As respects ventilation from above, as well as from below, so as to allow a free current of air to pass through the hive, I am decidedly opposed to it, as in cool and windy weather, such a current often compels the bees to retire from the brood, which in this way is destroyed by a fatal chill. In thin hives, ventilation from above may be desirable in Winter, to carry off the superfluous moisture, but in properly constructed hives, standing over a Protector, there is, as has already been remarked, little or no dampness to be carried off. The construction of my hives will allow, if at all desirable, of ventilation from above; and I always make use of it, when the bees are to be shut up for any length of time, in order to be moved; as in this case, there is always a risk that the ventilators on the bottom-board may be clogged by dead bees, and the colony suffocated. As the entrance of the hive, may in a moment, be enlarged to any desirable extent, without in the least perplexing the bees, any quantity of air may be admitted, which the necessities of the bees, under any possible circumstances, may require. It may be made full 18 inches in length, but as a general rule, in Summer, in a large colony, it need not exceed six inches: while in Spring and Fall, two or three inches will suffice. In Winter, it should be entirely closed; unless in latitudes so warm, that even with the Protector, the bees cannot be kept quiet. The bee-keeper should never forget that it is almost certain destruction to a colony, to confine them when they wish to fly out. The precautions requisite to prevent robbing, will be subsequently described. In Northern latitudes, in the months of April and May, I prefer to keep the ventilators entirely closed; as the air of the Protector, at such times, like the air of a cellar in Spring, is uncomfortably cool, and has a tendency to interfere with breeding.
Note.—Since the remarks on the neglect of ventilation were put in type, my attention has been called by Hon. M. P. Wilder, of Dorchester, to an article on the same subject, in the Nov. number of the Horticulturist, for 1850, from the pen of the lamented Downing. It seems to have been written shortly after his return from Europe, and when he must have been most deeply impressed by the woful contrast, in point of physical health between the women of America and Europe. While he speaks in just and therefore glowing terms of the virtues of our countrywomen, he says: "But in the signs of physical health and all that constitutes the outward aspect of the men and women of the United States, our countrymen and especially countrywomen, compare most unfavorably with all but the absolutely starving classes on the other side of the Atlantic." Close stoves he has most appropriately styled "little demons," and impure air "The favorite poison of America." His article concludes as follows:
"Pale countrymen and countrywomen rouse yourselves! Consider that God has given us an atmosphere of pure health-giving air 45 miles high, and ventilate your houses."
CHAPTER X.
NATURAL SWARMING, AND HIVING OF SWARMS.
The swarming of bees has been justly regarded as one of the most beautiful sights in the whole compass of rural economy. Although, for reasons which will hereafter be assigned, I prefer to rely chiefly on artificial means for the multiplication of colonies, I should be very unwilling to pass a season without participating, to some extent, in the pleasing excitement of natural swarming.
"Up mounts the chief, and to the cheated eye
Ten thousand shuttles dart along the sky;
As swift through æther rise the rushing swarms,
Gay dancing to the beam their sun-bright forms;
And each thin form, still ling'ring on the sight,
Trails, as it shoots, a line of silver light.
High pois'd on buoyant wing, the thoughtful queen,
In gaze attentive, views the varied scene,
And soon her far-fetch'd ken discerns below
The light laburnum lift her polish'd brow,
Wave her green leafy ringlets o'er the glade,
And seem to beckon to her friendly shade.
Swift as the falcon's sweep, the monarch bends
Her flight abrupt; the following host descends.
Round the fine twig, like cluster'd grapes, they close
In thickening wreaths, and court a short repose."
Evans.
The swarming of bees, by making provision for the constant multiplication of colonies, was undoubtedly intended both to guard the insect against the possibility of extinction, and to make its labors in the highest degree useful to man. The laws of reproduction in those insects which do not live in regular colonies, are such as to secure an ample increase of numbers. The same is true in the case of hornets, wasps and humble-bees which live in colonies only during the warm weather. In the Fall of the year, all the males perish, while the impregnated females retreat into winter quarters and remain dormant, until the warm weather restores them to activity, and each one becomes the mother of a new family.
The honey bee differs from all these insects, in being compelled, by the laws of its physical organization, to live in communities, during the entire year. The balmy breezes of Spring will quickly thaw out the frozen veins of a torpid Wasp; but the bee is incapable of enduring even a moderate degree of cold: a temperature as low as 50° speedily chills it, and it would be quite as easy to recall to life the stiffened corpses in the charnel house of the Convent of the Great St. Bernard, as to restore to animation, a frozen bee. In cool weather, they must therefore associate in large numbers, in order to maintain the animal heat which is necessary to their preservation; and the formation of new colonies, after the manner of wasps and hornets, is clearly impossible. If the young queens left the parent stock in Summer, and were able, like the mother-wasps, to lay the foundations of a new colony, they could not maintain the warmth requisite for the development of their young, even if they were able, without any baskets on their thighs, to gather bee-bread for their support. If all these difficulties were surmounted, they would still be unable to amass any treasures for our use, or even to lay up the stores requisite for their own preservation.
How admirably are all these difficulties obviated by the present arrangement! Their domicile is well supplied with all the materials for the rearing of brood, and long before any of the insects which depend upon the heat of the sun, are able to commence breeding, the bees have added thousands in the full vigor of youth to their already numerous population. They are thus able to send off in season, colonies sufficiently powerful to take advantage of the honey-harvest, and provision the new hive against the approach of Winter. From these considerations, it is very evident that swarming, so far from being, as some Apiarians have considered it, a forced or unnatural event, is one, which in a state of nature, could not possibly be dispensed with.
Let us now inquire under what circumstances it ordinarily takes place.