160 ANNUAL REPORT 



Mr. Urie then came forward and addressed the Association. 

 APIAKY CULTUEE. 



By Wm. Urie, Minneapolis. 



Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen: 



I feel inadequate to undertake the task of doing justice to so 

 great a subject as that of apiary culture. It is a subject that 

 to me seems of great importance. It is a subject that I have 

 studied for over forty years. I see in this hall to-day another 

 gentleman that has also made it a study for some forty years, 

 and in making a few remarks here I feel that my time is limited. 

 I could occupy one hour easily and not exhaust the subject. But 

 I will endeavor to be brief and take as little of your valuable 

 time as possible. 



In the management of bees the first thing to be considered is 

 a location. A great many men lay great stress, and perhaps too 

 much, on location. What I mean by location is this: At the 

 time you are first engaging in the business you should ascertain 

 the varieties of flowers that secrete honey, and the time of the 

 year when those flowers come into bloom. In order to get a 

 crop of honey from those flowers you must have the bees at the 

 proper time to gather the honey. The flowers only secrete honey 

 while the bees gather it. 



In order to get the right condition they have to be properly 

 managed during the winter and spring. I claim there is as much 

 in bringing them through the winter and spring — or more, in 

 fact — than in all other management put together. It is of the 

 greatest importance to have a large body of bees when the flow 

 of honey comes on. 



In this country, at least in some portions, and where I am lo- 

 cated, the largest flow of honey usually comes from the white 

 clover. The flowers commence blooming from the first to the 

 middle of June. Some years it commences at the first and in 

 others not until the middle. And yet you scarcely find any 

 honey in the clover until in bloom about eight or ten days. It 

 lasts generally until the tenth or fifteenth of July, making a com- 

 paratively short space of time in which the bees must collect 

 their store of honey. But if your colony is in the right condi- 

 tion and has a large body of bees, there will be no trouble to get 

 the honey, if they are rightly managed. 



