates and i cheerfully submit my pretensions to the suffrages of all intelligent keepers of bees in the chapter on requisites i have spoken of the ravages of the mouse and have there described the way in which my hives are guarded against its intrusion that some kinds of birds are fond of bees every a perian knows to his cost still i cannot advise that any should on this account be destroyed it has been stated to me by an intelligent observer that the king bird which devours them by scores confines himself always in the season of drones to those fat and lazy gentlemen of leisure i fear however that this is as the children say is too good news to be true and that not only the industrious portion of the busy community fall a prey to his fatal snap but that the luxurious gourmand can distinguish perfectly well between an empty bee in search of food and one which is returning full laden to its fragrant home and whose honey bag sweetens the delicious tidbit as the crushed unfortunate already sugared glides daintily down his voracious ma still i have never yet been willing to destroy a bird because of its fondness for bees and i advise all lovers of bees to have nothing to do with such foolish practices unless we can check among our people the stupid as well as inhuman custom of destroying so wantonly on any pretense and often on none at all the insectivorous birds we shall soon not only be deprived of their aerial melody among the leafy branches but shall lament over the ever increasing horde of destructive insects which ravage our fields and desolate our orchards and from whose successful inroads nothing but the birds can ever protect us think of it ye who can enjoy no music made by these winged choristers of the skies except that of their agonizing screams as they fall before your well-aimed weapons and flutter out their innocent lives before your heartless gaze drive away as fast and as far as you please from your cruel premises all the little black birds that you cannot destroy and then find if you can those who will sympathize with you when the caterpillars weave their destroying webs over your leafless trees and insects of all kinds riot and glee upon your blasted harvests i hope that such a healthy public opinion will soon prevail that the man or boy who is armed with a gun to shoot the little birds will be scouted from all humane and civilized society and if he should be caught about such contemptible business will be too much ashamed even to look an honest man in the face i shall close what i have to say about the birds with the following beautiful translation of an old greek poet's address to the swallow quote attic maiden honey fed chirping warbler bears away thou the busy buzzing bee to thy callow brood a prey warbler thou a warbler sees winged one with lovely wings guest thyself by summer brought yellow guest whom summer brings wilt not quickly let it drop tis not fair indeed tis wrong that the ceaseless warbler should die by the mouth of ceaseless song end quote marivales translation i have not the space to speak at length of the other enemies of the honeyed race nor indeed is it at all necessary if the aparian only succeeds in keeping his stock strong they will be their own best protectors and if he does not succeed in this they would be of little value even if they had no enemies ever vigilant to watch for their halting nations which are both rich and feeble invite attack as well as unfit themselves for vigorous resistance just so with the commonwealth of bees unless amply guarded by thousands ready to die in its defense it is ever liable to fall a prey to someone of its many enemies which are all agreed in this one opinion at least that stolen honey is much more sweet than the slow accumulations of patient industry in the chapters on protection and ventilation i have spoken of the fatal effects of dysentery this disease can always be prevented by proper caution on the part of the beekeeper let him be careful not to feed the bees late in the season on liquid honey c chapter on feeding and let him keep them in dry and thoroughly protected hives if his situation is at all damp and there is danger that water will settle under his protector let him build it entirely above ground otherwise it may be as bad as a damp cellar and incomparably worse than nothing at all there is one disease called by the germans foul brood of which i know nothing by my own observation but which is of all others the most fatal in its effects the brood appeared to die in the cells after they are sealed over by the bees and the stench from their decaying bodies infects the hive and seems to paralyze the bees this disease is in two instances attributed by Sierra zone to feeding bees on american honey or as we call it southern honey which is brought from cuba and other west indian islands that such honey is not ordinarily poisonous is well known probably that used by him was taken from diseased colonies it is well known that if any honey or combs are taken from a hive in which this pestilence is raging it will most surely infect the colonies to which they may be given no foreign honey ought therefore to be extensively used until its quality has been thoroughly tested the extreme violence of this disease may be inferred from the fact that Sierra zone in one season lost by it between four and five hundred colonies as that president advised if my colonies were attacked by it i should burn up the bees combs honey frames and all from every diseased hive and then thoroughly scald and smoke with sulfur all such hives and replenish them with bees from a healthy stock there is a peculiar kind of dysentery which does not seem to affect a whole colony but confines its ravages to a small number of the bees in the early stages of this disease those attacked are excessively irritable and will attempt to sting anyone who comes near the hives if dissected their stomachs are found to be already discolored by the disease in the latter stages of this complaint they not only lose all their irasability but seem very stupid and may often be seen crawling upon the ground unable to fly their abdomens are now unnaturally swollen and of a much lighter color than usual owing to their being filled with a yellow matter exceedingly offensive to the smell i have not yet ascertain the cause of this disease end of chapter 11 chapter 12 of Langstroth on the Hive and the Honeybee this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Adam Marsatich August 2009 Alexandria Virginia Langstroth on the Hive and the Honeybee by L. L. Langstroth chapter 12 loss of the queen that the queen of a hive is often lost and that the ruin of the whole colony soon follows unless such a loss is seasonably remedied are facts which ought to be well known to every observing beekeeper some queens appear to die of old age or disease and at a time when there are no worker eggs or larvae of suitable age to enable the bees to supply their loss it is evident however that no very large proportion of the queens which perish are lost under such circumstances either the bees are aware of the approaching end of their aged mother and take seasonable precautions to rear a successor or else she dies very suddenly so as to leave behind her brood of a suitable age it is seldom that a queen in a hive that is strong in numbers and stores dies either at a period of the year when there is no brood from which another can be reared or when there are no drones to impregnate the one reared in her place in speaking of the age of bees it has already been stated that queens commonly die in their fourth year while none of the workers live to be a year old not only is the queen much longer lived than the other bees but she seems to be possessed of a greater tenacity of life so that when any disease overtakes a colony she is usually among the last to perish by a most admirable provision their death ordinarily takes place under circumstances the