The use of these additions will be easily understood by those who know that it takes as long a time to hatch a bee as to hatch a chicken, viz. three weeks.
I have already said and repeated, that, in the swarming season, the strong and well provisioned hives are almost entirely filled with the brood-comb, and that scarcely any of the cells will be found empty. At that time also, honey becomes abundant; and, when fine days succeed each other, the working bees amass an astonishing quantity; but where is it to be stored? Moments are precious. Must they wait until the young bees have left the brood-cells, a week or perhaps a fortnight longer, by which time the early flowers will be cut down or withered, never more to display their honied cups to these little reapers? What is to be done in this dilemma? Must the young be sacrificed, and torn from the cells, in order to make room for the riches that nature offers on every hand? But this destruction of its posterity would ruin the colony. Mark, then, the resource of the industrious bees. They search in their neighbourhood for a place where they may deposit their honey until the young shall have left the comb in which they were hatched, and nourished, and undergone their metamorphoses; and, if they fail in their object, they crowd together op the front or sides of their habitation, forming prodigious clusters. It is not uncommon to see them build combs on the outside; many did so in the year 1791, the finest honey year I have seen since 1753. In the year 1791, I drew from one of my straw-hives that did not swarm, seventy-two pounds of beautiful honey-comb, merely by emptying the capes as they were filled. All years, however, are not like that, nor any thing approaching to it. There are middling seasons, when the bees find little more than merely what is requisite for their own supply. There are also bad seasons, when almost all the swarms perish, as well as numberless old hives, when they do not receive assistance: such, among others, were the years 1812 and 1813. In the worst years there are days and even weeks of fine weather, when the honey is abundant; but it is of short continuance. The bees, however, at that time, will deposit their honey into the capes; and, towards the end of summer, or beginning of autumn, when little or no more is to be found, they remove it into the hive, filling the cells which the brood occupied at the time it was collected.
If, during the summer, we deprive them of this treasure, which is only deposited in the capes for the time, we impoverish them, unless it is returned to them in twice the quantity. This was one cause of the ruin and depopulation of so many apiaries during these two fatal years, and my principal motive for taking up my pen is, to prevent, if possible, the recurrence of such disasters, by making known to the public my observations and discoveries.
If the bees have room enough in the interior to dispose of their honey, it is needless to give them capes, for they will not build in them. These capes are commonly placed on the top of the hive, but it is matter of indifference whether they be on the right, on the left, or even underneath, provided there be an accessible way of communication between them. If we wish to attach them to the bottom of the hive, we establish a communication between the hive and the cape, by making a hole in the board on which the hive rests, so as to afford a free passage to the workers. I have capes of all kinds, above, below, and on the sides, which all succeed equally well. Those placed above have an advantage not to be despised, which is, that they prevent the combs from moulding during the winter, an evil to which hives are liable in those countries where they are taken into the house, to protect them from the frost and snow.
All those that are well stocked, produce a moisture which, having no vent, collects in drops on the sides, and at the base of the hive, in which the bees are kept close prisoners until the return of fine weather. Many perish during their long captivity, and, oftener than once, I have found large icicles in strong hives. This never happens to those that have capes on the top: the moisture ascending evaporates through the opening, as by a chimney; and then one has the satisfaction of finding the combs healthy and free of mould in the spring. Care, however, must be had to cement it all round with clay or mortar, or some composition suited to exclude the wind, and to prevent the bees, sometimes very impatient, from getting out during the winter.
With this precaution, very few will be found dead in the spring; and, in well-stocked hives, the laying of eggs begins about the end of January or beginning of February.
Capes may be adapted to wooden hives, or to those of any other material, as well as to those of straw.
Many people place capes over all their swarms the very day, or the day after, their emigration, and I approve of this plan for early and strong swarms.
Capes neither prevent nor retard the issuing of swarms. I have frequently had hives that filled them, or were in the way of doing so, when the emigration took place, but on their numbers being diminished, stopped the work, and returned to it again as soon as they were reinforced, provided they did not give out a second swarm. Hives that have capes rarely give out second swarms, and this is no loss.
The honey obtained by the capes is very pure, beautifully white, and very superior to what is obtained by the cutting out of combs.