128 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



April 



from one central plant the advan- 

 tages may be listed as follows: 



1. A thoroughly suitable building 

 may be erected on the beekeeper's 

 own property where machinery can 

 be permanently installed. A sys- 

 tematic person will then gather 

 around him all sorts of labor-saving 

 devices and conveniences which take 

 time to accumulate and which fre- 

 quent moving to outapiaries com- 

 pletely disorganize. I am referring 

 especially to the tools one uses only 

 occasionally which must have 



lar places and be kept in them or 

 thej can never be found when 

 wanted. 



2. There is less expense for equip- 

 ment than where each apiary is 

 equipped, and less wear on machin- 

 ery than where one outfit is torn up, 

 moved, fastened down and torn up 

 again from time to time. 



3. Larger and better machinery will 

 lie used, and it will be installed in a 

 much more substantial manner when 

 it is going in to stay 



4. More pounds per day will be 

 extracted because of the improved 

 machine^. 



5. The work of extracting and 

 caring for honey and cappings is 

 done at home, where meals and 

 hours can be regular, and if the bee- 

 keeper wishes to fit machinery or do 

 other chores before and after hours 

 he is there to do it, instead of travel- 

 ing on the road. This matter of 

 regular hours is very important in 

 keeping help. 



6. Honey can be left in store- 

 tanks for a few days to clarify, free 

 itself of air bubbles from the extrac- 

 tor, and blend before filling into sell- 

 ing packages. 



.-. of Pettit Apiary Building 



7. The work of extracting, onc< 

 started, rried through more 



ii illy. 



8. At tile end - . son all 

 supers are at thi o\ erhaul- 

 ing or painting many of them will 

 need. 



Xo doubt thi of this sys- 



tem will know other advantages I 

 have missed. 



The 'I. ! i es of bringing su- 



uact are: 



1. The expense of hauling full 

 supers home and empty ones out. 

 including some risk of breaking 

 This includes first cost, up- 

 keep and depreciation of truck; also 

 the time of driver. Against this 



must be balanced the fact that a light 

 truck is practically indispensable 

 anyway; almost as many trips to the 

 outapiaries would be needed to go to 

 work as to bring supers home, es- 

 pecially as the honey and wax have 

 to come home in any case, and the 

 moving and setting up of machinery 

 take considerable time. 



2. The trouble with robbers when 

 wet combs are taken to a yard in the 

 absence of a flow. This is serious, 

 but could be overcome by going with 

 them at night, as a last resort. 



3. A more serious objection is the 

 danger of spreading disease, and I 

 would advise going slowly until it is 

 pretty well eradicated from all api- 

 aries concerned. The danger can be 

 overcome by extreme care to prevent 

 robbing at every step. The home 

 garage should be in the same build- 

 ing as the extracting room and 

 equally bee-tight, so that each load 

 of supers is under cover all the time 

 at home 'except when actually mov- 

 ing in or out. Also all supers from 

 each apiary should be kept by them- 

 selves, with no mixing. Extreme 

 care with reference to infection all 

 along the line will not only prevent 

 spread from one apiary to another, 

 but should eradicate American foul- 

 brood entirely. 



The Pettit Apiary Building 

 After several years of moving ma- 

 chinery, first the hand extractor and 

 capping can in a one-horse wagon ; 

 then the power extractor, engine and 

 capping melter with a team, and later 

 in a motor truck, I have become a 

 convert to the central apiary building 

 idea. I have built one and have, or 

 will incorporate in it some ideas 

 based on modern principles of fac- 

 tory equipment. The building is 24x 

 40 ft., with walls 16 ft. to the plate, 

 and a gable roof. It is built on a 

 concrete foundation and is two 

 stories high, with a 4-in. cement floor 

 down stairs and a pine floor on 10-in. 

 joist overhead. The joist are 12 ft. 

 long and meet on a middle partition, 

 making a floor strong enough to 

 carry almost any weight that is likely 

 to be put on it. 



The ground floor is divided by the 



middle partition, which stops 11 ft. 

 from one endfor a garage, running 

 across the building and extending 6 

 ft. in front. This garage, being about 

 11x30 ft., has room for a truck and 

 an automobile, or two light trucks, 

 as required. The other two rooms, 

 each 12x29 ft., are the extracting 

 room and honey room, respectively. 

 It is 10 feet from the lower to the 

 -upper floor, giving a ceiling 9 feet 

 in the clear. The cement foundation 

 on all walls rises four inches above 

 the cement floor, which slopes to- 

 ward the middle of each room, where 

 a bell-trap connects with the sewer. 

 This makes washing down the floor 

 with hose and brush after each day's 

 extracting, or other mussy work, a 

 pleasure to anticipate. The extract- 

 ing room also has a washing sink 

 with draining table against the mid- 

 dle partition near the door of the 

 honey room. Running water, hot 

 and cold, and steam will be on tap 

 at the sink. 



The upstairs will contain the office 

 of the business, a lavatory with 

 closet and a shower for the men, the 

 carpenter shop, paint shop, founda- 

 tion room, storeroom, etc. As far as 

 possible, I aim to have a room de- 

 voted to each line of work, and use 

 it for nothing else. Then machinery 

 and appliances once installed need 

 not be moved, but can be left all 

 ready for use at a moment's notice. 

 It will be a lot of space, but that is 

 cheaper than man-time, which is 

 about the most expensive commodity 

 there is in production today. 



The stairs go up beside the middle 

 partition and open from the garage. 

 They are of easy grade for climbing, 

 but no wider than is necessary for 

 one person to go up or down. They 

 are not intended for carrying things 

 up, as all material goes through a 

 trap door in the ceiling over the 

 garage. This is 6x4 ft. and may be 

 fitted with a simple hoist, although 

 it is easy to hand light things up or 

 down from the back of a truck stand- 

 ing on the garage floor beneath. 

 This is particularly convenient when 

 loads come in or go out: all material 

 being handled in the garage under 



Apiary sid tral i gat th< Pettil Apiaries at Georgetown, Ontario. 



Garage door on this side allows (ruck to bi backed ""i between rows of hives 



for bringing in supers. Extracting room downstairs; office and carpenter shop 

 upstairs 



