178 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL^ 



ExperimenU in Apiculture 

 Sometiiins About Tliem. 



Written for the ^'Bee-Keepers'' Bevieiv^^ 

 BY W. Z. HUTCHINSON. 



All of our bee-journals are published 

 simply to tell of new things, of those not 

 before known, or, at least, not generally 

 known. From whence come these facts ? 

 From experience; from experimenting. 

 Scattered all over the land are bee- 

 keepers. In the spring each one starts 

 in with a more or less definite plan of 

 how he will manage his apiary that sea- 

 son, but many times during the season 

 must he make a choice of several dif- 

 ferent methods. Some of them may be 

 of minor importance, others may make 

 all the difference between a fair crop 

 and being obliged to feed the bees for 

 winter. 



Suppose the bees are in the cellar ; 

 how early shall they be taken out, shall 

 they be protected when taken out, shall 

 they be fed to stimulate tkem, shall 

 swarming be allowed, shall foundation 

 be used in the brood-nest in hiving 

 swarms, shall there be an effort to make 

 the number of unfinished sections, at 

 the end of the season, as small as possi- 

 ble, or shall abundant room be given to 

 the end of the harvest, and then feeding 

 back be resorted to for completing the 

 unfinished sections ? These, and many 

 more questions, would bee-keepers like 

 answered. 



The trouble with the average bee- 

 keeper is, that he is likely to choose 

 some one of these plans and carry it 

 out with his whole apiary. No compara- 

 tive work is done. If he gets a good 

 crop with the plan adopted he reports it 

 as a success. Perhaps some other plan 

 might have been more successful. 



A writer in a recent issue of the 

 American Bee Journal, in criticising 

 my advice not to hive swarms on drawn 

 comb at the height of the honey harvest, 

 when working for comb honey, men- 

 tioned two or three instances where he 

 had done so, and, by the way, one was 

 where he had put two swarms together, 

 and secured good results. If he tried 

 hiving swarms on starters only in the 

 brood-nest, he does not mention it. If 

 he did not try it, he does not know that 

 It would not have been more profitable. 

 Mr. Doolittle, a few months ago, men- 

 tioned in the Review an experience of 

 his in stimulative feeding in the spring. 

 A part of his apiary was fed and went 

 booming ahead at such a rate that it 

 was a great temptation not to feed all 



of the colonies. As a result of resisting 

 the temptation, he learned that in that 

 instance, at least, not much was gained 

 by the feeding. It is in such ways as 

 this that experiments ought to be con- 

 ducted. 



It is not every bee-keeper that is " cut 

 out " for an experimenter. It needs a 

 person of a judicial cast of mind, one 

 that is perfectly willing, so to speak, 

 that an experiment shall prove the 

 truth. Too many of us are inclined to 

 make a decision first, and then go to 

 work and try to prove what we already 

 believe. This will not answer. An ex- 

 perimenter ought to be wholly disinter- 

 ested in the results, that is, be willing 

 that an experiment proves either side of 

 the question. 



It costs money, time and bees to ex- 

 periment. The average bee-keeper can- 

 not afford to spare much of these with- 

 out a reasonable supposition that there 

 will be a money return. If he desires 

 to experiment he is confronted with the 

 query. Will it pay? Unless there are 

 fair prospects of a money return, it 

 must be abandoned. 



The foregoing are not the only reasons 

 why it would be advisable to have com- 

 petent bee-keepers employed by the gov- 

 ernment to take charge of experimental 

 apiaries. There is another reason that 

 perhaps but few have thought of viz. : 

 that such a person would be clothed 

 with authority. What he said or did 

 would be looked upon with respect by 

 the outside world. 



For instance, when queen-bees were 

 thrown out of the mails, it was mainly 

 through the efforts of Prof. Cook that 

 they were re-admitted. Last year a duty 

 was placed upon queen-bees imported 

 into this country. Again it was through 

 the instrumentality of Prof. Cook that 

 this duty was removed. Prof. Cook told 

 me himself that as an individual he 

 could never have accomplished these 

 results, but, as Professor of Entomology 

 in the Agricultural College of Michigan, 

 he was heard, and his arguments given 

 consideration. Cases like these are 

 liable to come up at any time, and a 

 good man at the head of a State experi- 

 mental apiary would be a power for 

 good. 



It seems as though no arguments are 

 needed to show that an experimental 

 apiary in each State would be a great 

 benefit. We all know that there are 

 many questions connected with bee- 

 keeping that are unanswered, and that 

 the correct answer to them would make 

 of bee-keeping a more safe and profit- 

 able pursuit. Frank Benton writes me 



