Bees have long been highly valued for their honey and the care of bees was a traditional rural pursuit. In 1820 this letter to the Stamford Mercury gives a detailed description of the bee box made by the writer’s neighbour.
Nowadays so many different types of bee hives or bee boxes are available, some of which sound like the one described below.
BEES.
Mr. Editor,- I request that you will give a place in your next number to the following attempt at describing the method by which a neighbour of mine manages his bees, and by which he always has his honey in the purest state, without ever destroying a single bee. In place of the common hive, my neighbour uses square boxes, made of thin board, about fourteen inches each way at top, and eight inches deep ; each box has a square hole cut out in the centre of the bottom and top, of about three inches across, exactly opposite to each other, and slips of thin board fitted to them, to slide out and in, as occasion may require. These boxes are placed close on the top of each other, to the number of three or four, and the slides drawn back the breadth of the hole, so that they will have a communication with each other. The bees are put into the uppermost box, and when it is completely filled with comb, in place of swarming, (as they must do in the common hive, for want of room) they work down into the second box, and so on to the bottom. By putting a pane of glass in the side of each box, it can be always be seen what progress they make downwards. By the time they are down into the third box, the slide is then to be put in, and cut off the communication between the first and second ; the upper box can be lifted off full of pure honey, without a single bee in it. – By the time they have reached the lowermost box, they are to be lifted off gently, and an empty one put in below it, and so on. One can have any number of sets of these boxes that their stock requires, and they are all to be placed in a wooden frame of convenient width, and in length to answer the quantity one intends to keep ; it is to be boarded entirely round ; the north side, however, to open on hinges, for the more conveniently taking out and putting in the boxes.
Stamford Mercury, 14th January, 1820.