most favorable to their bereaved family if it were otherwise the number of colonies which would annually perish would be very much greater than it now is for as a number of superannuated queens must die every year many or even most of them might die at a season when their loss would necessarily involve the ruin of the whole colony in non-swarming hives i have found cells in which queens were reared not to lead out a new swarm but to supply the place of the old one which had died in the hive there are a few well authenticated instances in which a young queen has been matured before the death of the old one but after she had become quite aged and infirm still there are cases where old queens die either so suddenly as to leave no young brood behind them or at a season when there are no drones to impregnate the young queens that queens occasionally live to such an age as to become incapable of laying worker eggs is now a well established fact the seminal reservoir sometimes becomes exhausted before the queen dies of old age and as it is never replenished see page 44 she can only lay unimpregnated eggs or such as produced drones instead of workers this is an additional confirmation of the theory first propounded by searsone i am indebted to mr. Wagner for the following facts quote in a behind zine tug for august 1852 count stash gives us the case of a colony examined by himself with the aid of an experienced a perian on the 14th of april previous the worker brood was then found to be healthy in may following the bees worked industriously and built new comb soon afterwards they ceased to build and appeared dispirited and when in the beginning of june he examined the colony again he found plenty of drone brood in worker cells the queen appeared weak and languid he confined her in a queen cage and left her in the hive the bees clustered around the cage but next morning the queen was found to be dead here we seem to have the commencement progress and termination of superannuation all in the space of five or six weeks in the spring of the year as soon as the bees begin to fly if their motions are carefully watched the a perian may even in the common hives generally ascertain from their actions whether they are in possession of a fertile queen if they are seen to bring in bee bread with great eagerness it follows as a matter of course that they have brewed and are anxious to obtain fresh food for its nourishment if any hive does not industriously gather pollen or accept the rye flour upon which the others are feasting then there is an almost absolute certainty either that it has not a queen or that she is not fertile or that the hive is seriously infested with worms or that it is on the very verge of starvation an experienced eye will decide upon the queenlessness to use the german term of a hive from the restless appearance of the bees at this period of the year when they first realize the magnitude of their loss and before they have become in a manner either reconciled to it or indifferent to their fate they roam in an inquiring manner in and out of the hive and over its outside as well as inside and plainly manifest that something calamitous has befallen them often those that return from the fields instead of entering the hive with that dispatchful haste so characteristic of a bee returning well stored to a prosperous home linger about the entrance with an idle and very dissatisfied appearance and the colony is restless long after the other stocks are quiet their home like that of a man who is cursed rather than blessed in his domestic relations is a melancholy place and they only enter it with reluctant and slow moving steps if i could address a friendly word of advice to every married woman i would say do all that you can to make your husband's home a place of attraction when absent from it let his heart glow at the very thought of returning to its dear enjoyment and let his countenance involuntarily put on a more cheerful look and his joy quicken steps proclaim as he is approaching that he feels in his heart of hearts that there is no place like home let her whom he has chosen as a wife and companion be the happy and honored queen in his cheerful habitation let her be the center and soul about which his best affections shall ever revolve i know that there are brutes in the guise of men upon whom all the winning attractions of a prudent virtuous wife make little or no impression alas that it should be so but who can tell how many even of the most hopeless cases have been saved for two worlds by a union with a virtuous woman in whose tongue was the law of kindness and of whom it could be said the heart of her husband doth safely trust in her for she will do him good and not evil all the days of her life set a man of large experience quote i scarcely know a woman who has an intemperate husband who did not either marry a man whose habits were already bad or who did not drive her husband to evil courses often when such a calamitous result was the furthest possible from her thoughts or wishes by making him feel that he had no happy home end quote think of it ye who find that home is not full of dear delights as wealthy yourselves as to your affectionate husbands try how much virtue there may be in winning words and happy smiles and the cheerful discharge of household duties and prove the utmost possible efficacy of love and faith and prayer before those words of fearful agony are extorted from your despairing lips quote anywhere anywhere out of this world end quote when amid tears and sighs of inexpressible agony you settle down into the heartbreaking conviction that you can have no home until you have passed into that habitation not fashioned by human hands or inhabited by human hearts is there any husband who can resist all the sweet attractions of a lovely wife who does not set a priceless value upon the very gem of his life quote if such there be go mark him well high though his titles proud his fame boundless his wealth as wish can claim the wretch concentered all in self living shall forfeit fair renown and doubly dying shall go down to the vile dust from whence he sprung unwept unhonored and unsung end quote scott i trust my readers remembering my profession will pardon this long digression to which i felt myself irresistibly impelled when the bees commence their work in the spring they give as previously stated reliable evidence either that all is well or that ruin lurks within in the common hives however it is not always easy to decide upon their real condition the queenless ones do not in all cases disclose their misfortune anymore than all unhappy husbands or wives will see fit to proclaim the full extent of their domestic wretchedness there is a vast amount of seeming even in the little world of the beehive one great advantage in my mode of construction is that i am never obliged to leave anything to vague conjecture but i can in a few moments open the interior and i know precisely what is the real condition of the bees on one occasion i found that a colony which had been queenless for a considerable time utterly refused to raise another and devoured all the eggs which were given to them for that purpose the colony was afterwards supplied with an unimpregnated queen but they refused to accept of her and attempted at once to smother her to death i then gave them a fertile queen but she met with no better treatment facts of a similar kind have been noticed by other observers thus it seems that bees may not only become reconciled as it were to living without a mother but may pass into such an unnatural state as not only to decline to provide themselves with another but actually to refuse to accept of one by whose agency they might be rescued from impending ruin before expressing too much astonishment at such foolish conduct let us seriously inquire if it has not often an exact parallel in our obstinate rejection of the provisions which god has