BEE-spoke-data/bees-v0 huggingface dataset:
Ample reasons for the extension of bee-culture are adduced in the chapter on "Bees and Flowers," but the direct financial results in a well-managed apiary furnish probably a much greater inducement to many persons to take up and prosecute successfully such a well-paying hobby. In many industries the products are of a perishable nature. Not so, however, with bee-products, honey and wax. They may, when properly packed, he transported to all parts, and at the same time, should the state of the market render it advisable, they may, without detriment to quality, be stored away for sale at a future date.
While no industry connected with rural occupations is so interesting, from an intellectual standpoint, as bee-culture, there is none which approaches it in the profits on the outlay, when the time spent on the work in the apiary is taken into consideration. The bee-keeper has only to provide a home for his bees, and receptacles in which they may store their surplus, and they will roam afield, gathering honey in abundance from morning till night. In most districts some honeyproducing crops are grown, and in many localities, in addition to acres of orchards and a sprinkling of white clover in the pastures, crops of white and asike clover are regularly grown for seed, while sainfoin, nustard, turnip, cabbage, and other profusely-flowering crops are abundant. Then, again, in the neighbourhood of moors where heather is abundant, there is another excellent source of late honey.
The late Mr. H. M. Jenkins, secretary to the Royal Agricultural Society of England, some years ago gave an address in the Lecture Hall, Dublin, on "Some of the duties of a farmer's wife," and referred to the keeping of bees as advisable, and instanced the success of a lady well known among practical beelepers, Miss Gayton, of Much Hadham, Herts, who wrote, saying, "From my own experience I am sure that almost every cottager might make his bees pay his rent and more ; and with five or six hives the trouble of attending to them is not more than he and his wife could find time for. One thing, however, is absolutely necessary for success in bee-keeping, namely, to thoroughly study and understand the habits and requirements of bees, and to bestow on them as much care and attention as would be required for any other pursuit or occupation in order to be successful. Having but small means I began bee-keeping with the hope of making it a profitable business. I have kept a strict account of every expense, and as my statement shows I have found bee-keeping profitable." Miss Gayton, who resides in a good honey district, commenced bee-keeping with one stock in 1876, and her initial expense was $1 12s. 6d. She increased her stock to twenty-eight hives, and her average profit at the end of eight years was $20 per year.
In the _British Bee Journal_ for 1885 a cottager wrote : "I am only a cottager, I have taken nearly 900 lbs. of honey, all from supers without touching the stock hives." Another, whose daily work occupies him from six to six, said he had taken over 400 lbs., nearly all in sections, and sold it for the nice sum of $22 10s.
During the last few years the prices of all kinds of agricultural produce have fallen below what was formerly realised, but from bee-keeping equally good results in comparison with other industries are still obtained. A young man, the son of a farmer at Wainfleet, Lincolnshire, who has been favoured of late years with crops that have bloomed in splendid weather, took an average of 109 lbs. of honey from each of his three stocks in 1892, and an average of 156 lbs. per hive in 1893. Near him another bee-keeper had an average of over 90 lbs. per hive. Results in other parts of the same neighbourhood were disheartening. But evidently this was due to lack of attention, without which success cannot be expected.
These are only fair specimens from hundreds of examples that might be quoted ; and they may be taken as evidence that, given a good district and favourable climatic influences, it must be the fault of the bee-keeper himself if his enterprise does not prove to be of an exceedingly profitable character.
## Chapter 3 The contents of the five.
In order that bee-keeping may give the greatest amount of enjoyment and pleasure, and, at the same time, the largest profit, it is necessary to study carefully the natural history of the honey-bee so far as it is applicable to the practical work of the apiary.
In commencing this study we should naturally first make an examination of the hive to learn about the structure of the combs and their varied contents.
The Combs.
The combs are found in all hives or other cavities where bees have built according to their own devices, at an almost uniform thickness, viz., a trifle under an inch from face to face, when containing sealed "worker brood." The space between the combs is about half an inch, consequently the distance from centre to centre of the combs is just under 14 inches, or, to be exact, \(1\frac{9}{20}\) inch.
