20. No part of the interior of the hive should be below the level of the place of exit.
If this principle is violated, the bees must, at great disadvantage, drag their dead, and all the refuse of the hive, up hill. Such hives will often have their bottom boards covered with small pieces of comb, bee-bread, and other impurities, in which the moth delights to lay her eggs; and which furnished her progeny with a most congenial nourishment, until they are able to get access to the combs.
21. It should afford facilities for feeding the bees both in warm and cold weather.
In this respect, my hive has very unusual advantages. Sixty colonies in warm weather may, in an hour, be fed a quart each, and yet no feeder be used, and no risk incurred from robbing bees. (See Chapter on [Feeding].)
22. It should allow of the easy hiving of a swarm, without injuring any of the bees, or risking the destruction of the queen. (See Chapter on [Natural Swarming, and Hiving].)
23. It should admit of the safe transportation of the bees to any distance whatever.
The permanent bottom-board, the firm attachment of the combs, each to a separate frame, and the facility with which, in my hive, any amount of air can be given to the bees when shut up, most admirably adapt it to this purpose.
24. It should furnish the bees with air when the entrance is shut; and the ventilation for this purpose ought to be unobstructed, even if the hives should be buried in two or three feet of snow. (See Chapter on [Protection].)
25. A good hive should furnish facilities for enlarging, contracting, and closing the entrance; so as to protect the bees against robbers, and the bee-moth; and when the entrance is altered, the bees ought not to lose valuable time in searching for it, as they must do in most hives. (See Chapters on [Ventilation], and on [Robbing].)
26. It should give the bees the means of ventilating their hives, without enlarging the entrance too much, so as to expose them to moths and robbers, and to the risk of losing their brood by a chill in sudden changes of weather. (See Chapter on [Ventilation].)