made in the gospel for our moral and religious welfare if a colony which refuses to rear another queen has a range of comb given to it containing maturing brood these poor motherless innocents as soon as they are able to work perceive their loss and will proceed at once if they have the means to supply it they have not yet grown so hardened by a habit to unnatural and ruinous courses as not to feel that something absolutely indispensable to their safety is wanting in their hive a word to the young who may read this treaties although you enjoy to remember your creator in the days of your youth you are constantly tempted to neglect your religious duties and to procrastinate their performance until some more convenient season like the old bees in a hive without a queen that seek only their present enjoyment forgetful of the ruin which must surely overtake them so you may find that when manhood and old age arrive you have even less dispossession to love and serve the lord than you now have the fetters which bind you to sinful habits will have strengthened with years until you find both the inclination and ability to break them continually decreasing in the spring as soon as the weather becomes sufficiently pleasant i carefully examine all the hives which do not present the most unmistakable evidence of health and vigor if a queen is wanting i at once if the colony is small break it up and add the bees to another stock if however the colony should be very large i sometimes join to it one of my small stocks which has a healthy queen it may be asked why not supply the queenless stock with the means of raising another simply because there would be no drones to impregnate her in season and the whole operation would therefore result in an entire failure why not endeavor to preserve it until the season for drones approaches and then give it a queen because it is in danger of being robbed or destroyed by the moth while the bees if added to another stock can do me far more service than they could if left to idleness in their old hive it must be remembered that i am not like the beekeepers on the old plan extremely anxious to save every colony however feeble as i can at the proper season form as many as i want and with far less trouble and expense than are required to make anything out of such discouraged stocks if any of my colonies are found to be feeble in the spring but yet in possession of a healthy queen i help them to combs containing maturing brood in the manner already described in short i ascertain at the opening of the season the exact condition of all my stock and apply such remedies as i find to be needed giving to some maturing brood to others honey and breaking up all whose condition appears to admit of no remedy if however the bees have not been multiplied too rapidly and proper care was taken to winter none but strong stocks they will need but little assistance in the spring and nearly all of them will show indubitable signs of help and vigor i strongly recommend every prudent beekeeper who uses my hives to give them all a most thorough overhauling and cleansing soon after the bees begin to work in the spring the bees of any stock may with their combs etc all be transferred in a few minutes to a clean hive and their hive after being thoroughly cleansed may be used for another transferred stock and in this way with one spare hive the bees may all be lodged in habitations from which every speck of dirt has been removed they will thus have hives which can by no possibility harbor any of the eggs or larvae of the moth and which may be made perfectly free from the least smell of must or mold or anything offensive to the delicate senses of the bees in making this thorough cleansing of all the hives the aperion will necessarily gain an exact knowledge of the true condition of each stock and will know which have spare honey and which require food in short which are in need of help in any respect and which have the requisite strength to lend a helping hand to others if any hive needs repairing it may be put into perfect order before it is used again hives managed in this fashion if the roofs and outside covers are occasionally painted anew will last for generations and will be found on the score of cheapness preferable in the long run to any other kind but i ought to beg pardon of the genius of American cheapness who so kindly presides over the making of most of our manufacturers and under whose shrewd tuition we are fast beginning to believe that cheapness in the first cost of an article is the main point to which our attention should be directed let us to be sure save all that we can in the cost of construction by the greatest economy in the use of materials let us compel every minute to yield the greatest possible practical result by the employment of the most skillful workmen and the most ingenious machinery but do not let us learn that sliding an article so as to get up a mere sham having all the appearance of reality with none of the substance is the poorest possible kind of pretended economy to say nothing of the tendency of such a system to encourage in all the pursuits of life the narrow and selfish policy of doing nothing thoroughly but everything with reference to mere outside show or the urgent necessities of the present moment we have yet to describe under what circumstances by far the larger proportion of hives become queen list after the first swarm has gone out with the old mother then both the parent stock and all the subsequent swarms will each have a young queen which must always leave the hive in order to be impregnated it sometimes happens that the wings of the young female are from her birth so imperfect that she either refuses to sally out or is unable to return to the hive if she ventures abroad in either case the old stock must if left to its own resources speedily perish queens in their contests with each other are sometimes so much crippled as to unfit them for flight and sometimes they are disabled by the rude treatment of the bees who insist on driving them away from the royal cells the great majority however of queens which are lost perish when they leave the hive in search of the drones their extra size and slower flight make them a most tempting prey to the birds ever on the watch in the vicinity of the hives and many in this way perish others are destroyed by sudden gusts of winds which dash them against some hard object or blow them into the water for queens are by no means exempt from the misfortunes common to the humblest of their race very frequently in spite of all their caution in noticing the position and appearance of their habitation before they left it they make a fatal mistake on their return and are imprisoned and destroyed as they attempt to enter the wrong hive their precautions which should be used to prevent such a calamity have already been described if these are neglected those who build their hives of uniform size and appearance will find themselves losing many more queens than the person who uses the old fashioned boxes hardly any two of which look just alike the bees seem to me to have as it were an instinctive perception of the dangers which await their new queen when she makes her excursion in search of the drones and often gather around her and confine her as though they could not bear to have her leave i have repeatedly noticed them doing this although i cannot affirm with positive certainty why they do it they're usually excessively agitated when the queen leaves and often exhibit all the appearance of swarming if the queen of an old stock is lost in this way her colony will gradually dwindle away if the queen of an after swarm fails to return the bees very speedily come to nothing if they remain in the hive as a general rule however they soon leave and attempt to add themselves to other colonies it would be highly interesting to ascertain in what way the bees become informed of the loss of