a dwelling for bees. In early times, man made artificial bee dwellings in imitation of the insects’ natural nests in tree hollows. The earliest beehives included log-type hives consisting of part of a tree trunk with a natural or artificial hollow, narrow tubs turned upside down to simulate a tree hollow, and round woven hives of straw and twigs smeared with clay and furnished with an entrance. The first box beehive with removable frames was invented by the Russian apiculturist A. I. Prokopovich in 1814. After a series of improvements, the box beehive gained popularity throughout the world.
A modern beehive consists of the hive body, frames, a bottom board, a cover, and additional bodies (brood chambers or honey storage supers with frames). The upper bars of the frames are attached sheets of artificial beeswax, on which the bees build their honeycombs, bring up the young, and store honey. The main bee entrance is made in the front wall, near the bottom. All beehives are either vertical, which are enlarged by placing brood chambers or supers on top of the hive body, or horizontal, in which the nest is enlarged by adding frames within the main body.
Soviet industry manufactures hives of three types: double-bodied, multibodied, and horizontal. Hives are made of dry coniferous and soft deciduous wood, mainly pine, spruce, fir, cedar, linden, and willow. The exterior of the hive is painted with water-resistant paints in colors readily distinguished by bees—white, light blue, or yellow.
G. F. BUKHAREV