AU Gr:"r 1. 1913 



527 



Fifty colonies kept in tlie center of a village. 



BEEKEEPING AS A RECREATION AND SIDE 

 LINE 



BY MRS. G. W. BAEGE 



We do not keep bees entirely for recrea- 

 tion; but we do keep them as a side line, 

 because Mr. Barge is fond of caring' for 

 them, and has had bees more or less for 

 about twenty years. His real work is in 

 the cold-storage business; but as that docs 

 not take all his time except during two 

 months in the s^Dring, when storing eggs, 

 he spends his leisure time in caring for 

 bees. 



We have at present about 250 colonies, 

 but have always had the greater part of 

 them out on shares until this summer. The 

 man who has had them because of old age 

 and poor health became unable to care for 

 them any longer, so Mr. Barge hired a man 

 to help, and will take care of all of them 

 himself. He usually keeps about fifty or 

 sixty colonies here at home; and as the 

 queens are all clipped we are not troubled 

 by swarms clustering in the trees as we 

 were before this was done. When a swarm 

 issues, Mr. Barge catches the queen and 

 moves the old hive away, putting- a new one 

 in the same place. The be'^s soon go into 

 it ; and if there is no one here to attend to 

 them, of course they go back to the old hive. 



Our house is situated nearly in the cen- 

 ter of the village; but as tlie grounds are 



lai'ge, being thiee lots, 66I/2 by 120 feet, 

 the bees do not bother any one much. You 

 can s°e from one of these pictures that they 

 are gentle, as the little boy sitting on one 

 of the hives was a little fellow from Mil- 

 waukee who had never seen a bee until he 

 came to visit us; but as he is very fond of 

 honey he was quite intei'ested in them. He 

 was only three years old at that time, but 

 walked around among the hives \vithout 

 even a hat on, and did not seem to fear 

 them at all. He is now six years old, just 

 as fond of honey ; and last summer when 

 l:e was visiting us again his aunt addressed 

 Mr. Barge as Mr. B., and he said, " Mr. B., 

 from the bee country;" and since then he 

 often calls him that. 



At present all the yards, of which there 

 are two besides this, one a mile north of 

 town on our farm and the other a mile 

 south, are I'un entirely for extracted honey, 

 as it does not take so much time to do this; 

 and the last few years the honey has not 

 come in fast enough to make a success of 

 comb honey, as there were too many unfin- 

 ished sections. 



We find that people, especially farmers, 

 are using- honey more and more, and we do 

 not have any trouble in disposing of the 

 greater part of the crop right at home. 

 Several customers among- nearby farmers 

 take three sixty-pound cans each year for 

 their family use. They do not consider it a 



