Proceedings of tee Farmers' Club. 543 



Quiuby, in his work upon bee-keeping, in his first edition, estimates 

 the annual average product, in the common swarming hive, at one 

 dollar's worth of surplus. This, at twenty cent« per pound, would 

 be five pounds per swarm. In his second edition, he estimates it 

 at two dollars' worth; this would be ten pounds per swarm. Five 

 hundred pounds of surplus, at the fii'st estimate, would require one 

 hundred swarms. His second estimate would require fifty colonies. 

 But improvement in hives has led to more favorable results. Some 

 apiaries, in some classes of hives, have averaged fifty pounds per 

 swarm. Our average, in the four Eureka hives, in 1867, was one 

 hundred and twenty-five pounds — five hundred pounds of surplus 

 from the four. If we estimate the price of hives with their boxes, 

 in all but the Eureka hives, at three dollars each, and the Eureka 

 hives, with their boxes, at eight dollars, and swarms at five dollars 

 each, we have this result: It will require, on Mr. Quinby's first 

 estimate, one hundi'ed hives, three dollars each, three hundred dol- 

 lars; estimate, one hundred swarms, five dollars each, five hundred 

 dollars; amount of outlay, eight hundred dollars; one year's inter- 

 est, fiit3'-six dollars. Swarms may be good, on an average, four 

 3^ears; one-quarter of five hundred dollars, one hundred and twenty- 

 five dollars. Hives will be good for ten j'-ears; one-tenth of three 

 hundred dollars is thirty dollars; cost of sui'plus per five hundred 

 pounds, two hundred and eleven dollars; cost per pound, forty- 

 two cents and two-tenths. According to his second estimate, it 

 would be one-half of this; five hundred pounds would be one hun- 

 dred and five dollars and fifty cents; per pound, twenty-one cents 

 and one-tenth. Some have secured an average of fifty pounds. 

 This is a high average. The result would be: Ten hives cost thirty 

 dollars; ten swarms cost fifty dollars; outlay, eighty dollars; inter- 

 est on eighty dollars, five dollars; one-tenth the cost of the hives, 

 three dollars; one-quarter the cost of ten swarms, twelve dollars 

 and fifty cents; cost of five hundred pounds of surplus, twenty-one 

 dollars and ten cents; actual outlay per pound, four cents and one- 

 quarter. Four Eureka hives, at eight dollars each, cost thirty-two 

 dollars; four swarms, at five dollars each, twenty dollars; outlay, 

 fifty-two dollars; interest on outlay, three dollars and sixty cents; 

 one-tenth of hives, three dollars and twenty cents; one-fourth of 

 swarms, five dollars; cost of five hundred pounds surplus, eleven 

 dollars and eighty cents; cost per pound, two cents and eighteen- 

 fiftieths. Cost per pound: Euraka hive, two cents and eighteen- 

 fiftieths; in one of the swarmers, six cents and one-quarter; accord- 



