INVERTED-HIVE.
Many useful discoveries have been made by accident;—and to some of the greatest and grandest of those discoveries even philosophers and men of science have been led by accidents apparently the most trifling and insignificant.
To the playful tricks of some little children that astonishing and most scientific instrument—the telescope, it is said, owes its origin; and it is said also that that great and good man—Sir Isaac Newton was led to investigate the laws of gravitation by accidentally observing an apple topple to the ground from the twig that had borne it. One of the sweetest of our poets, however, informs us—that
All Nature is but Art, unknown to thee,
All Chance, Direction, which thou canst not see.
If, therefore, a beautifully delicate honey-comb suspended from the stool of a hive first led me to discover the utility of ventilation in a colony of Bees, though there may be nothing very surprising, there is, I trust,—nay, I am convinced, and therefore I assert—there is something very useful in it: and if an accident of another description induced me to endeavour to turn it to advantage, there is nothing to be greatly wondered at. So, however, it happened; and here follows the account of it.
On rising early one morning in July 1827, and walking into my apiary, as my custom then was, and still is, I discovered that some malicious wretch had been there before me, and had overturned a fine colony of Bees. The reader may judge how much my indignation was aroused by that dastardly act of outrage against my unoffending Bees. My feelings of vexation soon, however, subsided into those of pity for my poor Bees; and fortunately for them, no less than for me, their overturned domicil, which consisted of a hive eked or enlarged by a square box upon which I had placed it some weeks previously, was so shaded from or towards the east by a thick fence, that the rays of the sun had not reached it;—this compound-hive, and the countless thousands that were clustering around it, were prostrate in the shade. I viewed my distressed Bees for a considerable time, and studied and planned what I might best do to relieve them, and, if possibly I could, rescue them from the deplorable situation into which they had been thrown. At length I determined to reverse the whole, which I effected by first carefully drawing the box as closely as I was able to the edge of the hive, and then placing the hive upon its crown, so that, in fact, the whole domicil was inverted. I shaded, protected, shored-up, and supported the Bees, their exposed works, and their hive, in the best way I could, and afterwards reluctantly left them for the day, being under the necessity of going from home a distance of almost twenty miles, viz. to Wisbech. On my return in the evening I could discern evident proofs of the willingness of the Bees to repair the sore injury they had sustained; and on the third day afterwards I was highly pleased to witness the progress their united efforts had made to rescue their dilapidated habitation from the ruin that had threatened it and them too, and which, I confess, I had anticipated. I was particularly attentive to their movements. I assisted them by every means I could devise. They gradually surmounted all the difficulties to which they had been exposed. In short, they prospered; and from that malicious trick of some miscreant or other I first caught the idea of an inverted-hive, which I have since studied and greatly improved.
Every Bee-master will have had opportunities of observing—that this curious, I may say—intelligent, little insect—the Bee, is ever alive to the most ready methods of extricating itself from difficulties, and of bettering the condition of the state, whenever accident or misfortune has placed it in jeopardy: and, I will add—that the timely assistance of the Bee-master will frequently save a stock from that ruin, or at least from that trouble and inconvenience, which apparently trivial circumstances, such for instance as uncleanliness, excessive heat in summer, intense severity of winter, too contracted an entrance at one season, a too extended and open one at another, or wet lodged on and retained by the floor-board, may, and very often do occasion.
The subjoined cut is a representation of an INVERTED-HIVE fixed in its frame, trellised, roofed, completely fitted up, and just as it appears when placed in an apiary and stocked with Bees.
EXPLANATION OF AN INVERTED-HIVE.
