ILLINOIS STATE BEE-KEEPERS' ASSOCIATION 



199 



send it away. Of , course, that is not 

 the right thing to do, and it is con- 

 trary to law in a good many cases, 

 but I have yet to find the inspector 

 that will conscientiously prohibit that 

 In every case he finds. I am not 

 familiar with all of them, but I have 

 travelled with some of them, and I 

 have seen them wink at that sort of 

 thing. I know there is too much con- 

 taminated honey being put ou itf the 

 market. The only safe thing to do is 

 to destroy it or disinfect it by hard 

 boiling. It can be disinfected by boil- 

 ing with water for half an hour. 



Mr. Darby — I want to say I believe 

 that this contaminated honey is the 

 means of spreading the bee disease 

 throughout the United States more 

 than any other one thing. I have good 

 reason to believe that the honey being 

 shipped from diseased apiaries 'has 

 been responsible for the greater part 

 of the trouble in the State of Missouri, 

 and I think that this work of educa- 

 tion along this line and various lines 

 is one of the best things we can do 

 towards the wiping out of bee diseases. 

 You must get people to understand 

 that they must do right themselves if 

 they expect others to do right. This 

 is a pretty hard matter. We find so 

 many of them that count the dollars 

 and cents first and then the princi- 

 ples dt right and wrong after. We 

 should seek to educate the bee-keepers 

 in our community. Each individual 

 bee-keeper should attempt to do this 

 right at home; and not only must the 

 bee-keepers be taught this, but you 

 should talk it to your individual leg- 

 islators, your doctors, lawyers and 

 school teachers; everybody should 

 be familiar with the bee industry to 

 an extent that they should think it 

 was right that we should have protec- 

 tion. I have had occasion to talk this 

 way to many of our law makers and 

 influential men in our State, and when 

 they understand it once they will 

 readily drop in with the idea and say, 

 ' you should have protection; but if you 

 ^on't educate them how can you ex- 

 pect them to give you assistance when 

 it comes to asking the Legislators to 

 hear you? In this work of education 

 along the various lines I want to say 

 we must learn to be careful in the 

 smallest detail. 



I was very much impressed yester- 

 day afternoon by a few remarks Dr. 

 Bohrer made in regard to handling 



frames. I find so many bee men, and 

 in other respects good bee men, who 

 are careless about handling their 

 frames when they go to look for bee 

 disease or eggs or larvae; they will 

 turn them fiatways and look over this 

 way, and you all know when new 

 honey is coming in that it is so thin 

 it will often drop out, and if you hap- 

 pen perchance to lift a comb out of a 

 disased colony, maybe you don't 

 know the disease is there, and before 

 you are aware of it you drop some of 

 that honey on the ground, and by that 

 means maybe have diseased a num- 

 ber of colonies in your apiary. Tell 

 bee-keepers to hold the frames 

 straight. Mr. France has told you 

 here and elsewhere at Conventions to 

 hold the frames straight. Then there 

 is no danger of this diseased honey 

 dropping out. It is the proper method 

 any way of holding a frame. I don't 

 like to speak harshly about it, but it 

 shows the bee -keeper has not stud- 

 ied along some of the lines as much 

 as he should, and I think we should 

 discuss these little details so that we 

 may get the bee-keepers to think about 

 the little things as well as the large 

 ones, because they all go to making up 

 the sum total. 



In the matter of disinfecting, there 

 are so many bee-keepers that are 

 careless in that respect like they are 

 in some others. We find some peo- 

 ple very careful, and we find some 

 others that will make a mess of every- 

 thing they undertake, and those kind 

 of people should not be in the bee 

 business; and if you leave the im- 

 pression it is not necessary to disin- 

 fect hives or other things that they 

 are using, they will take it for granted 

 they are just as careful and clean as 

 anybody in their work and it is not 

 necessary for them to disinfect. I 

 make it a rule to say to people 

 throughout the country, when they are 

 treating diseased colonies, to disin- 

 fect those hives. It doesn't take but 

 a minute to paint the inside of the 

 hive with gasoline or kerosene and 

 touch a flame to it, and in a verj' few 

 minutes' time this work has been done, 

 and if a few drops of honey have been 

 accidentally dropped there, then you 

 have done the work. So, do your 

 work thoroughly. I know with a care- 

 ful man, and a man that has been 

 working with bees for years, he may 

 get along all right without any of this 



^A.; 



