From the preceding remarks, the necessity of fre quently inspecting hives is evident ; not by tearing them from the boards, as is usually done, to the manifest destruction of the combs and derangement of the whole colony, but by examining the entrance with caution, and by using hives of such a constriction that part of them opens to expose what is contained within. An apparatus of the description proposed by Bergman, should be kept for weighing the hives from time to time, that the increase or diminution may be known. This consists of a steelyard hung to a small frame : from one arm of the steelyard the hive is suspended by three slight chains, and a weight shifts along the other. The common iron spring steelyards may be conveniently employed, providing their accuracy has been previously ascertained.
When seasons are peculiarly unfavourable for the secretion of honey, sometimes, we have said, a whole swarm may perish in the middle of summer. Then," or when they are deprived of too great a portion of their stores, it becomes the cultivator's care to supply the deficiency. There are various methods of doing so, always regulating the supply by the number of bees and the temperature of the atmosphere. The hive may be placed above a section of another hive containing several combs with honey ; or combs may be laid on the boards of the hive before the entrance, which is less to he recommended from exposing the bees and their provisions to the invasion of stran gers. Syrup of sugar, treacle, and other sweet sub stances, may be given them as food, introducing their allowance every afternoon in nutshells, or in a ves sel with a grated covering, by an opening in the back of the hive. Unless the supply be daily administered, it is extremely difficult to preserve the bees; and by admitting of longer intervals, the most skilful culti vators have failed. A practical operator informs us, that he takes an oblong box, in one end of which Is a reservoir containing honey, that is allowed to flow from the bottom of the reservoir under a thin float buoyed up by cork. This float has many small perforatiuns, through which the bees standing on it supply themselves with the honey. There is one hole in the side of the box, which is to be applied to the entrance of the hive, for admitting the bees above the float, and another on the opposite side, which is opened at pleasure, to allow them to escape, should the box be too much crowded. The lid of the box is a glass pane. On pouring honey into the reser voir, the float rises, whence there should not be such a quantity as to raise it close to the lid or pane above. The box is about ten inches long, four broad, two and a half deep, and the reservoir is an inch wide. When used, the hole in the side is to be placed close to the entrance of the hive, which must be gently rapped on if the bees do not immediately find the way down. It is entertaining to observe bees ac customed to be fed in this manner, watching the ap proach of the feeder; when the ordinary time draws near, they rush down to the box the moment that it is put on the board, and after speedily filling them selves they return to the hive, from which they very soon come back for a second supply. By throwing a little fine flour on those leaving the box, it will be seen that they can fill themselves in three minutes, and are absent not above five. One convenience that attends feeding in such a box, is the exclusion of stranger bees ; as the sole communication with the interior is from the entrance of the hive. Several practical operators recommend a mixture of sugar and small beer as food, which we should warn others to be cautious of adopting, as they will find honey or syrup quite adequate to their purpose. It is main tained that fruit may likewise be presented to bees for feeding them.
Supposing, by a concurrence of favOurable circum stances, that a hive is well provided with bees ; that t they are protected from enemies, their collections r ample, and their brood abundant ; the cultivator has to watch it strictly during the summer season when swarming takes place. It is only. during the warmer weather that bees swarm, on fine days, and when the heavens are unclouded : if the sun be overcast, they hesitate to depart, awaiting the moment when he • shines forth in full lustre. Though what are called precursors cannot be depended on, as we have shewn, they are not to be altogether neglected ; and in at .
