SOME FIRST CONSIDERATIONS.—Chapter I. 
Every orchard should have bees for greatest success. 
busiest with fowls in winter and early spring, the bees are inactive in their 
hives. When swarms and the honey harvest must be looked after, work in 
the poultry-yard is not pressing. 
In combination with fruit-growing, beekeeping is especially desirable. 
The bees fertilize the blossoms, and the blossoms furnish considerable 
nectar. In gathering the nectar of the fruit blossoms, bees unconsciously 
earry pollen from stamen to pistil and from one blossom to another, aiding 
in the setting of the fruit, thus materially increasing the size of the fruit 
crop. In fact, no up-to-date and successful orchardist of today thinks of 
trying to raise fruit without bees in or near his orchard. 
Farmers, fruit-growers and poultry-raisers may keep from 10 to 50 or 
even 100 colonies cf bees without interfering with other work; and nearly 
every one can keep from 2 to 10 colonies in a back yard. Moreover, 10 or 
20 colonies will yield a much larger revenue per colony than will five or 
ten times as many located on the same site. : 
The busy farmer may expect success with bees, although they need 
much attention at the same time as do the farm crops. If the older children 
and the women folks of the family chance to love outdoors and take a fancy 
to bees, the problem of help and care of the bees in the busy farm season is 
at once solved. Then, too, if the farmer owns any orchards or is engaged in 
any small-fruit raising, he positively can not afford to be without at least 
a few colonies of bees on his premises. They should constitute an essential 
part of his business. 
School-teachers who can have an apiary near at hand will find that 
they can use their vacation months very profitably among the bees, and 
this vacation time is just when the bees will need greatest attention. A Sat- 
urday given now and then in the fall and spring will afford all the time 
necessary for caring for the bees during these seasons. 
Professional men, generally, and all classes confined to the indoors 
while at their regular work, may well look to beekeeping as a source of 
interesting recreation and profit. 
When to Start. 
For the beginner, inexperienced in beekeeping, the best time to start is 
during the fruit bloom or at the time of the first honey flow of any kind 
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