Jan. 1, 1912 



25 



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In presenting this list of questions it should be underatood that it is impossible, in many 

 instances to do justice to the subjects in the short space here allowed, and for full particulars 

 we refer the reader to our encyclopedia on bees — the ABC and X Y Z of Bee Culture — a book 

 that is of inestimable value to the beginner and expert as well. 



Q. Where can bees be kept? 



A. There are few places in the country 

 where one or more colonies of bees can not 

 make honey. It is true that the natural sur- 

 roundings may be unfavorable to the bees, but 

 one who has had no experience is often aston- 

 ished as to distance bees will go in search of 

 nectar of the flowers. In almost every large 

 city there are some bee-keepers who have 

 bees right in the heart of the city, either in 

 back lots or on the roof of buildings. Ordi- 

 narily, bees will go from one to three miles in 

 search of nectar, but if there is none nearer 

 they will go much further. There are cases 

 on record of bees going seven miles from 

 h'lme. 



Q. Do bees ever make trouble in a city? 



A. It is very seldom that bees make trouble 

 of any sort in a town or city, and if the bee- 

 keeper is careful, there need be none at all. 

 We advise placing the hives in the back yard 

 as far away as possible from the general high- 

 way. 



It is true that in some few cases city councils 

 have attempted to pass ordinances declaring 

 bees to be a nuisance; but no such ordinance 

 is constitutional, as the supreme court of 

 Missouri in what is known as the Arkadelphia 

 case, has decided that bees are not a nuisance 

 per se. A similar case was tried in Rochester 

 with the result that a verdict was rendered 

 in favor of the bees. Full particulars con- 

 cerning these can be obtained by addressing 

 General ■ Manager N. E. France, of the Na- 

 ticnal Bee-keepers' Association, Platteville, 

 Wis. 



Q. What must be planted for bees to work 

 on? 



A. Strange as it may seem, it usually does 

 not pay to plant anything that is valuable 

 only for the honey unless waste places such 

 as roadsides or fence corners can be utilized 

 that would be of no value in any other way. 

 Very often the natural sources of nectar in 

 a locality can be augmented by the sowing 

 of sweet clover seed, and since this is be- 

 coming to be known as a valuable forage in- 

 stead of a pest or weed, as it was formerly 

 called, there is no question but that it pays 

 to grow sweet clover for hay and thus secure 

 some additional honey of fine quality, also. 

 However, it must be remembered that each 

 blossom yields only a small amount of nectar, 

 hence there must be hundreds of acres of 

 any such plant before any great difference 

 will be noticed in the surplus honey produced, 

 if there are very inany bees in the locality. 

 However, as stated first, almost every locality 

 has enough natural sources of nectar to sup- 

 port one or more colonies without artificial 

 pasturage. 



Since alfalfa clover and alsike clover are 

 being grown more and more even by the 

 farmers of the Bast, there is every reason to 

 suppose that there will be more honey pro- 

 duced from these sources in the future than 

 ever before. Buckwheat is a good yielder and 

 especiallv valuable for furnishing nectar in 

 the late summer to keep up brood rearing. 



Q. Do bees do well in a fruit country? 



A. The fruit trees alone, unless there are 

 acres and acres of them, do not usually fur- 

 nish enough honey to be noticeable in the 

 surplus supply secured, but of course there 

 are many exceptions to this in localities 

 where fruit is grown extensively. In this con- 

 nection, however, it might be well to state 

 that bees are a necessity in a fruit grow- 

 ing localitv, for without their aid the blos- 

 soms do riot set, that is the cross fertiliza- 

 tion is not accomplished. It is true that the 



wind and other insects distribute the pollen 

 to a certain extent and thus fertilize the blos- 

 soms, but at the same time, if there are no 

 bees at all a great many of the blossoms will 

 not bear fruit. A simple experiment may be 

 tried to prove this: Cover a branch of blos- 

 soms with coarse mosquito netting which will 

 just prevent the bees from getting through, 

 and it will be found that the blossoms on 

 this branch will not bear fruit, even though 

 the netting is removed as soon as the petals 

 fall. 



Q. Do bees work on ripe fruit and spoil it? 



A. If the skin of the fruit has been punc- 

 tured by some other insect or by the birds, 

 it is true that the bees will work on the pulp 

 and juice of the fruit thus exposed, but such 

 fruit would be unfit for market anyway, hence 

 the bees after all do no real harm. Bees by 

 themselves can not possibly puncture the skin 

 of fruit. Sound fruit, if kept carefully guarded 

 from birds and other insects, will be un- 

 touched by the bees. This has been demon- 

 strated over and over again. 



Q. How many kinds of bees are there in 

 a colony? 



A. During the early part of the summer a 

 normal colony consists of one queen, the only 

 perfect female in the hive; several hundred 

 drones (the male bees) — and any where fr.im 

 twenty to fifty thousand worker bees, which 

 are undeveloped females. The queen is not 

 the ruler of the hive as was formerly sup- 

 posed, but is simply the mother; she lays 

 the eggs. A good prolific queen in the height 

 of the season will lay from two to four thou- 

 sand eggs per day, or nearly twice her own 

 weight, in twenty-four hours. Continual feed- 

 ing by the worker bees enables her to do this. 

 The drone is the male bee and he has no 

 sting nor any suitable tongue with which to 

 work; hence the drone does no work, not so 

 much because he is lazy but because he has 

 no tools to work with nor weapons with which 

 to defend the hive. The workers are stunted 

 females, and as their name indicates, they do 

 all the field work such as bringing in pollen, 

 nectar, building the comb and feeding the 

 young. 



Q. How many colonies can one man take 

 care of? 



A. Thi.-s depends on the man and so this 

 question can not be definitely answered any 

 more than one could positively say how many 

 acres of land one man could farm. However, 

 one man with a little help in the busiest 

 part of the season can usually care for as 

 many as five hundred colonies if he is experi- 

 enced. Colonies of bees in order to produce 

 good results, must be properly taken care of. 

 A hundred weak colonies not in good condition 

 for producing honey by the time the main 

 honev-f!ow opens, will not produce as much 

 surplus as ten colonies that are very strong 

 and in the very best condition at the time 

 the main honey-flow begins. 



Q. What profit can reasonably be expected? 



A. As much as $10.00 per colony lias been 

 secured where there are only a few colonies to 

 the localitv. but this is above the average. 

 $2.00 to $3.00 a colony would be about the 

 figure where there are a large number of 

 colonies. 



Q. How much increase can be expected in 

 a year? 



A. If natural swarming is allowed a fifty 

 percent increase is perhaps an average. No 

 colony should be allowed to swarm more than 

 once,' for the parent colony is too greatly re- 