tending to them the time of swarming will scarce ly be overlooked.. It is commonly between ten and .three o'clock, sometimes a little earlier or later, that a swarm leaves the hive, during which interval. the owner should be on the watch to follow it. A sud den buzzing is heard, the bees are seen in innumerable multitudes traversing the air in all possible direc tions, and the entrance of the hive soon appears de serted. After wandering about for some minutes, they are generally seen in small clusters, on some neighbouring shrub or tree, which gradually unite round the queen, and all are collected together in a single heap. If they rise high in the air, it frequently indicates their inclination to take a long flight, which is usually endeavoured to be checked by beating.pans, ringing bells, and throwing dust or sand among them. The former can have little influence ; if it does ope rate, it may be by producing a slight concussion of the air, which, alarming the bees in the same way as thunder, may induce them to settle ; but the discharge of a fowling piece yould have much more effect. Bees are conceived to mistake the dust and sand for rain, which they greatly dread; and we often observe them hastening to the hive on the approach of a shower, or when the sky cloudy. Notwith standing every effort to retain them, they sometimes rise very high, fly to a distance, and are irrecover ably lost. As they are said to fly in a straight line after having taken their direction, they must be pur sued, as there is no other method of discovering where they alight. The place of their settling is extremely uncertain. Bonner says they will fly four miles to take possession of a dead hive, and affirms, that he has seen a swarm go into a living one that stood in the same apiary. If they alight in an accessible place, on the branch of a tree for example, after allowing them to settle completely, it must be gently cut oil and laid on the ground, and a -clean hive supported on two sticks put over it, and the whole covered with a sheet or large table cloth. The bees will soon ascend into the hive, and immediately begin working: late in the evening, when all is quiet within, the hive is to be transported to its station in the apiary. When the cultivator can, by any device, catch the queen and put her into the hive, all the bees will quickly follow. This is more essential to attempt, when the place where the swarm has settled is of difficult access ; such as flying to the roof of a house, or the cleft of a tree. Then it is far from easy to dislodge the bees, which is, in the majority of cases, the sole method of recovering them ; as we can hardly sanction the following method recommended by Bonner : " The owner should make as much room as possible to get his hand introduced, so as to pull them out by handfuls, and put them into an empty hive." Bees very quickly commence working even in the most exposed and unsheltered situations, un less removed to a hive. The operator should be pro vided with a dress to protect him from the stings of the bees: the best expedient is to have a close leather jacket and trowsers; the head and face covered, and goggles of gauze to save the eyes. Bees are less dis posed to sting during their swarming than at all other times; and there have been instances of their settling on a person's head, unattended by inconvenience. We have an authentic account of this from Thorley. " In the year 1717," he observes, " one of my swarms settled among the close twisted branches of a codling tree ; and not to be got into a hive without help, my maid servant, being in the garden, offered her assistance to hold the hive while I dislodged the bees. Having never been acquainted with bees, she
put a linen cloth over her head and shoulders, to guard and secure her from their swords. A few of the bees fell into the hive, some upon the ground, but the main body upon the cloth which covered her upper garments. 1 took the hive out of her hands when she cried out, the bees were got under the covering, and crowding up towards her breast and face, which put her into a trembling posture. When I perceived the veil was of no farther service, she gave to remove it : this done, a most affecting spectacle presented itself to the view of all the company, fil ling me with the deepest distress and concern, as I thought myself the unhappy instrument of drawing her into so imminent hazard of her life. Had she en raged them, all resistance had been vain, and nothing less than her life would have atoned for the offence. I spared not to use all the arguments I could think of, and using the most affectionate intreaties; begging her, with all earnestness in my power, to stand her ground and keep her present posture ; in order to which I gave her encouragement to hope for a full discharge from her disagreeable companions. I be gan to search among them for the queen, now got in a great body upon her breast, about her neck, and up to her chin. I immediately seized her, taking her from among the crowd, with some of the commons in company with her, and put them together into the hive. Here I watched her for some time, and, as I did not observe that she came out, I conceived an ex pectation of seeing the whole body quickly abandon their settlement ; but instead of that, I soon obser ved them gathering closer together, without the least signal for departing. Upon this I immediately re flected, that either there must be another sovereign, or that the same was returned. I directly commenced a second search, and in a short time, with a most agreeable surprise, found a second or the same. She strove, by entering farther into the crowd, to escape me, but I reconducted her with a great number of the populace into. the hive. And now the melan choly scene began to change, to one infinitely more agreeable and