§ XVIII. WEIGHING HIVES.
One of the most effectual modes of ascertaining the condition of a hive is by weighing it. Such knowledge is most important at the close of the gathering season, in order that the bee-keeper may determine whether he ought to give his bees artificial food to enable them to live through the dreary winter. A knowledge of the numerical strength of the colony is also useful in enabling the bee-keeper to decide which hives will be benefited by being joined together, on the method explained in the article on "Uniting Hives."
A hive can very easily be weighed if a Salter's spring balance be suspended near the apiary. The hive, having a strap or cord passed under and over it, crossing at right angles on the top, may be hooked on to the balance, so that the weight will be indicated on the dial. The annexed illustration represents a tripod stand, with a weighing-machine of the above-named construction, to which a hive with a super is attached. Such an arrangement will be found convenient for those bee-keepers who may not possess suitable sheds in their gardens where a hive could be thus suspended from a beam. To prevent the hive being swayed to and fro by the wind, three cords (gear ropes) might be attached therefrom to the three legs of the stand. The height of such a stand need not exceed four feet.
This contrivance is both portable and simple, and can be used from time to time; or, if the apiarian desires to have the hive constantly suspended, a water-proof covering might easily be made to drop over, and adapted so as to admit of being raised occasionally for ascertaining the weight shown on the dial. Much interest might be derived by watching the daily or hourly increasing store brought into a hive during the gathering season. Mr. George Fox, of Kingsbridge, and Mr. S. Bevan Fox, of Exeter, have for some years each kept one stock attached to a "Salter's Circular Spring Balance," suspended from a beam under a shed, and, from experience, found that from a hive so balanced a criterion may be formed of what other hives in the apiary are doing through the day.
Some interesting observations have been made upon this point. Baron von Berlepsch has had stocks which brought in twelve pounds of honey in a day; Kader in Mentz had days when one stock brought twenty-one pounds; Pastor Stein in Mentz had days when one stock brought twenty-eight pounds. The sap which a bee's honey-bag holds weighs but a grain, so that the bees, in this last case, must have made in one day over 160,000 journeys.
Many ingenious contrivances will, no doubt, suggest themselves for the observation of hives in this manner. For instance, instead of the cord being tied round the hive, three or four strong irons, with a screw at one end and a ring at the other (known by ironmongers as "eyes"), could be screwed into the floor-boards, to which the attachments might be made fast. It will scarcely be necessary to hint that great care is necessary that full provision should be made securely to support the increasing weight; a fall would be most ruinous, and terribly enrage the bees.
The weight of the hive should be marked on it when empty, so that the exact amount of its contents may at any time be ascertained. Experienced apiarians are able to judge of the weight of a hive by lifting it a few inches from the stand; or by looking in at the window of a stock hive a conclusive opinion may be formed as to the state of the colony. If the combs within view be well filled and sealed, it will be safe to consider that the hive contains sufficient stores to carry the bees through the winter.