302 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAi 



September 



SOLDIER BEEKEEPERS 



SI >MEWHERE there are statistics 

 i,, show that a large propoi tiori 

 of the men engaged in the re- 

 tail grocery business fail. Not being 

 interested in the grocer) business 

 except as an ultimate consumer, I 

 have not taken the trouble to verif) 

 this statement. However large the 

 per cent of failures in the grocery 

 business, it is fully as large in bee- 

 keeping, with one important differ- 

 ence. When a grocer fails he soon 

 finds it out. but thousands of bee- 

 keepers are miserable failures and 

 never do make tile discovery. This 

 is absolute proof, of course, that 

 beekeeping is a branch of industry 

 well worthy of effort, for if one can 

 fail and still keep going it speaks 

 well for the returns to be attained 

 under the right management. 



Because of the uncertainty of suc- 

 cess one should hesitate about urg- 

 ing anyone to take up beekeeping. 

 The uncertainty is not so much in 

 the secretion of nectar, although, as 

 everv beekeeper knows, this varies 

 more than we might wish. Yet we 

 have all perh ps seen innumerable 

 instances where the good beekeeper 

 gets a crop when other beekeepers 

 all about him experience a failure. 

 The difference is really in the 

 amount of brains applied to the busi- 

 ness. Strangely enough, this does 

 not always mean the amount of 

 brains possessed by these persons, 

 for many people do not fully apply 

 to beekeeping the brains which they 

 have. You cannot, therefore, tell in 

 advance who will make the good 

 beekeeper. 



In spite of — or perhaps because of 

 — a considerable amount of experi- 

 ence in answering questions of be- 

 ginners and of trying to guide them 

 through the early days of beekeep- 

 ing work, I never try to help a be- 

 ginner without a feeling that per- 

 haps it is the wrong thing to give 

 encouragement to a new beekeeper, 

 who will, according to the law of av- 

 erages, stand about one chance in a 

 hundred of doing anything reallj 

 worth while in beekeeping. But it is 

 not my fault if they fail to apply 

 themselves to this work, to study the 



By E. F. Phillips 



literature, and especially to study 

 their bees. If all teachers worried 

 too much about the use .to be made 

 of the subjects taught, we probably 

 would not have any schools, and all 

 that any teacher can do is to do his 



in ,1 



There is, however, another angle 

 to the teaching of beekeeping, and 

 that is the danger from the average 

 small beekeeper. Apiary inspectors 

 are almost unanimous in condemn- 

 ing amateur beekeepers and farmer 

 beekeepers, making almost no ex- 

 ception to a universal condemnation, 

 and anyone who tries to clean up an 

 area of either brood disease will 

 probably feel the same way. Com- 

 mercial beekeepers, may their tribe- 

 increase, usually feel the same way 

 about the beekeeper with a few_ colo- 

 nies, partly because of the disease 

 situation, partly because so many 

 markets are temporarily injured by 

 ignorant marketing of honey — and 

 partly on general principles. The way 

 of the amateur is a hard one, and 

 yet probably every reader of this 

 journal knows one or two, perhaps 

 more, amateurs who are really bet- 

 ter beekeepers than most commer- 

 cial producers. 



In this hasty and unsatisfactory 

 manner I have tried to show why 

 it is far from wise to do anything to 

 increase the number of amateur bee- 

 keepers in the United States. We 

 have already more beekeepers than 

 we need — ten times over, perhaps. 

 It is true that we need ten times the 

 the present number of good bee- 

 keepers, but the wise policy at pres- 

 ent is to make better beekeepers of 

 those now in the work, rather than 

 to try to make more beekeepers. 

 This has been the policy of the Bu- 

 reau of Entomology, and I hope it 

 will continue to be so for many 

 years. 



There is one outstanding excep- 

 tion to this, however, and it is about 

 this class of persons that I want to 

 write. There are many men return- 

 ing from France who have suffered 

 some disablement, disqualifying them 

 for the work in which they were en- 

 gaged before entering the' army. 



While a commercial beekeeper needs 

 to be in fine physical condition to 

 do his best, it yet remains true that 

 the most important part of a bee- 

 keeper is the part above the neck. 

 If, therefore, there are some of 

 these disabled men who can better 

 find themselves in beekeeping than 

 in other lines of work, if they mani- 

 fest the right kind of interest and 

 show a disposition to study the busi- 

 ness, I, for one, shall be glad to see 

 them take up the work, and shall be 

 delighted to see them enter the 

 ranks of commercial beekeepers. We 

 owe these men a debt which we can 

 never fully pay, but if we can make 

 their lives better and happier by 

 helping them get a start in commer- 

 cial beekeeping, there should be 

 nothing but the best of co-operation 

 from the commercial beekeepers of 

 the country. 



The Government, through the Fed- 

 eral Board of Vocational Education, 

 offers disabled nun training in what- 

 ever lines of work they decide upon 

 for re-education. If they choose 

 beekeeping they may go to some 

 . hool or college where a good 

 , ourse is offered, and <■>. erj possible 

 aid will be given them during the 

 period of training. Unfortunately, 

 not all the agricultural colleges oti'er 



1 courses in beekeeping, but this 



important work is rapidly increasing. 

 lust as an experiment, the Bureau 

 mi" Entomology recently invited some 

 | the boys from the Walter Reed 

 General Hospital in Washington out 

 ,,, i hi- new Bee Culture Laboratory 

 in Somerset, Maryland. They came 