their queen when she is taken from them under such circumstances as to excite the whole colony then we can easily see how they find out that she is gone for when greatly excited they always seek first to assure themselves of her safety just as a tender mother in time of danger forgets herself and her anxiety for her helpless children if however the queen is carefully removed so that the colony is not disturbed it is sometimes a day or even more before they realize their loss how do they first become aware of it perhaps some dutiful bee feels that it is a long time since it has seen its mother and anxious to embrace her makes diligent search for her through the hive the intelligence that she cannot anywhere be found is soon noised abroad and the whole community are at once alarmed at such times instead of calmly conversing by merely touching each other's antennae they may be seen violently striking as it were their antennae together and by the most impassioned demonstrations manifesting their agony and despair i once removed a queen in such a manner as to cause the bees to take wing and to fill the air in search of her she was returned in a few minutes and yet on examining the colony two days after i found that they had actually commenced the building of royal cells in order to raise another the queen was unheard and the cells were not tenanted was this work begun by some that refused for a long time to believe the others when told that she was safe or was it begun from the apprehension that she might again be removed every colony which has a new queen should be watched in order that the a perian may be seasonably appraised of her loss the restless conduct of the bees on the evening of the day that she fails to return will at once inform the experienced bee master of the accident which has befallen his hive if the bees cannot be supplied with another queen or with the means of raising one if an old swarm it must be broken up and the bees added to another stock if a new swarm it must always be broken up unless it can be supplied with the queen nearly mature or else they will build combs unfit for the rearing of workers by the use of my movable comb hives all these operations can be easily performed if any hives have lost their young queen they may be supplied either with the means of raising another or with sealed queens from other hives or if the plan is found to answer with mature ones from the nursery as a matter of precaution i generally give to all my stocks that are raising young queens or which have unimpregnated ones a range of comb containing brood and eggs so that they may in case of any accident to their queen proceed at once to supply their loss in this way i prevent them from being so dissatisfied as to leave the hive about a week after the young queens have hatched i examine all the hives which contain them lifting out usually some of the largest combs and those which ought to contain brood if i find a comb which has eggs or larvae i am satisfied that they have a fertile queen and shut up the hive unless i wish to find her in order to deprive her of her wings c page 203 i can thus often satisfy myself in one or two minutes if no brood is found i suspect that the queen has been lost or that she has some defect which has prevented her from leaving the hive if the brood comb which i put into the hive contains any newly formed royal cells i know without any further examination that the queen has been lost if the weather has been unfavorable or the colony is quite weak the young queen is sometimes not impregnated as early as usual and an allowance of a few days must be made on this account if the weather is favorable and the colony a good one the queen usually leaves the day after she finds herself mistress of a family in about two days more she begins to lay her eggs by waiting about a week before the examination is made ample allowance in most cases is made early in the month of september i examine carefully all my hives so as to see that in every respect they are in suitable condition for wintering if any need feeding c chapter on feeding they are fed at this time if any have more vacant room than they ought to have i partition off that part of the hive which they do not need i always expect to find some brood in every healthy hive at this time and if in any hive i find none and ascertain that it is queenless i either at once break it up or if it is strong in numbers supply it with a queen by adding to it some feebler stock if bees however are properly attended to at the season when their young queens are impregnated it will be a very rare occurrence to find a queenless colony in the fall the practical beekeeper without further directions will readily perceive how any operation which in the common hives is performed with difficulty if it can be performed at all is reduced to simplicity and certainty by the control of the combs if however beekeepers will be negligent and ignorant no hive can possibly make them very successful if they belong to the fraternity of no eyes who have kept bees all their lives and do not know that there is a queen they will probably derive no special pleasure from being compelled to believe what they have always derided as humbug or book knowledge although i have seen some beekeepers very intelligent on most matters who never seem to have learned the first rudiments in the natural history of the bee those who cannot or will not learn for themselves or who have not the leisure or disposition to manage their own bees may yet with my hives entrust their care to suitable persons who may at the proper time attend to all their wants practical gardeners may find the management of bees for their employers to be quite a lucrative part of their profession but with little extra labor and with great certainty they may from time to time do all that the prosperity of the bees require carefully overhauling them in the spring making new colonies at the suitable period if any are wanted giving them their surplus honey receptacles and removing them when full and on the approach of winter putting all the colonies into proper condition to resist its rigors the business of the practical a perian and that of the gardener seem very naturally to go together and one great advantage of my hive and mode of management is the ease with which they may be successful united some a perians after all that has been said may still have doubts whether their young queens leave the hive for impregnation or may think that the old ones occasionally leave even when they do not go out and lead a swarm such persons may if they choose easily convince themselves by the following experiments of the accuracy of my statements about a week after having a second swarm or after the birth of a young queen in a hive and after she has begun to lay eggs open the hive and remove her carry her a few rods in front of the apiary and let her fly she will at once enter her own hive and thus show that she has previously left it if however an old queen has removed a short time after hiving the swarm she will not be able to distinguish her own hive from any other and will thus show that she has not left it since the swarm was hived if this experiment is performed upon an old queen in a hive in which she was not put the year before when unimpregnated the same result will follow for as she never left it after that event she will have lost all recollection of its relative position in the apiary the first of these experiments has been suggested by Searsome end of chapter 12 chapter 13 of Langstroth on the Hive and the Honey Bee this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Adam Marcitich August 2009 Alexandria Virginia Langstroth on the Hive and the Honey Bee by L. L. Langstroth chapter 13 Union of Stocks transferring bees from the common hive starting an apiary frequent illusions have been made to the importance for various reasons of breaking up stocks and