CHAPTER VI.
THICKNESS OR SOLIDITY OF HIVES.
Whatever may be the form or material of which hives are made, I strongly recommend not to be sparing of it, but to make them substantial. I would recommend that the boards of the wooden ones be an inch and a half thick; and that the straw-ropes of which the others are composed, be well twisted, and more than an inch in diameter. Such hives will be heavier and more unwieldy than thin hives, but they afford a better protection from the sun in summer, and the frost in winter. The heat of the sun is apt to melt the combs in summer: in winter the cold sometimes candies, and renders them useless; and, in the spring, the thin hives neither retain the heat necessary for hatching the eggs, nor for preserving the honey in a liquid state. One may easily be convinced of this, by laying some folds of linen on the top of the hive, and then passing the hand between them, and there will be a degree of warmth felt, which never happens where the hives are thick enough. They may be a little more costly, but the expence is more than compensated by the prosperity of the bees.