THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW 



187 



Here was a proposition demanding 

 the most serious consideration. I was 

 asked to continue the work of a recog- 

 nized leader, a man whose strong per- 

 sonality permeated every page of the 

 Review. A gigantic task, indeed, and 

 only from the fact that I have been a 

 close student of Mr. Hutchinson for a 

 good many years, and am heartily in 

 sympathy with his teachings of "Keep 

 more bees," and "Bee Keeping as a 

 Business," I hardly believe I would 

 have had the courage to have under- 

 taken it. 



But the Review must not go down. 

 Although it meant that I must give up 

 my position as Field Manager of a 

 farmers' organization of nearly 70,000 

 members, a position that gave me 

 charge of the field workers and was 

 paying me a good salary, yet the hun- 

 dreds of subscribers of the Review 

 must not be disappointed, the gospel 

 of courage and eflficiency among bee 

 keepers must still go forward, and the 

 thought of the vast good that could be 

 done along this line had no little in- 

 fluence in my decision. 



Now that I have placed my hands 

 to the piow, I have no thought of 

 looking back. The policies of the Re- 

 view will be continued along the same 

 progressive lines. The style may be 

 different, the personality may be dif- 

 ferent, but remember, dear reader, that 

 the same object is sought — that of plac- 

 ing the business of bee-keeping on a 

 higher plane; of taking it from among 

 the avocations and placing it among 

 the vocations. Bee keeping doesn't 

 need a prop, except that of courage, 

 care, and good common sense. 



Then here's my hand, dear reader. 

 Tm with you, and I hope you're with 

 me. Together let us work for a greater 

 Review, a greater bee keeping, and 

 more encouraging words to our broth- 

 ers who are willing "to try." 



The Importance of Preparedness. 



There is seldom a year in which, 

 sometime during the season, there is 

 not at least a short or a light honey 

 flow. There is an occasional year when 

 no possible management would result 

 even in a small surplus, but such years 

 are very few. They are far outnum- 

 bered by those years that might have 

 furnished surplus, but fail in this par- 

 ticular from lack of preparedness ; 

 from lack of proper management. 

 Sometime during the summer, a honey 

 flow is likely to stalk across the plains. 

 H everything is in readiness we can 

 capture it. If we are not ready and 

 watching, it is gone before we can 

 gather together, arm and equip our 

 forces. If affairs take an unexpected 

 turn, many bee keepers lose their 

 heads or hearts, or good business sense, 

 and don't back up their bees and keep 

 them in readiness for action. 



When forest fires swept away the 

 raspberry pastures of Northern Michi- 

 gan, bee keepers might possibly be ex- 

 cused for losing their "nerve;" and I 

 can tell you that it did take "nerve," 

 the next spring and summer, to keep 

 rolling in the barrels of sugar on the 

 prospects that willow herb might 

 furnish a crop ; but, oh ! the exultation 

 of lying in the shade in August and 

 September, and seeing the air fairly 

 black with bees that were dropping, 

 dropping, dropping at the entrances of 

 hives stacked up three or four stories 

 high, taking in a crop that eventually 

 amounted to 20,000 pounds. Had we 

 waited until the willow herb began to 

 yield, the flow would have been over 

 and gone before we were ready for it. 



This watching for and being in readi- 

 ness for a passing honey crop that may 

 come and go inside of a week, reminds 

 me of a hunter watching on the "run- 

 way" of a deer. As some of my read- 

 ers know, deer have a certain route 

 or "runway" over which they travel. 

 If frightened or pursued they always 



