136 EIGHTEENTH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE 



body because we did not have room, and left them there until the 7th 

 or 8th of May. 



Now, I unfortunately was out of the city when the bees were 

 unpakced. Perhaps some of you won't think that is any misfortune, 

 because it is some little job, but I missed the opportunity to see what was 

 going on. But Mr. Sturtevant of the office made a very careful exam- 

 ination of every colony of bees at the time of unpacking on the 7th or 

 8th of May. They started in on the 7th, and it got cloudy and chilly 

 in the afternoon, so the matter was deferred until the next morning, 

 when it came out nice and l)right and warm. An examination showed 

 that the average amount of brood for the entire apiary was enough 

 brood to fill twelve Langstroth frames. Now that means enough 

 brood to fill twelve frames. But there were three or four colonies in 

 the apiary that had enough brood to fill fifteen Langfetroth frames. 



Now, our honey flow began the 19th of May, and we had reached 

 the peak. In all the histor}'^ of American Bee-keeping there has never 

 been a record of an apiary, so far as I have been able to find, that had a 

 larger amount of brood than we had there. The disappointing thing 

 is that we showed from our own records that it is possible to get fifteen 

 frames full of brood, and that our average was only twelve. So that 

 we are looking for a method of wintering which will give us that fifteen, 

 because it can be done. And so we don't claim that we have reached 

 perfection by a long way, because we are still shy three frames of 

 brood, and we are looking for a man who will come along with a method 

 which will give us all that can be obtained, and until we get it all we 

 are not going to get all the honey we are entiled to. 



Now, let me go ahead a little with -our experience. The honey 

 flow in the vicinity of Washington has always been supposed to be 

 from clover. Now, we are on the Serpentine barrens. Everybody who 

 has lived in the east knows there is some horrible soil there, which 

 does not favor plant growth, and it is as sour as vinegar. Clover 

 grows a little, but does not do well, and we have always looked on the 

 vicinity of Washington as virtually, from the honey standpoint, a 

 desert, and I have repeatedly said personally and before groups of 

 bee-keepers that we have the poorest honey location in the United 

 States in the vicinity of Washington, I have said it and believed it, 

 becuase we were depending on clover to give us our surplus, and then 

 after clover, which generally ends between the ^th and 10th of July, 

 there is not anything until the fall flow comes, and I have only seen 

 one good fall flow in Washington in thirteen years. 



But when we began to pack these bees and get them strong early, 

 we discovered a honey flow from two sources, both of them very heavy. 

 Poplar and Locust will give an average fl-ow in the vicinity of Wash- 

 ington of 100 pounds to the colony. I had never seen anybody get 

 it, but since we began getting our bees strong early in the year we are 

 getting that honey flow. Now, it is not a very high grade of honey, 

 because Poplar honey, as some of j^ou know, is an inferior honey, rather 

 strong in flavor and dark aml^er in color, but it is honey, and better 

 than none at all. So that now we can count on getting our main crop 

 well under way before the 15th of May. It usually starts in about the 

 7th, 8th or 9th of May. 



