THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW 



245 



venture as yet. I sought out by 

 inquiring a man who was thorough- 

 ly familiar with the country and 

 wlio could carry me over it and I 

 employed him to do so, and I spent 

 week looking it over, and learned 

 all I could about it by inquiring 

 among the natives and by observa- 

 tion. 



The situation looked favorable 

 from the standpoint of a start any 

 way. I met a number of natives 

 who had from 1 to 25 hives of 

 bees. They would sell at from on< 

 to two dollars per hive. I traded 

 with the man I viewed the country 

 with to buy bees for me, taking 

 them as he could find them over 

 the country just in any kind of a 

 hive or gum just so they were 

 heavy and contained normal swarm 

 of bees giving him information how 

 to determine this. He agreed to 

 take the job and go at it at once 

 at 10c per colony in his county and 

 15c per colony for those he bought 

 outside his county. I told him I 

 would pay this if he would assure 

 me as many as 300 colonies. He 

 said he would. I told him that $2.00 

 per colony was the limit and to buy 

 just as far below this as possible. 

 He promised to take care of me in 

 this. I instructed him to send me 

 the name and full address of 

 everyone he bought bees from and 

 the number of colonies and price 

 of same. 



I left him and returned home 

 to wind the business up here for 

 the season. In two weeks I heard 

 from him and he had bought just a 

 few over 300 colonies inclosing 

 the addresses of those he 



bought from, the number colonies 

 and prices to be paid. I went at 

 once to my postoffice and got all 

 the employees busy writing money 

 orders to these parties who were 

 selling me their bees and there 

 was a long list of them and I 

 expended for these bees $560.20 and 

 through the one who was buying 

 them for me I sent the money 

 orders to the parties and then took 

 my helpers and went down and start- 

 ed work. The first day of Decem- 

 ber following we landed at O'Brien, 

 Fla. which was a small town and 

 near the center of the territory 

 I wished to occupy. 



The first thing a bill of lumber 

 was bought and our first camp set 

 up (see cut) which consisted of a 



stall, feed room, wagon shelter, 

 living room, packing room and 

 work shop, all under one shelter 

 and all in a row. This was the 

 most economical and convenient 

 structure we could get up. This 



Our Temporary Headquarters 



was headquarters for several seas- 

 ons when a more modern structure 

 was erected, also a six room cot- 

 tage for manager of apiaries. The 

 next thing a horse and wagon was 

 purchased, then four apiary sites 

 Avere looked up and privileges from 

 land owners obtained. Then came 

 the main work, that of gathering 

 up the bees and hauling them to 

 the most convenient apiary site. 

 Hunting the bees up, preparing 

 them for moving was no small job 

 for they were in every kind of an 

 eld box, gum and hive, and many 

 of them badly decayed. Then the 

 hauling of some of them was a 

 great job as they had to be gath- 

 ered up and hauled 30 miles or 

 more. But we did not do all the 

 l^auling with one wagon for at 

 times we could get a wagon from 

 parties who sold the bees to take 

 a load. This helped us a consider- 

 able, but our holidays were all 

 ppent moving and arranging bees, 

 but the task was accomplished the 

 latter part of February at which 

 time we returned to Georgia and 

 left our animals in the care of 

 our next door neighbor. As soon as 

 we arrived home we shipped to 

 the new location 350 hives and 

 700 supers, including sections and 

 full sheets, foundations for same 

 also the necessary brood frames, etc. 

 (Continued on page 270) 