uniting them to other families in the apiary colonies which in the early spring are found to be queenless ought at once to be managed in this way for even if not speedily destroyed by their enemies they are only consumers of the stores which they gathered in their happier days the same treatment should also be extended to all that in the fall are found to be in a similar condition as small colonies even though possessed of a healthy queen are never able to winter as advantageously as large ones the bees from several such colonies ought to be put together to enable them by keeping up the necessary supply of heat to supply the winter on a smaller supply of food a certain quantity of animal heat must be maintained by bees in order to live at all and if their numbers are too small they can only keep it up eating more than they would otherwise require a small swarm will thus not unfrequently consume as much honey as one containing two or three times as many bees these are facts which have been most thoroughly tested on a very large scale if a hundred persons are required to occupy with comfort a church that is capable of accommodating a thousand as much fuel or even more will be required to warm the small number as the large one if the stocks which are to be wintered are in the common hives the condemned ones must be drummed out of their old encampment sprinkled with sugar water scented with peppermint or some other pleasant odor and added to the others see page 212 the colonies which are to be united ought if possible to stand side by side sometime before this process is attempted this can almost always be affected by a little management for a while it would not be safe to move a colony all at once even a few yards to the right or left of the line of flight in which bees sadly out to the fields especially if other hives are near they may be moved a slight distance one day and a little more the next and so on until we have them at last in the desired place as persons may sometimes be obliged to move their apiaries during the working season i will here describe the way by which i was able to accomplish such a removal so as to benefit instead of injuring my bees selecting a pleasant day i moved early in the morning a portion of my very best stocks a considerable number of bees from these colonies returned in the course of the day to the familiar spot after flying about for some time in search of their hives if the weather had been chilly many of them would have perished they at length entered those standing next to their old homes more of the strongest were removed on the next pleasant day and this process was repeated until at last only one hive was left in the old apiary this was then removed and only a few bees returned to the old spot i thus lost no more bees in moving a number of hives than i should have lost in moving one and i conducted the process in such a way as to strengthen some of my feeble stocks instead of very seriously diminishing their scanty numbers i have known the most serious losses to result from the removal of an apiary conducted in the manner in which a change of location is usually made the process of uniting colonies in my hive is exceedingly simple the combs may after the two colonies are sprinkled be it once lifted out from the one which is to be broken up and put with all the bees upon them directly into the other hive if the aparian judges it best to save any of his very small colonies he can combine them to one half or one third of the central part of the hive and fill the two empty hives with straw shavings or any good non conductor any one of my frames can in a few minutes by having tack to it a thin piece of board or pasteboard or even an old newspaper be fashioned into a divider which will answer all practical purposes and if it is stuffed with cotton waste etc it will keep the bees uncommonly warm if a very small colony is to be preserved over winter the queen must be confined in the fall in a queen cage to prevent the colony from deserting the hive i shall now show how the beekeeper who wishes only to keep a given number of stocks may do so and yet secure from that number the largest quantity of surplus honey if his bees are kept in non swarming hives he may undoubtedly reap a bounteous harvest from the avails of their industry i do not however recommend this mode of beekeeping as the best still there are many so situated that it may be much the best for them such persons by using my hives can pursue the non swarming plan to the best advantage they can by taking off the wings of their queens be sure that the colonies will not suddenly leave them a casualty to which all other non swarming hives are sometimes liable and by taking away the honey in small quantities they will always give the bees plenty of spare room for storage and yet avoid discouraging them as is so often done when large boxes are taken from them see chapter on honey by removing from time to time the old queens the colonies can all be kept in possession of queens at the height of their fertility and in this way a very serious objection to the non swarming or as it is frequently called the storifying system may be avoided if at any time new colonies are wanted they may be made in the manner already described in districts where the honey harvest is a very short continuance the non swarming plan may be found to yield the largest quantity of honey and in case the season should prove unfavorable for the gathering of honey it will usually secure the largest returns from a given number of stocks I therefore prefer to keep a considerable number of my colonies on the storifying plan and am confident of securing from them a good yield of honey even in the most unfavorable seasons if beekeepers will pursue the same system they will not only be on the safe side but will be able to determine which method it will be best for them to adopt in order to make the most from their bees as a general rule the aparian who increases the number of his colonies one third in a season making one very powerful swarm from two c page 211 will have more surplus honey from the three than he could have obtained from the two to say nothing of the value of his new swarms if at the approach of winter he wishes to reduce his stocks down to the spring number he may unite them in the manner described approximating all the good honey of those which he breaks up and saving all their empty comb for the new colonies of the next season the bees in the doubled stock will winter most admirably will consume but little honey in proportion to their numbers and will be in most excellent condition when the spring opens it must not however be forgotten that although they eat comparatively little in the winter they must be well supplied in the spring as they will then have a very large number of mouths to feed to say nothing of the thousands of young bees bred in the hive if any old-fashioned beekeeper wishes he can thus pursue the old plan with only this modification that he preserves the lives of the bees in the hives which he wishes to take up secures his honey without any fumes of sulfur and saves the empty comb to make it worth nearly 10 times as much to himself as it would be if melted into wax let no humane beekeeper ever feel that there is the slightest necessity for so managing his bees as to make the comparison of Shakespeare always opposite quote when like the bee toiling from every flower the virtuous sweets our thighs packed with wax our mouths was honey we bring it to the hive and like the bees are murdered for our pains end quote while i am an advocate for breaking up all stocks which cannot be wintered advantageously i never advise that a single bee should be killed self-interest in christianity like forbid the unnecessary sacrifice transferring bees from the common hive to the movable comb hive the construction of my hive is such as to permit me to transfer bees from the common hives