30 BEES. 
PREPARATION FOR THE HARVEST. 
An essential in honey production is to have the hive overflowing 
with bees at the beginning of the honey flow, so that the field force 
will be large enough to gather more honey than the bees need for 
their own use. To accomplish this, the bee keeper must see to it that 
brood rearing is heavy some time before the harvest, and he must 
know accurately when the honey flows come, so that he may time 
his manipulations properly. Brood rearing during the honey flow 
usually produces bees which consume stores, while brood reared 
before the flow furnishes the surplus gatherers. The best methods 
of procedure may be illustrated by giving as an example the condi- 
tions in the white-clover region. 
In the spring the bees gather pollen and nectar from various 
early flowers, and often a considerable quantity from fruit bloom 
and dandelions. During this time brood rearing is stimulated by 
the new honey, but afterwards there is usually a period of drought 
when brood rearing is normally diminished or not still more in- 
creased as it should be. This condition continues until the white- 
clover flow comes on, usually with a rush, when brood rearing is 
again augmented. If such a condition exists, the bee keeper should 
keep brood rearing at a maximum by stimulative feeding during 
the drought. When white clover comes in bloom he may even find 
it desirable to prevent brood rearing to turn the attention of his 
bees to gathering. 
A worker bee emerges from its cell twenty-one days after the 
egg is laid, and it usually begins field work in from fourteen to seven- 
teen days later. It is evident, therefore, that an egg must be laid 
five weeks before the honey flow to produce a gatherer. Since the 
flow continues for some time and since bees often go to the field 
earlier than fourteen days, egg laying should be pushed up to within 
two or three weeks of the opening of the honey flow. In addition 
to stimulative feeding, the care of the colony described under the 
heading of “Spring management” (p. 24) will increase brood pro- 
duction. 
THE PRODUCTION OF HONEY. 
The obtaining of honey from bees is generally the primary object 
of their culture. Bees gather nectar to make into honey for their 
own use as food, but generally store more than they need, and this 
surplus the bee keeper takes away. By managing colonies early in 
the spring as previously described, the surplus may be considerably 
increased. The secret of maximum crops is to ‘‘ Keep all colonies 
strong.” 
397 
