1S86 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



(81 



is true, that bce-kccpiiig' may also be considcrccl as 

 a source cf ploi'.sant exercise and relaxation from 

 mental pursuits; but this view is far overshadowed 

 in importance by the other. 



As at present conducted, tlicrc is a kind of hap- 

 hazard character about tlie busincssot' bee keeping. 

 A man keeps a number of bees for a time, and 

 then gives up the business cnliroly. Tlie same may 

 be said of farming; but in the latter case it is only a 

 change of farmers. In some shape or other the 

 land is all occupied for agricultural purposes. 



The public good will be best subserved by having 

 the field regularly occupied; and to this end it 

 seems necessary that the one who engages in the 

 business, be it man, woman, invalid, or servant-girl, 

 shall devote a principal ]iart of, if not his entire 

 time and energies, to beekeeping as a business. It 

 is a business ih it i-eq;iii-es not only certain natural 

 qualifieations, but also thought, st\idy, and experi- 

 ence. One can lianllj' afford to give these without 

 the expectation of engaging in the bnsiness to a 

 sullicient extent to reap a pecuniary reward. Right 

 hei-o I shall be met by some who will say that I 

 must not fail to recognize the right of individuals 

 to engage in bee-keeping, not for the money there 

 is in it, but for i)astJine and healthful recreation. 

 I do recognize this fully, just as I recognize the 

 right of every merchant, mechanic, or professional 

 man, to have hi- patch of ground to cultivate pota- 

 toes, coi-n, or strawberries; but the fact remains, 

 that, to make agriculture a sourc:> of wealth to the 

 nation, thcie must be farmers who devote their en- 

 tire time to the business. Others, again, will think 

 that it is to the interest of certain clas.^cs, as pub- 

 lishers and supply-dealers, that bee-keeping should 

 be largely if not entirely in the hands of amateurs. 

 Let us look at this In a given area of, say, 1000 

 square miles, there might be established profitably 

 perhaps IJO apiaries of 100 colonies each if conducted 

 by 30 specialists. If no specialists were on the 

 ground Iher,' might be an^ where from ;?0 to 200 or 

 more places where from one to a dozen colonies are 

 kept. In the latter case, does any one suppose 

 there would be as many books and periodicals de- 

 voted to bee culture taken as among the oO special- 

 ists? And as to supplies, there would be something 

 like a steady trade among the 30 specialists, and 

 among the others the trade would be worth very 

 little. As to the bee-keepers themselves, the sooner 

 the business gets down to an established basig, pur- 

 sued as a principal if not an entire means of ob- 

 taining a livelihood, the better. Those of us who 

 now get our bread and butter by bee-keeping know 

 only too well how the market is annually demoral- 

 ized by the owner of a few colonics who considers 

 the amount of surplus obtained as so much luck, 

 puts it on the market in any kind of shape, and at 

 any price, doing just so much towai-d preventing 

 honey from becoming a staple conimG<lity. 



I am a little afraid that some of those whoso at- 

 tention I am anxious to secure stojiped reading 

 before reaching this point, saying, " I don't see that 

 there is any thing of interest to me in this. What 

 is there practical about iti-" It is of practical im- 

 portance, if my position is correct, to be able to in- 

 vest time and money in this business, and have 

 some feeling of security that there is some perma- 

 nence about it; that no mere whim of some envious 

 neighbor may drive me f)ut of the business next 

 year; that, after making inxestment in buildings 

 an 1 fixtures, and perhaps special pasturage. I may 



feel secure that no one else may be able, by over- 

 stocking, to drive me from the field. In plain words, 

 I take the radical ground that legislation is needed, 

 whereby in some way, under jiroper limitations and 

 restrictions, by paying for it, I may have the con- 

 trol of a certain number of acres or square miles 

 as a range for my bees. I sincerely believe that 

 somothieg of this kind would best serve the inter- 

 ests of all, and I may have a word to say upon it 

 hereafter. In the meantime I shall be glad if others 

 may consider it of sutticicnt moment to give their 

 views, even if nothing but objections are given. 



Marengo, III., Sept., 18t6. C. C. Miller. 



Friend M., your ideas are good and sound, 

 but I am afraid it will take a good while to 

 get things into shape as they tire in agricul- 

 ture and some other inirsuits. You say, 

 that in farming the ground is all occupied 

 by somebody. It is true, it is occupied aft- 

 er a fashion, but it is not all occupied in the 

 way we market-gardeners sometimes occupy 

 a few acres, 1 tell you. It is a misfortune 

 all aroinid, to have so many wh.o are dab- 

 bling at all kinds of industries in this hap- 

 hazard way— benefiting neither themselves 

 nor the pti'Mic at large. But so long as this 

 is a free country, it seems hard to prescribe 

 a remedy. By the way, aren't you a little 

 uncharitable toward supply-dealers? I liope 

 that there are few if any supply-dealers (or 

 publishers) who are pleased at the prospect 

 of selling supplies which will probably never 

 permanently benelit tlie purchaser nor his 

 neighl)ors. I do not mean to say that we 

 are any more conscientious as a class than 

 otlier business men ; but I do think we are 

 about as good as the average. 



REPORT FROM FLORIDA. 



FRIEND fiUAY TELt^S US SOME OF HIS EXPEKI- 



ENCIC WITH I'EHFOUATED honey-boauus, 



IllVINO IlKES ON EMPTY FRAME.S, ETC. 



|n,DlTOK GLEANINGS:— Although my specialty 

 W^ is queen-rearing, yet a report from ten hives 

 Ip f set apart for comb honey may be of interest 

 ■^^ to some one. This is an " off " year, and, like 

 Mr. Hart on page 645, 1886, 1 would rather not 

 give figures. Our honey season began with the 

 oi*ange-bloom in March; but this year it seems that 

 the orange trees produced enough blossoms only to 

 make oranges, and no surplus; and there was not 

 more than one-tenth the bloom we generally have. 

 Besides a great deal of unfavoi-ablc weather, high 

 winds prevailed; consequently the surplus honey 

 from orange was next to nothing. Saw-palmetto 

 did better, and the ten hives spoken of averaged 

 'M lbs. and increased to 20. This is all the honey we 

 get till fall. 



OltANGE-ULOOM IIONEV. 



During the orange-bloom, when honey was com- 

 ing in slowli", my bees got the swarming mania bad- 

 ly, I thought; but the reading of Mrs. Chaddock's, 

 Hutchinson's, and Hart's letters consoled me. I 

 adopted the Hutchinson plan of hiving swarms on 

 five L. frames with starters only; sections with fdn. 

 above, and at side also on a few. I believe four 

 swarms out of ten hived this way swarmed again 

 about one month or less afterward, and T must say 

 the drone-comb built bothered me. I had all the 

 drones reared from choice (jueens that I wanted; 



