92 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



March 



Maple Honey Co.'s apiary at Antigo, Wisconsin. This 



pie 



nt spot to spend 



A Wisconsin Apiary 



Our illustration shows a very at- 

 tractive apiary in tile woods of 

 Northern Wisconsin. The Maple 

 Honey Company, of Antigo, Wis., has 

 never had less than an average of 

 100 pounds per colony in that loca- 

 tion. The yard is well protected by 

 the hills on the north, east and west, 

 and on the south a "sugar bush" of 



Summer Management 



By H. D. Murry 



IX reading the beepapers one can- 

 not fail to note the effect that lo- 

 cality has upon the necessary 

 management of bees. This idea is 

 brought out by a careful perusal of 

 the very interesting article by Mr. 

 G. C. Greiner, on pages 19 and 20 of 

 the American Bee Journal of Jan- 

 uary. What most impressed my mind 

 was his closing paragraph, in which 

 he sa- 



"The secret of my heavy yields, ex- 

 id in a nutshell, is simply this: 

 Brood-chambers should never be dis- 

 turbed during a honey-flow. I never 

 open a hive from the time spring 

 management is completed until the 

 following spring unless it is strictly 

 necessary." 



Now, if your valuable journal had 

 no circulation in the south, I' should 

 not say a word. But we already 

 have too many beekeepers in the 

 southland who keep bees in some 

 such way as that, and that is largely 

 responsible for the low average pro- 

 i of surplus honey per colony 

 in Dixie. 



I do not know just how much ma- 

 nipulation is indicated by Mr. Greiner 

 in his term "spring management," 

 but too many readers are liable to in- 

 terpret it to mean, Put on supers in 

 the spring and let 'em alone. 



The most successful beekeepers in 

 the south find il necessary to 

 form many manipulations during the 

 course of the season. We hardly 

 ever, I might say, have a continuous 

 honey-flow from spring to fall; but 

 our season is cut up into several 

 short flows. This may bring about 

 swarming, either at the beginning or 

 ■ nd nt" any one of these flows. This 

 makes it necessary that we know, 

 illy all (he time, what is going 

 on in each brood-chamber. In order 

 to know this it is necessary to make 



tall maple trees furnish both shade 

 and nectar. The hills and surround- 

 ing fields are filled with dandelion 

 and white clover, and basswood is 

 abundant in the nearby forests. 

 Raspberry yields abundantly for sev- 

 eral weeks and the season is rounded 

 out with flows from buckwheat and 

 goldenrod in late autumn. Aster and 

 fireweed added to the long list of 



examinations from time to time. 

 All. .ut the only exception to this rule 

 is in the case of introducing a queen 

 of the current season's rearing. In 

 that case, we think that colony is not 

 apt to swarm during the first honey- 

 flow after her introduction, and it is 

 not necessary to examine that colony 

 again, unless some abnormal condi- 

 tions arise with it. 



A colony may not be doing the 

 work in the super that we think it 

 should, and we may think it needs 

 requeening with a better queen. It 

 may be doing good work in the super, 

 but is getting extraordinarily strong. 

 It might develop the swarming fever, 

 so we examine to find out and take 

 steps to prevent, in case we find it 

 building queen-cells. Also, we usually 

 desire to make more or less increase 

 during the season, and this calls for 

 work in the brood-chambers. There 

 are so many conditions to be met 

 that the most progressive beekeepers 

 in the south have generally settled 

 down to some system of frequent ex- 

 amination and manipulation of the 

 brood-chamber. This is made all the 

 more necessary by the fact that all 

 rcial beekeepers have a num- 

 ber of outapiaries. They must be so 

 managed as to have a minimum of 

 swarming, or the results at the end 

 of the season will inevitably show a 

 balance on the wrong side of the 

 ledger. 



Mr. Greiner doubtless finds his 

 of management satisfactory 

 in his locality; but taking the coun- 

 try at large, I doubt if the same sys- 

 tem will prove profitable in many lo- 

 cations. I think Dr. C. C. Miller 

 bears the palm as the most successful 

 comb-honey producer in the United 

 States, and from reading his book, 

 "Fifty Years Among the Bees," I get 

 tin idea that he does quite a bit of 

 manipulating combs in brood-cham- 

 bers during the honey-flow. 



Mr. Greiner was not attempting to 



honey plants insure that no season 

 will bring failure. 



During the past season 85 colonies 

 in the yard shown averaged 187 

 pounds per colony. In the picture 

 may be seen some hives that are six 

 stories high. These gave a surplus 

 of more than 300 pounds each. This 

 is one of the yards belonging to 

 Cherf and Leykom. 



give us a complete outline of his 

 management, or tell us exactly what 

 he did to each and every colony; 

 but taking the information as he has 

 given it to us, it appears that the 

 colony that gave him the best yield 

 in 1918 was the one that he manipu- 

 lated the most. He at least increased 

 that colony a little more by the extra 

 manipulation than might have been 

 otherwise. Then, there is that swarm. 

 If that had occurred at an outyard 

 during his absence, he would most 

 likely have lost that, together with 

 the 55 pounds of surplus honey it 

 put up. Such swarms would be fre- 

 quent in the south, and we strive to 

 prevent them by periodical examina- 

 tion of brood-chambers and what- 

 ever manipulation may be indicated 

 by the examination. 

 Ladonia, Texas. 



A Simple Feeder 



By C. B. Palmer 



TAKE pulverized sugar and honey 

 (1 pound of honey to 2 pounds of 

 sugar), knead them into a stiff 

 dough ; work in all the sugar you can. 

 When your wrists give out you will 

 know when you have enough sugar 

 in. Now make this dough into pies 

 one-half inch thick, sprinkle a little 

 of the sugar in the bottom of a com- 

 mon bucket, put in a layer of the 

 dough, or one pie, and a little more 

 sugar, and another pie until all are 

 in. Now you are ready to feed. Get 

 from your grocer a lot of empty cigar 

 cans. He will be glad to have you 

 take them out of the way. Remove 

 the cover and press as much of the 

 dough into the can as possible. They 

 hold 3 pounds of the food. Open the 

 hive and turn this can bottom side 

 up over the bee-escape hole in your 

 lucking super; or, if cloth is directly 

 mi top of the frames, then cut a small 

 bole in the cloth and put the'ean over 

 this hole. Now place the packing 