during all the season that the weather is warm enough to permit them to fly and yet to be able to guarantee that they will receive no serious damage by the change on the 10th of november 1852 in the latitude of northern massachusetts i transferred a colony which wintered in good health and which now may 1853 promises to make an excellent stock the day was warm but after the operation was completed the weather suddenly became cold and as the bees were not able to leave the hive in order to obtain the water necessary for repairing their comb they were supplied with that indispensable article they went to work very busily and in a short time mended up their combs and attached them firmly to the frames the transfer may be made of any healthy colony and if they are strong in numbers and the hive is well provision and the weather is not too cool when the operation is attempted they will scarcely feel the change if the weather should be too chilly it will be found almost impossible to make a colony leave its old hive and if the combs are cut out and the bees removed upon them large numbers of them will take wing and becoming chilled will be unable to join their companions and so will perish the process of transferring bees to my hives is performed as follows let the old hive be shut up and well drummed and the bees if possible be driven into an upper box if they will not leave the hive of their own accord they will fill themselves and when it is ascertained that they are determined if they can help it not to be tenants at will the upper box must be removed and the bees gently sprinkled so that they may all be sure to have nothing done to them on an empty stomach if possible an end of the old box parallel with the combs must be pried off so that they may be easily cut out an old hive or box should stand upon a sheet in place of the removed stock and as fast as a comb is cut out the bees should be shaken from it upon the sheet a wing or anything soft will often be of service in brushing off the bees remember that they must not be hurt if the weather is so pleasant that many bees from other hives are on the wing great care must be taken to prevent them from robbing as fast therefore as the bees are shaken from the combs these should be put into an empty hive or box and covered with a cloth or set in some place where they will not be disturbed as soon as all the combs have been removed the aperion should proceed to select and arrange them for his new hive if the transfer is made late in the season care must be taken of course to give the bees combs containing a generous allowance of honey for their winter supplies together with such combs as have brood or are best fitted for the rearing of workers all coarse combs except such as contain the honey which they need should be rejected lay a frame upon a piece of comb and mark it so as to be able to cut it a little larger so that it will just crowd into the frame to remain in its place until the bees have time to attach it if the size of the combs is such that some of them cannot be cut so as to fit then cut them to the best advantage and after putting them into the frames wind some thread around the upper and lower slats of the frame so as to hold the combs in their place until the bees can fasten them if however any of the combs which do not fit have no honey in them they must be fastened very easily by dipping their upper edges into melted rosin when the requisite number of combs are put into the frames they should be placed in the new hive and slightly fasten on the rabbits with a mere touch of paste so as to hold them firmly in their places this will be the more necessary if the transfer is made so late in the season that the bees cannot obtain the propolis necessary to fasten them themselves as soon as the hive is thus prepared let the temporary box into which the bees have been driven be removed and their new home put in its place shake out now the bees from the box upon a sheet in front of this hive and the work is done bees brood honey bee bread empty combs and all have been nicely moved and without any more serious loss than is often incurred by any other moving family which has to mourn over some broken crockery or other damage done in the necessary work of establishing themselves in a new home if this operation is performed at a season of the year when there is much brood in the hive and when the weather is cool care must be taken not to expose the brood so that they may become fatally chilled the best time for performing it is late in the fall when there is but little brood in the hive or about 10 days after the voluntary or forced departure of a first swarm from the old stock by this time the brood left by the old queen will all be sealed over and old enough to bear exposure especially as the weather at swarming time is usually quite warm a temperature not lower than 70 degrees will do them no harm for exposed to such a temperature they will hatch even if taken from the bees I have spoken of the best time for performing this operation it may be done at any season of the year when the bees can fly without any danger of being chilled and I should not be afraid to attempt it in midwinter if the weather was as warm as it sometimes is let me here earnestly caution all who keep bees against meddling with them when the weather is cool irreparable mischief is often done to them at such times they are tempted to fly and thus perish from the cold and frequently they become so much excited that they cannot retain their feces but void them among the combs if nothing worse ensues they are disturbed when they ought to be in almost deathlike repose and are thus tempted to eat a much larger quantity of food than they would otherwise have needed let the aparian remember that not a single unnecessary motion should be required of a single bee for all this to say nothing else involves a foolish waste of food see page 116 in all operations involving the transferring of bees it is exceedingly desirable that the new hives to which they are transferred should be put as near as possible where the old one stood if other colonies are in close proximity the bees may be tempted to enter the wrong hives if their position is changed only a little they are almost sure to do this if the others resemble more closely than the new one their former habitation it will be often advisable to transport to the distance of one or two miles the stocks which are to be transferred so that the operation may be performed to the best advantage in a few weeks they may be brought back to the apiary in hiving swarms and transferring stocks care must be taken to prevent the bees from getting mixed with those of other colonies if this precaution is neglected many bees will be lost by joining other stocks where they may be kindly welcome or may it once be put to death it is exceedingly difficult to tell beforehand what kind of a reception strange bees will be met with from a colony which they attempt to join in the working season they are much more likely to be well received than at any other time especially if they come loaded with honey new swarms full of honey that attempt to enter other hives are often killed at once if a colony which has an un impregnated queen seeks to unite with another which has a fertile queen then almost as a matter of course they are destroyed if by moving their hive or in any other way bees are made to enter a hive containing an un impregnated queen they will often destroy her if they came from a family which was in possession of a fertile one if anything of this kind is ever attempted the queen ought first to be confined in a queen cage if while attempting a transfer of a bees to a new hive i am apprehensive of robbers attacking the combs or impressed for want of time i put only such combs as contain brood into the frames and set the others in a safe place the bees are now at once allowed to enter their new hive and the