The Bee Preserver; or, Practical Directions for the Management and Preservation of Hives

by Jonas de Gélieu

The following year, on the 4th of March, I cut away the two black combs that were left in front, and thus this hive was also entirely renewed; after which it produced me four swarms, and nearly forty pounds of honey-combs in the capes: this I consider a clear profit, there not being the smallest doubt that the hive would have perished, had it not been renewed.

These two examples may suffice to shew the advantage to be derived from the renewing of old hives. What would mine have yielded had I resorted to the common method of suffocating the bees? A little indifferent honey; for that of candied combs is very inferior to that of new ones. As to the wax, I should have had no more, since I took away all that the hives contained, and the exchange gave me good strong colonies, which are more valuable than the best swarms.

The advantage of my plan will be better understood, if we shall suppose two neighbouring apiaries, equally good, and in all respects equally well taken care of. Suppose one of them shall be managed in the ordinary way, and that, every year, the owners shall suffocate the heaviest swarms for the sake of the honey, and that they also destroy the old hives that have too little provision for the winter. Let the other apiary be managed according to the principles I have detailed, that not one bee shall be put to death, and that, in the autumn, the swarms that are too light, as well as the old hives that are scarce of food, shall be united, and that the latter shall be renewed when they cease to prosper.

At the end of fifteen years, compare these two apiaries, and see which has the strongest hives, the greatest number, and in the best condition. It would be surprising indeed, if they preserved their original equality.

Will these operations be objected to, on account of the difficulties attending the performance of them? Will it be said that every one has not the courage to run the risk of being stung, or the dexterity to set about handling the bees?

In all countries there are people to be found who are accustomed to gather swarms, and to put joinings on hives. Let them be employed, and directed in every part of the work that the proprietors do not like to perform themselves. This practice is common in Lusatia, a country celebrated in the history of bees, by the very useful discoveries of M. Shirach, and where they make annually, according to his principles, a great quantity of artificial swarms. The country people, of whom the greater number understand nothing of these complex operations, which take more time, and are much more difficult than the union of swarms, or the renewing of hives, employ people who are bred to the business, and who, in the proper season, go from village to village, making swarms, and are paid for their trouble.

From the result of my experiments, it is evident that the duration of hives is indefinite; and here a multitude of questions present themselves. How long does a queen live? Would she live twenty years and more? Is the term of her existence prolonged beyond that of the working bees? I cannot answer; but I have reason to think that bees live only one year, and that those which have lived over the winter, and have assisted at the work during the spring and summer, and which do not perish by accident, die of age in the month of August. By that time, they seem to become paralytic; and, unable to fly, they fall down in the neighbourhood of the hives, and creep about until they expire from fatigue and exhaustion.

One then sees many of them, with their wings fringed, which is a sign of decrepitude, similar to the wrinkles of an old person; while the young-bees may be discerned by their grey ashy colour, which becomes darker, approaching to black, as they get older. I do not believe that the queen (on whose existence depends that of the colony), lives ten, fifteen, or twenty times longer than the working bees. But they have the means of filling her place when she comes to die. M. Shirach has completely demonstrated, by very varied and multiplied experiments, that they require only for that purpose a common bee-worm that has been hatched within two or three days, and that this worm becomes a queen, and a fruitful queen, in less than a fortnight, by means of a thicker, more roomy, and differently formed cell, which they construct expressly for her, and by a different sort of pap with which she is nourished. I have repeated the experiment oftener than once.

Forty days after I had put a bit of brood-comb into a wired box, after the manner of M. Shirach, I saw young bees come out; and the young queen I had made be hatched, was the mother of my artificial swarm. It is therefore probable that a hive, from twenty to twenty-five years old, has not always the same queen, but that the queen has, from time to time, been replaced. Moreover, every time that a swarm comes off, it is the old queen that emigrates with it.

The sudden decline of a hive that has lost its queen, and which never long survives the loss, when it has not young brood to create another, proves that bees live but one year, as the depopulation would be less rapid if the lives of the individuals extended beyond that term.