Subject: Information needed (see letter, please)

From: "Roman M. Shparber" <[email-masked]>
Date: 5 Sep 1996 19:11:30 +0300

Please, help get any information (or www-site) about bee-hives of
Farrar construction and DeLon(g) construction.
Or maybe you know some interesting web-sites (with hive plans or
descriptions), please share the address.
Thank you a lot in advance.

Mihail Leshkov.

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From: [email-masked] (Joel Govostes)
Date: Tue, 10 Sep 1996 20:24:27 -0500

> Thank you a lot in advance.

Farrar used 12 or 13 - frame hive bodies, 6 5/8" deep.  These held the
Modified Dadant 6 1/4" frames.  The hive bodies were essentially square as
seen from the top.  Dr. Farrar recommended using 4-5 of these as the
standard hive-unit, more of the same were added above for honey surplus
storage.  I think the idea behind using these shallow hive bodies was so
that in the scheme of management entire boxes could be shifted instead of
moving individual frames, to achieve the same results.

These hives were shown and described in 1970's editions of BEEKEEPING IN
THE UNITED STATES, a U.S. Dept. of Agriculture publication, from the U.S.
Gov't Printing Office.  This may be still available.  Otherwise, Dr.
Farrar wrote a series of articles for the American Bee Journal back in the
40's or 50's entitled "Productive Management of Honey Bee Colonies."  This
I believe was reprinted within the last 10 years in ABJ.  Farrar was a
proponent of 2-queen management systems, and preferred the shallow
chambers for this as well.  You could try contacting Univ. of Minnesota
entomologists/apiculture dept.  They may still be using these hives.