ILLINOIS STATE BEE-KEEPEES' ASSOCIATION. 87 



ment of the bees themselves. We probably realize that a great many 

 of the apiarists, probably seventy-five or eighty. per cent of all the 

 bee-keepers in this country do not own a bee book. You would be 

 surprised if you had a large number of replies from the bee-keepers 

 and you had asked them the question what bee books they owned, how 

 few of them have any bee books at all. Now, how many of us would 

 think of entering into any business with which we were not acquainted 

 unless we knew considerable about that business, or unless we were 

 willing to read up all we could find out about it and know that unless 

 we did that we could never make a success. One of the biggest prob- 

 lems of the inspectors regarding bee-keepers is lack of information, 

 oftentimes because they do not have any bee books or bee-keeping 

 literature to which to refer. 



Another problem, besides the lack of bee-keeping literature, 

 which we find with so many of the bee-men is that they do not realize 

 the possibilities that there are in honey production and for that reason 

 they do not make preparations for the coining season. It is pretty 

 hard to estimate the per cent of men who wait until the colonies are 

 about ready to swarm, or one or two swarms go off, before they even 

 think of ordering their supplies, or even if they have their supplies on 

 hand, before they think of making them up and placing on the colonies. 

 We realize, of course, that that lack of preparation is due primarily to 

 lack of knowledge and also lack of interest, so that the apiary inspectors 

 to-day ought to meet those problems. We know, after we have in- 

 spected for a few years, that those problems exist to a much greater 

 degree than the average bee-keeper would ever imagine and that a 

 great many of the bee-keepers who keep bees know very, very little 

 about the business. If we keep those problems in mind, then we can 

 work with the end in view of creating the interest, developing the 

 interest of the bee-keeper and then once we have the interest developed, 

 also develop his education and his knowledge of bee behaviour and 

 bee-keeping management and from that time, any bee-keeper whom 

 we can develop to that state will go along with very httle help. 



I might say that the apiary inspection work under the old laws 

 was very monotonous and a very unpleasant job for the apiary in- 

 spector, but under the newer laws where education is made one of 

 the main features of the foul brood laws themselves, then we find that 

 apiary inspection work is pleasant, because we meet with a great many 

 men who are anxious to learn and when we meet with men of that kind 

 and we see them having a successful season and getting a fairly good 

 crop of honey, then we realize that some of our work and some of our 

 efforts have been well spent and that we have accomplished some of 

 the things we set out to do. 



One thing that I think we sould remember is this, we all realize 

 that there is a great possibility in bee-keeping as a business. Really 

 it is only just developing. A few years ago there were very few spe- 

 cialists in the country, whereas to-day there are a great many more. 

 But we must remember this, that we cannot expect, we would not 

 expect to go into any business at all without a fair amount of know- 

 ledge to run that business and expect to be successful, the same thing 

 applies to honey production. We know there is a possibility in bee- 



