1886 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



209 



then, in connection with the work, read all the I 

 standard works on bees, including the bee-papers. 

 I think the last plan the better of the two. 



1 believe that bee-keeping- can be made a success 

 if the party eng-aged in it Ikis a liking lor the busi- 

 ness, and starts in a good location. But the bee- 

 business is not all honey. I have found, in my ex- 

 perience, a great many pull-backs and losses, and 

 many things that did not come up to my expecta- 

 tions but I have blundered along until 1 have learned 

 something about the bees and about my locality, etc. 

 In my remarks I wish to speak of my management, . 

 and my mistakes. 



Bee-keepers as a rule, don't like to tell their blun- 

 ders. They "blow" about their great success, big 

 crops of honey, and figure up every thing at the 

 highest price, and make abig show in figures. Per- \ 

 haps the next year their success is in the little end 

 of the horn— had bad luck; bees winter-killed, 

 spring-dwindled, poor honey season, etc. Not a 

 word said now. So the A B C class get only the 

 bright side, and are led to think that bee-keeping is 

 a big thing, and they go in heavily, only to end in 

 failure and disappointment. 



HOW DID I EVER CO.ME TO BE A BEE-KEEPER? 



Why, I just blundered into the business. I al- 

 ways had a liking for bees and honey. I tried hard to 

 be a farmer. I went to Iowa 30 years ago, bought 200 

 acres of land on the prairie; stayed six years; then 

 the war bi-oke out, and at first there was no price 

 for any thing I could raise on the farm. We had 

 some relatives here in Platteville, so we left the 

 farm and came here to visit; stayed a year, and 

 then went back to the farm again. 



When we got here I had to do something for a liv- 

 ing, as my labor was about all we had to depend 

 on to support myself, wife, and one little boj\ then 

 five years old. About that time I saw an advertise- 

 ment, "Agents wanted, to sellMetcalf's Bee-hives." 

 I took the agencj', got a sample hive, and made the 

 hives myself. At that time almost every farmer 

 kept a few swarms of bees. The hives sold for $2.50 

 each ; the patent to use them, $5.00 for a farm-right. 

 I had all I got for hives, and half for the patent. 1 

 soon made enough to buy the county-right, and 

 then I bought two more counties. 1 took some bees 

 in trade, and that is the way I got started. 



The hive was a frame hive, 12 x 13 inches, and 1" 

 inches high; used 8 frames standing on the bottom. 

 It had a movable front. I made them single for one 

 colony; double for two, and quadruple for four col- 

 onies, all single-walled hives, no chaff hives then, 

 nor extractors. 1 worked my bees for comb honey 

 in large boxes, 30 lbs. or more. I soon divided my 

 boxes down to 3 lbs. Honey sold then from 25 to 30 

 cts. at home. I kept increasing slowly until the 

 fall of 1871, when I had 123 colonies of bees. I al- 

 ready had them in three apiaries. All old veterans 

 will remember that winter of 1871 and '72. In the 

 spring I had 20 colonies left alive. 



The next fall I started in the winter with .50, and 

 that winter was a hard one. The spring of 1873 I 

 had 14 colonies alive. Then I made up my mind 

 that my hive was too small, so I commenced to 

 make larger hives. I made them 13'/2 x 13' 2, and 22 

 inches high, inside measure. I used 9 frames, and 

 made them quadruple, or, as they are called nowa- 

 days, tenement hives, holding four colonies, but at 

 that time I made them single-walled. I changed 

 my 14 colonies all into the large hives. My stock of 

 old hives was used up for kindling-wood. There 



was no sale for hives, as all the bees in the country 

 about here were dead. 



Now right here let me mention one of my blun- 

 ders. I got me an account-book, and kept a record 

 of just what was done with every individual colony, 

 but I failed to give my number of colonies in the 

 spring and fall, and amount of hone3' taken each 

 year — in fact, no general management, which would 

 have been of more value for reference. But I 

 make out this much: That in the fall of 1880 we 

 had 220 colonies; in the spring of 1881, we had lost 

 all but 72. We had one yard of over 60 colonies, 

 that went down to 3; cause of the loss, too windy a 

 location, very hard winter, and we extracted too 

 close late in the season. 



The year of 1881 was a poor season for honey, but 

 we increased our 75 colonies to 157 in the fall, and 

 took 2000 lbs. of honey, all extracted, and had our 

 bees fixed up in splendid order for winter. 



The winter of 1881 and '82 proved to be an open, 

 warm winter. Of the 1.57 in the fall, we had 155 col- 

 onies in the spring, which we increased to 295 in 

 the fall, and took 13,000 lbs. of honey. 



The spring of 1883 we had 211 colonies in five 

 yards. The loss was almost all from desertion in the 

 spring. From the 211 colonies in the spring of 1883 

 we extracted 22,037 lbs. of honey— an average of 

 104^2 lbs. per colony, spring count. I failed to re- 

 cord the number of colonies in the fall of 1883. 



The spring of 1884 we had 291 colonies. From 287 

 colonies we extracted 31,283 lbs. of honey; comb 

 honey, 206 lbs. from 4 colonies— an average of 109 lbs. 

 for the 287 extracted, and 51!2 lbs. average of comb 

 honey from the four ran for comb honey. We 

 went into winter quarters with 455 colonies. 



Last winter was a hard one, and the spring of 1885 

 found us with 321 colonics— a loss of 134. From 

 these 321 we extracted 33,086 lbs. of honey, and in- 

 creased the bees to 510 colonies. Our average per 

 colony this year was 1(3 lbs.; but owing to so much 

 wet weatber at the close of the basswood season, 

 and no fall honey, we had to feed back to the bees 

 6114 lbs. of honey, to give them enough to winter 

 on. That left us 26,972 lbs. after feeding back. Our 

 average would be 84 lbs. per colony, spring count. 



I find it hard to tell just when to quit taking hon- 

 ey, and get all the honey we can, and leave them 

 enough for their winter stores. In this locality the 

 basswood is the last thing that gives us any surplus. 

 Wetry to time it so that the bees will have a good sup- 

 ply for winter out of the basswood. This year, when 

 the basswood was half through, we commenced as 

 usual to leave in full combs of honey in the back- 

 side of the hives, leaving in more and more every 

 day. The last day we extracted we left in one-half 

 of the honey. The ne.xt day was a rainy day, and 

 the next five days were wet, drizzly weather, and 

 the basswood season was over. The bees were 

 short of honey for winter. We waited three weeks 

 and then went to feeding. We fed one yard at a 

 time until all were fed. We fed the last honey we 

 extracted, and fed all but one yard; that one had 

 enough, and it was the next yard in rotation to ex- 

 tract, but we did not get to it, on account of the 

 rain. 



We use the pepper-box feeder, (luart size. It 

 holds three lbs. We put two on a hive at a time, and 

 fill them up again in two days. We fed one yard of 

 100 colonies six feedersful each— 18 lbs. each, or 1800 

 lbs. for the 100 colonies. The other yards were fed, 

 some 18 lbs., some 12 lbs., and some 6 lbs., according 



