JOURNAL 



OF 



ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY 



OFFICIAL ORGAN AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGISTS 



Vol. 15 APRIL, 1922 No. 2 



American Association of Economic Entomologists— Pro- 

 ceedings of the Thirty-Fourth Annual Meeting. 



{Continued) 



Section on Apiculture 



Thursday, December 2g, igzi, 8 p. m. 

 No discussion was submitted and the papers are published as listed. Ed. 



ESSENTIALS OF APIARY PRACTICE AND MANAGEMENT 



By MoRLEY Pettit, First Ontario Provincial Apiarist, now Commercial Beekeeper, 



Georgetown, Ont. 



Beekeeping has to do with enduring colonies of short-lived insects. 

 The colony, not the individual is the unit. Bees cannot be harnessed 

 or trained like animals. Only inherited characteristics may be altered 

 slightly by breeding. Their labor which is useful to man is performed 

 primarily for the benefit of the colony; man appropriates the surplus. 

 Apiary practice consists in so controlling the economy of the hive as 

 to increase this surplus to a maximum. Altho bees are not harnessed 

 or trained, the key word to successful practice is "Control." It is 

 well established in beekeeping literature that strong colonies during 

 the whole period of the honey flow are of the utmost importance. In 

 recent years the willingness to work of these strong colonies has been 

 equally stressed. Successful apiary practice secures the maximum sur- 

 plus production of honey by controlling the condition of every colony, 

 so that it has a maximum surplus population of vigorous willing workers 

 during the whole period of the honey flow. 



The year in the apiary is divided into Active and Inactive seasons. 

 The former may be subdivided into preparation time and surplus- 



121 



