Hive

Traditional hives

One can say that the traditional hives do nothing but bring one envelope to the colony of the bees. Because there is no structure inside a traditional hive, the bees fill their hive in straw of honey and the Cire (which is called here the cell with honey ).

The cell with honey strongly binds, and one cannot move it without destroying it. Therefore, the harvest of honey destroyed the hive in general, though it had there sometimes modifications to prevent the destruction of the hive.

One in general extracted honey from the traditional hives by pressing, which crushed the cell (which is made of wax, as one has just said) to express honey. Because of this way of harvesting, the hives in straw provided more wax but less honey than a modern hive does not provide.

In general, one does not use any more hives in straw (and moreover, they are illegal in much country) because one can inspect neither the bees nor the cells for the diseases and of the parasites without destroying the cells and often the colony.

There are three kinds of traditional hives: hives in tile, hives in straw and gum hives.

There exist also hives immured in particular in the English Channel.

The modern Apiculture introduced the divisible framework mobiles hives in order to facilitate the control of the hives.

Hives in Africa

The modern hive

It is the unit of life built by the bee-keeper to receive a colony of bees. A whole of hives forms an apiary.

To the XIX {{E}} and 20th centuries, the search for a rational bee-keeping and the scientific approach of the bee-keeping led to the development of the modern hives, which are characterized by the adoption of mobile rays, of precise and standardized size.

The mobile rays make it possible to intervene in the hive without destroying it. Built by the bees, one by one, they can be easily extracted and positioned back. They either are built within frameworks prepared by the bee-keeper, or suspended with bars or bars on which the bee-keeper placed starters of rays.

There exist two big families of ruches :

those which increase by vertical stacking of standard elements, known as hives divisibles
those which increase by addition of frameworks laterally to those already in place.

Dimensions of the vertical hives vary according to the number of piled up elements, the horizontal ones always have the same appearance. They have enough place to inside accommodate additional rays at the time of the enlarging of the colony.

The hives often bear the name of their inventors. The vertical hives with framework most current in France are the hives Dadant, Langstrot and Voirnot. The hives Warre and Climatstable are divisible and for bars, their original control intends them for the ecological bee-keeping.

Among the horizontal framework hives, it is necessary to quote the hive developped at the point by De Layens and improved by Jean Hurpin. Currently, the bar Signal-Bar hive, adapted to the hot areas and of low costs, arouses an lively interest, as much in the countries in the process of development that in the most developed.

The standard divisible hive is composed of a stacking of of the same cases height, (Lanstrot or Dadant rise), above and below open.

This stacking rests on a floor overflowing on a side forming a balcony, called board of vol. It is from there that the bees leave the hive and enter there. The first case bears the name of body of hive. It is the private field of the bees. All that is stored in the body belongs to the bees, it contains enough provisions so that a colony of bees spends the winter. The following cases is rises, it is the field of the bee-keeper, from where it draws honey. The whole is covered with a lid known as cover-tallies and, to finish, with a roof. The body and the rises contain vertically suspended executives, in which the bees will build their rays. These frameworks are mobile, the bee-keeper will be able to one by one leave them the hive. He will be able to replace them, to change them hive, to check the state of the colony… The various models of hives are characterized by their dimensions and the number of frameworks.

External bonds

hive inside the house
See a detailed diagram of the hive
detailed Diagram of the hive Warré (popular hive of the Abbot Warré)

Internal bonds

to see Bee-keeping, very complete article.

Beats-smg: Aulis

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