pleasant. The bees missing their queen, began to dislodge and repair to the hive ; crowding into it in multitudes, and in the greatest hurry imagin able ; and in the space of two or three minutes the maid had not one single bee about her, neither had she so much as one sting, a small number of which would have quickly stopped her breath." Supposing that the cultivator desires to augment the number of his hives, without awaiting the period when swarming naturally ensues ; or that its opera. tion is checked by the uncertainties of weather, pre dominant in our climate above all others, lie may re. sort to the expedient of obtaining artificial swarms. Several young queens originate at once in a hive; and the production of two is sometimes so immediate, that although both cannot survive together, they come off in the same swarm. As by M. Shirach's discovery, bees having lost the queen can procure themselves another, providing there be workers' brood in the combs, we can at pleasure rear successive queens simply by removing the first. If a hive is strong enough therefore, it may be divided in two ; one half will retain the old queen, and the other will not be long of obtaining a young one.' Sliirach di rects, that the appearance of brood in a hive contain ing a queen is to be ascertained, which is always about the time that the trees are in blossom, or a little later in Britain. Three or four pieces of comb, with the brood, are to be cut out of the hive, and placed in a rack-work adapted in another hive in the same position as in that from which they came, and three or four hundred bees must be confined along with it ; unless the hive be very large, they should not be numerous ; and seven or eight hundred will al ways prove more than sufficient. Nearly fifteen days being requisite for the production of a queen, as much honey should be supplied every two days as will serve for subsisting the bees. The hive is then ' to be closed up a: ' transported to a place where the temperature is moderate. Violent agitation ensues among the bees whenever they discover that they imprisoned, and the tumult becomes still greater on their ascertaining that their sovereign is no longer with them. Silence succeeds, which is next followed by greater noise and confusion than what attends swarming. Immediately afterwards a new operation begins, and from the second day the construction of a royal cell is seen. The confinement of the bees must be protracted some days ; but on the fourth or fifth, the hive may be carried into a garden, and the prisoners allowed to escape. Their eagerness to do so is such, that hardly one remains in the hive ; how ever, in two hours they return to it again. The en trance must still be closed at night, and the hive car ried into a house, unless the fineness of the weather admits of it being left without. If the operator, on opening the hive, finds the brood hatched, and the royal cells well advanced, lie should transfer the whole along with the bees into a dwelling of greater capaci ty, provided a small box has been used with three or four combs of white wax fixed near the top, that the interior may resemble a hive containing work already commenced. Should the queen be hatched, it will facilitate the operation if she can be transferred to the new dwelling : and thus the artificial swarm is form ed. It is difficult to perform this operation with the common straw hives; but an expert person may ac complish it by means similar to those adopted in rob bing the bees of their provisions.—Here the use of the book or leaf hive is especially demonstrated; for it affords facilities in forming artificial swarms infinitely surpassing any others that have yet been devised. Under the conditions above specified, of brood and population, the leaf•hive is to be gently separated in the middle, and two empty frames insinuated between the halves. The queen must then be sought for in one of the halves, and a mark put on her, in order to avoid mistake. Should she by chance remain in the division with most brood, she is to be transferred to the other containing less, that the bees may have every chance of obtaining another female. Next, it is necessary to connect the halves together by a cord tied tight around them : and care shobld be taken to place them on the same board which the hive pre viously occupied. The old entrance, now become useless, will be shut up; but as each half requires a new one, these ought to be made at the extremities of the two divisions, on purpose to be as far asunder as possible. Both, however, should not be made on the same day. The bees in the half deprived of. the queen, ought to be confined twenty-four hours, and no opening made before the lapse of that time, ex cept for the admission of air ; otherwise they would soon search for the queen, and infallibly find her in the other division. But provided twenty-four hours be sufficient to make them forget their queen, this will not happen. When all circumstances are favour able, the bees in the division wanting the queen will begin to labour in procuring another ; and about fif teen days after the operation, as before observed, their loss will be repaired. " The young female they have reared," according to Huber, " soon issues forth to seek impregnation, and in two days commences the laying of workers' eggs. Nothing more is wanting to the bees of her division, and the success of the arti ficial swarm is ensured." The time of resorting to, this expedient is, when the males are about to origi nate or actually exist : if attempted earlier, the bees will be discouraged by the sterility of their young female. The structure of the leaf hive enables us easily to ascertain the concurrence of the necessary conditions; for by simply opening the frames succes sively, their whole contents are exposed to view.