Beekeepers' knowledge before the movable frame hive was invented

[Anthony Appleyard]

Before the movable frame beehive was invented, the usual hive was the skep. The Roman writer and poet Virgil, writing in his Georgics about beekeeping, knew about queen bees (but he called them kings), and he recommended removing the queens' wings, likeliest to prevent swarming; but among the generality of country skep beekeepers, how much was known about what happened inside beehives?

 

[Foxylad]

Here is the first in a series of YT videos showing how beekeepers worked with skeps.

 

[Finman]

Before the movable frame beehive was invented, the usual hive was the skep. The Roman writer and poet Virgil, writing in his Georgics about beekeeping, knew about queen bees (but he called them kings), and he recommended removing the queens' wings, likeliest to prevent swarming; but among the generality of country skep beekeepers, how much was known about what happened inside beehives?

How did they got the queen, because there were no movable frames?

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

The Roman writer and poet Virgil, writing in his Georgics about beekeeping, knew about queen bees (but he called them kings), and he recommended removing the queens' wings, likeliest to prevent swarming

He also believed that beating a cow to a pulp with a club would propagate colonies of bees

 

[Erichalfbee]

He also believed that beating a cow to a pulp with a club would propagate colonies of bees

Not a horse, then?

 

[Murox]

Aristotle (322BC) was probably the first person to study the life of bees and his research is still considered as a cornerstone of todays development of apiculture.
By the Middle Ages bee-keepers were using skep hives - problem with skeps was that if you want the honey, you need to get rid of the bees - and keepers would often poison them with sulphurous smoke, shake them off, scoop out the honey, and then worry about building another bee colony later.
Up until circa 1814, bee colonies, whether wild or under human stewardship, built themselves a set of combs entirely according to their own design in whatever cavity they could find or was provided by the beekeeper. In 1814 the Ukrainian Petro Prokopovych gave his invention of the first moveable frame beehive to the world.

 

[Finman]

I read from google a question: is it possible to produce milk without killing the cow?

 

[Anthony Appleyard]

.... In 1814 the Ukrainian Petro Prokopovych gave his invention of the first moveable frame beehive to the world.

Petro Prokopovych - Wikipedia

 

[REDWOOD]

Talking to the bees was an excepted practice back then
The only thing I say to my bees is $¥%#>€$¥+*?!’

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Not a horse, then?

I know a few who like to flog them

 

[Erichalfbee]

I know a few who like to flog them

Exactly

 

[oxnatbees]

Before the movable frame beehive was invented, the usual hive was the skep. The Roman writer and poet Virgil, writing in his Georgics about beekeeping, knew about queen bees (but he called them kings), and he recommended removing the queens' wings, likeliest to prevent swarming; but among the generality of country skep beekeepers, how much was known about what happened inside beehives?

Aristotle allegedly had a hive with windows, but it's thought they couldn't have been very transparent, more translucent - probably using isenglas (dried swim bladders). Anyway other indications are that he simply talked to beekeepers rather than observed directly himself.

Glass-windowed observation hives were made from around 1680 onwards.

Schwammerdam (Dutch microscopist) dissected bees in, I think, the late 1600s (Google his for more accurate info) and determined the key individual was a queen, not king and the workers were neuter females. Previously many academics thought all those eggs must have been laid by the workers. One reason the queen-not-king paradigm was accepted in the English speaking world was, due to queen Elizabeth "execute that man" I, it wasn't considered treasonous to suggest the boss was a woman.

Langstroth didn't just magic frames into existence. He had lots of experience examining comb in top bar hives. Just, very carefully.

 

[Anthony Appleyard]

Talking to the bees was an excepted practice back then
The only thing I say to my bees is $¥%#>€$¥+*?!’

Presumably the money symbols (dollar, yen, euro) in that lot, represent the expense of beekeeping.