other combs are given to them at a more convenient time the whole process of transferal need not occupy more than an hour and in some cases it can be done in 15 minutes if the weather is hot the combs must not be exposed at all to the heat of the sun until i had tested the feasibility of transferring bees from the old hives by means of my frames i felt strongly opposed to any attempt to dislodge them from their previous habitation if they are transferred in the usual way it must be done when the combs are filled with brood for if delayed until late in the season they will have no time to lay in a store of provision against the winter who can look without disgust upon the wanton destruction of thousands of their young and the silly waste of comb which can be replaced only by the consumption of large quantities of honey in the great majority of such cases the transfer unless made about the swarming season and previous to the issue of the first swarm will be an entire failure and if made before at best only one colony is obtained instead of the two which are secured on my plan i never advise the transfer of a colony into any hive unless their combs can be transferred with them nor do i advise any except practical a perians to attempt to transfer them even to my hives but what if a colony is so old that its combs can only breed dwarfs when i find such a colony i shall think it worthwhile to give specific directions as to how it should be managed the truth is that of all the many mistakes and impositions which have disgusted multitudes with the very sound of patent hive none has been more fatal than the notion that an old colony of bees could not be expected to prosper thousands of the very best stocks have been wantonly sacrificed to this chimera and so long as beekeepers instead of studying the habits of the bee prefer to listen to the interested statements of ignorant or enthusiastic or fraudulent persons thousands more will suffer the same fate as to old stocks the prejudice against them is just as foolish as the silly notions of some who imagine that a woman is growing old long before she has reached her prime many a man of mature years who has married a girl or a child instead of a woman has often had both time enough and cause enough to lament his folly it cannot be too strongly urged upon all who keep bees either for love or for money to be exceedingly cautious in trying any new hive or new system of management if you are ever so well satisfied that it will answer all your expectations enter upon it at first only on a small scale then if it fulfills all its promises or if you can make it do so you may safely adopt it at all events you will not have to mourn over large sums of money spent for nothing and numerous powerful colonies entirely destroyed let well enough alone should to a great extent be the motto of every prudent beekeeper there is however a golden mean between that obstinate and stupid conservatism which tries nothing new and of course learns nothing new and that craving after mere novelty and that rash experimenting on an extravagant scale which is so characteristic by a large portion of our american people it would be difficult to find a better maxim than that which is ascribed to david crocket quote be sure you're right then go ahead end quote what old beekeeper has not had abundant proof that stocks eight or ten years old or even older are often among the very best in his whole apiary always healthy and swarming with almost unfailing regularity i have seen such hives which for more than 15 years have scarcely failed a single season to throw a powerful swarm i have one now 10 years old in admirable condition which a few years ago swarmed three times and the first swarm sent off a colony the same season all these swarms were so early that they gathered ample supplies of honey and wintered without any assistance i have already spoken of old stocks flourishing for a long term of years in hives of the roughest possible construction and i shall now in addition to my previous remarks assign a new reason for such unusual prosperity without a single exception i have found one or both of two things to be true of every such high either it was a very large hive or else if not of unusual size it contained a large quantity of worker comb no hive which does not contain a good allowance of regular comb of a size adopted to the rearing of workers can ever in the nature of things prove a valuable stock hive many hives are so full of drone combs that they breed a cloud of useless consumers instead of the thousands of industrious bees which ought to have occupied their places in the combs it frequently happens that when bees are put into a new hive the honey harvest is at its height and the bees finding it difficult to build worker comb fast enough to hold their gatherings are tempted to construct long ranges of drone comb to receive their stores in this way a hive often contains so small an allowance of worker comb that it can never flourish as the bees refuse to pull down and build over any of their new combs all this can be easily remedied by the use of the movable comb hive procuring bees to start an apiary a person ignorant of bees must depend in a very great measure on the honesty of those from whom he purchases them many stocks are not worth accepting as a gift like a horse or cow incurably diseased they will only prove a bill of vexatious expense if an inexperienced person wishes to commence beekeeping i advise him by all means to purchase a new swarm of bees it ought to be a large and early one second swarms and all late and small first swarms ought never to be purchased by one who has no experience in aparian pursuits they are very apt in such hands to prove a failure if all beekeepers were of that exemplary class of whom the country curate speaks c page 33 it would be perfectly safe to order a swarm of any one keeping a stock of bees this however is so far from being true that some offer for sale old stocks which are worthless or impose on the ignorant small first swarms and second and even third swarms as prime swarms worth the very highest market price if the novice purchases an old stock he will have the perplexities of swarming etc the first season and before he has obtained any experience as it may however be sometimes advisable that this should be done unless he makes his purchase of a man known to be honest he should select his stock himself at a period of the day when the bees in early spring are busily engaged in plying their labors he should purchase a colony which is very actively engaged in carrying in bee bread and which from the large number going in and out undoubtedly contains a vigorous population the hive should be removed at an hour when the bees are all at home it may be gently inverted and of course towel placed over it and then tacked fast when the bees are shut in have a steady horse and before you start be very sure that it is impossible for any bees to get out place the hive on some straw in a wagon that has easy springs and the bees will have plenty of air and the combs from the inverted position of the hive will not be so liable to be jarred loose never purchase a hive which contains much comb just built for it will be next to impossible to move it in warm weather without loosening the new combs if a new swarm is purchased it may be brought home as follows furnish the person on whose premises it is to be hived with a box holding at the very least a cubic foot of clear contents let the bottom board of this temporary hive be clamped on both ends the clamps being about two inches wider than the thickness of the board so that when the hive is set on the bottom board it will slip in between the upper projections of the clamps and be kept an inch from the ground by the lower ones so that air may pass under it there should be a hole in the bottom board about four inches in diameter and two of the same size in the