A. is a stout octagon-box, in which is to be placed an inverted cottage-hive containing the Bees. Its diameter within the wood, I mean its clear diameter, is seventeen inches, and its depth, or rather its height, is fifteen or sixteen inches, or just sufficient to reach to, and be level with, the edge of the inverted cottage-hive, when placed within it: in fact, the octagon-box (A.) is a strong case or cover for the inverted-hive; and, if made an inch or two deeper than the hive to be placed in it, it is an easy matter to pack the bottom, so that the edge of the hive and the top-edge of the octagon-box (A.) may be exactly on a level. Fitted and fastened to this is a top or floor, made of three-fourths-inch deal, which top should sit closely upon the edge of the hive all round. The centre of this top is cut out circularly to within an inch and a half of the inner circumference or edge of the hive upon and over which it is placed. Upon this floor is a box, made of inch or inch-and-quarter deal, seventeen inches square within, and four inches deep. This I call the ventilation-box, because through two of its opposite sides are introduced horizontally two cylinder ventilating-tubes, made of tin, thickly perforated, and in all respects similar to those described in page 20. The top of this box is the floor upon which nine glasses are placed for the reception of honey, namely—a large bell-glass in the centre, and eight smaller ones around it. By a large bell-glass I mean—one capable of containing twelve or fourteen pounds of honey, and by smaller ones—such as will hold about four pounds. The Bees of an inverted-hive in a good situation will work well in glasses of these sizes, and soon fill some or all of them: but, if in an unfavourable situation, lesser glasses, down to one-half the abovementioned sizes, will be more suitable. Situation, season, and strength of the stock,—strength, I mean, as respects the number of Bees, must, after all, guide the apiarian in this matter. The floor abovementioned should be made of three-fourths-inch deal. Of course proper apertures must be cut through this floor under each of the glasses to admit the Bees into them from the box beneath. Around and over the glasses is placed another neat box or case, made like the ventilation-box, upon which it rests or stands. The lid of this box is made to open and shut. It is represented in the foregoing cut as opened at B. an inch or two, and may be so retained at pleasure by a proper weight attached to a cord passed over a pulley fixed in the inside of the roof (C.) and fastened to the edge of the lid above B. The depth of the box or cover for the glasses must of course be regulated according to their different sizes. The alighting-board is on the front-side, directly opposite to the latticed doors, and on a level with the upper-side of the first floor; so that the entrance for the Bees must be cut through the lower edge of the ventilation-box; and is made there most conveniently for them to pass either into the inverted pavilion below, or into the glasses above such entrance, as their inclinations may direct.
The octagon-cover placed upon the pavilion-hive, as represented in the view of the closed boxes (in page 29) if inverted, would be a tolerably good model of part A. of the inverted-hive.
I advise that every part be well-made—the floors and the boxes particularly so; and that the whole exterior be well painted too, previously to being exposed to the sun and to the weather. This advice has reference to all my boxes and hives, collateral as well as inverted.
The stocking of this hive may be effected in the following manner. Having made choice of a good, healthy, well-stocked, cottage-hive, you may, at any time between the beginning of March and the end of October, carefully invert and place it in the octagon below the ventilation-box, that is, in the apartment (A.) then fasten the floor with four short screws to the top of the octagon, taking especial care that this floor sits upon the edge of the inverted-hive all round. It will be necessary to keep the Bees from annoying you whilst adjusting this floor and the other parts of the hive, by putting a sheet of tin over the open circular space in the floor; by which tin every Bee may be kept in the hive below. When the boxes, ventilators, glasses, and all things, are duly adjusted, the dividing-tin may be withdrawn; and the operation of stocking will be then completed.
Another method of accomplishing the same object, i. e. of stocking an inverted-hive, is this:
Take the floor that is to rest upon, and be fastened to, the top of the octagon A. and that is to rest also upon the hive when inverted, and with a sheet of tin cover and securely close the circular space made by cutting out its centre: then invert it, that is—let the tinned side be undermost, and place upon this floor, thus prepared, the hive you intend to be inverted. Return it to, and suffer it to occupy, its usual place in your apiary; and there for two or three weeks let it work in which time the Bees will have fastened the hive to their new board with propolis. Then, early in the morning, or late in the evening, when all the Bees are in the hive, make up the entrance, and, having two doors made in opposite panels or sides of the octagon (A.) ten inches by six, or sufficiently commodious for the admission of your hands, steadily invert your hive and prepared board upon which it has been standing, and, without sundering from the hive the board that will now be at its top, carefully place them in the octagon; which, with the help of an assistant, and by the facility afforded by the two little doors in the panels of the octagon for staying and properly supporting and adjusting the hive and its attached floor, may be performed without the escape of a single Bee. As soon as this, which is properly the inversion of the hive, is completed, proceed with the ventilation-box, glasses, &c. as before directed; and, lastly, be careful to liberate the Bees by withdrawing the tin that has kept them prisoners since the entrance was closed. In inverting a hive by this method an expert apiarian need not confine the Bees five minutes.
The Bees will commence their labour by filling the square box between the pavilion and the glasses; they will then extend their beautiful combs into the glasses above. The appearance of their most curious works in this stage of their labour is highly interesting—nay, gratifying, to the apiarian observer; and, moreover, proves the extraordinary influence and utility of ventilation in the domicil, or, rather let me say, in the store-house apartment of Bees; for in the pavilion, or breeding and nursing apartment, it is seldom wanted.
The method of taking off the glasses, whether large ones or small ones, when stored with honey, is in every respect the same as that of which a particular account has been already given, (in pages 37 and 38): to that account, therefore, I beg to refer the reader, instead of here repeating it.