opposite sides of the box covered with wire gauze so that the bees may have an abundance of air when they are shut up three parallel strips and inch and a half wide should be nailed about one third of the way from the top of the temporary hive at equal distances apart so that the bees may have every opportunity to cluster a few pieces of old comb fastened strongly in the top with melted rosin will make the bees like it all the better a handle made of a strip of leather should be nailed to the top let the bees be hived in this box and kept well shaded at evening or very early next morning the temporary hive which was propped up when the bees were put into it may be shut closed to its bottom board and a few screws put into the upper projection of the clamps so as to run through into the ends of the box in such a box bees may be safely transported almost any reasonable distance care being taken not to handle them roughly and never to keep them in the sun or in any place where they have not sufficient air if the box is too small or sufficient ventilators are not put in or if the bees are exposed to too much heat they will be sure to suffocate if this swarm is unusually large and the weather excessively warm they ought to be removed at night unless great care is taken in moving bees in very hot weather they will be almost sure to perish therefore always be certain that they have an abundance of air if they appear to be suffering for want of it especially if they begin to fall down from the cluster and lie in heaps on the bottom board they should immediately be carried into a field or any convenient place and at once be allowed to fly in such a case they cannot be safely moved again until towards night this will never be necessary if the box is large enough and suitably ventilated i have frequently made a box for transporting new swarms out of an old tea chest when a new swarm is brought in this way to its intended home the bottom board may be unscrewed and the bees transferred at once to the new hive see page 168 in some cases it may be advisable to send away the new hive in this case if one of my hives is used the spare honey board should be screwed down and all the holes carefully stopped except two or three which ought to have some ventilators tacked over them the frames should be fastened with a little paste so that they will not start from their place and after the bees are hive the blocks which close the entrance should be screwed down to their place keeping them however a trifle less than an eighth of an inch from the entrance so as to give the bees all the air which they need i very much prefer sending a box for the bees one person can easily carry two such boxes each with a swarm of bees and if he chooses to fasten them to two poles or to a very large hoop he may carry four or even more if the aparian wishes to be sure the first season of getting some honey for his bees he will do well to procure two good swarms and put them both into one hive see page 213 to those who do not object to the extra expense i strongly recommend this course not unfrequently they will in a good season obtain and spare honey from their doubled swarm an ample equivalent for its increased cost at all events such a powerful swarm lays the foundation of a flourishing stock which seldom fails to answer all the reasonable expectations of its owner if the apiary is commenced with swarms of the current season and they have an abundance of spare room in the upper boxes there will be no swarming that season and the beginner will have ample time to make himself familiar with his bees before being called to hive new swarms or to multiply colonies by artificial means let no inexperienced person commence beekeeping on a large scale very few who do so find it to their advantage and the most of them not only meet with heavy losses but abandon the pursuit in disgust by the use of my hives the beekeeper can easily multiply very rapidly the number of his colonies as soon as he finds not merely that money can be made by keeping bees but that he can make it while i am certain that more money can be made by a careful and experienced beekeeper in a good situation from a given some invested in an apiary then from the same money invested in any other branch of rural economy i am equally certain that there is none in which a careless or inexperienced person would be more sure to find his outlay result in an almost entire loss an apiary neglected or mismanaged is far worse than a farm overgrown with weeds or exhausted by ignorant tillage for the land is still there and may by prudent management soon be made again to blossom like the rose but the bees when once destroyed can never be brought back to life unless the poetic fables of the mantuin bard can be accepted as the legitimate results of actual experience and swarms of bees instead of clouds of filthy flies can once more be obtained from the carcasses of decaying animals i have seen an old medical work in which vergell's method of obtaining colonies of bees from the putrid body of a cow slain for this special purpose is not only credited but minutely described a large book would hardly suffice to set forth all the superstitions connected with bees i will refer to one which is very common and which has often made a deep impression upon many minds when any member of a family dies the bees are believed to be aware of what has happened and the hives are by some dressed in mourning to pacify their sorrowing occupants some persons imagine that if this is not done the bees will never afterwards prosper while others assert that the bees will often take their loss so much to heart as to alight upon the coffin whenever it is exposed an intelligent clergyman on reading the sheets of this work stated to me that he had always refused to credit this latter fact until present at a funeral where the bees gathered in such large numbers upon the coffin as soon as it was brought out from the house as to excite considerable alarm some years after this occurrence being engaged in varnishing a table and finding that the bees came and lit upon it he was convinced that the love of varnish see page 85 instead of sorrow or respect for the dead was the occasion of their gathering around the coffin how many superstitions in which often intelligent persons most firmly confide might if all the facts were known be as easily explained before closing this chapter i must again strongly caution all inexperienced beekeepers against attempting to transfer colonies from an old hive i am determined that if any find that they have made a wanton sacrifice of their bees they shall not impute their loss to my directions if they persist in making the attempt let them by all means either do it at break of day before the bees of other hives will be induced to commence robbing or better still let them do it not only early in the morning but let them carry the hive on which they intend to operate to a very considerable distance from the vicinity of the other hives and entirely out of sight of the apiary i prefer myself this last plan as i then run no risk of attracting other bees to steal the honey and acquire mischievous habits the beekeeper is often reminded by the actions of his bees of some of the worst traits in poor human nature when a man begins to sink under misfortunes how many are ready not simply to abandon him but to pounce upon him like greedy harpies dragging if they can the very bed from under his wife and helpless children and appropriating all which by any kind of maneuvering they can possibly transfer to their already overgrown coffers with much the same spirit more pardonable to be sure in an insect the bees from other hives will gather around the one which is being broken up and while the disc consulate owners are lamenting over their ruined prospects will with all imaginable capacity and glee bear off every drop which they can possibly seize end of chapter 13