Combs are made of wax, a secretion resulting from the consumption of honey or an equivalent food. The wax oozes out from beneath the scales of theabdomen, on the underside of the body of the bee, and assuming a solid form, is drawn away in very thin flakes by the bee, and used for the making of the comb, the cell walls of which are \(\frac{1}{\mathbf{r}^{8}\cdot 0}\) inch in thickness. The work of comb-building is very trying to the bee. The amount of honey consumed in the elaboration of one pound of wax is variously estimated, some authorities putting it as high as twenty pounds, while others say not more than ten pounds are used. It is, however, certain that the weight must be several times that of the wax produced, so that if a substitute be given, a great deal of honey may be saved to the bee-keeper.
The combs are composed of Worker cells and Drone cells, built horizontally on each side of a mid-rib.
Worker cells are small, measuring five to the inch across the mouths of the cells, and drone cells four to the inch. The thickness of the comb when containing worker-broad is \(\frac{1}{4}\) inch ; and when containing drone brood \(1\frac{1}{4}\) inch. By cutting through a comb from top to bottom, and dividing the cells, it will be noticed that in building the coubs the bees give a slight upward pitch to the cells. This peculiarity it is necessary to bear in mind, when combs in a box or skep are being transferred and fitted into frames.
Queen cells are found in a hive, as a rule, only at swarming time. They are acorn-shaped, and are usually built on the bottom edges of the comb. If the bees lose their queen during the summer, queen-cells are built on the face of the comb in any part where the cells contain worker eggs.
Honey is found in the combs in quantity varying according to surrounding circumstances. This, the most delicious of sweets, forms the natural food of the insects that produce it. The substance of which it is composed, as originally secreted by the flowers, is termed nectar, and not until it has undergone chemical change within the body of the bee, and been stored in the combs, is it known by the familiar name of honey.
Having already passed through certain digestive processes it is, as food for man, of great value, inasmuch as it is at once taken directly into the system as a force-producer, without passing through the stagesnecessary in the case of many other foods. Honeyy vary greatly according to the source from which the reactant is gathered, some kinds having a delicate aroma, which causes them to be particularly sought after. Clover honey in England is considered the standard quality, but even this honey exhibits considerable variation according to the soil upon which the clover is grown and the surrounding climatic conditions. For instance, at a large show in the West of England, where I acted as judge of the honey exhibits in the autumn of 1893, it was noted as a remarkable fact that in nearly every instance, though some classes were open, the prizes were awarded to samples of honey taken from apiaries on or near the tops of the neighbouring hills. To the Scotsman, and many English bee-keepers resident near the moors, there is nothing to equal heather honey.
Pollen, which is the fertilising dust of the flowers, is carried by the bee, in its search for nectar, to those blooms where its presence is required to cause the production of fruit and seeds. Nature provides this fertiliser in a most lavish manner on certain flowers, and the bees, therefore, becoming dusted with more than is needed for the fructification of bloom, cleanse their bodies of the surplus, pack it away in the " pollen-baskets " formed by projecting hairs on the hindmost pair of legs, and carry it to the hive. Here it is stored in the cells to furnish, in conjunction with honey, a perfect bee-food, whether required. by the workers, the grubs that are their special care, or the queen. Pollen is also used in the formation of the cappings to the cells containing the grubs, and plays an important part in the making of wax.
M. de Layens, a French bee-keeper and author of note, was the first to notice that the colour of wax varied with the source of the pollen ; and it is not the light-coloured honey that is responsible for the wax of a light shade. Very often the contrary is the case, for, though heather honey is dark, the wax made from it is light yellow. In 1886, Dr. A. Von Planta, a famous Swiss chemist, proved the colour of the wax to be due to the presence of various coloured pollen grains.
Propolis is also gathered by the bee, but at present it has been put to no commercial use by the bee-keeper. It is of a resinous nature, and exudes from certain trees. The bees use it as a cement for filling cracks and crevices, and for covering intruders, such as the snail, that they are unable to remove. In the building of the combs propolis is employed to increase the tenacity of the wax, but it is used to the greatest extent at the close of the honey-flow, in daubing the sections and the crates, which, if left on the hive too long, become firmly fixed, and difficult to remove.
The Bees.
Every colony of bees in a normal condition will, during the summer months, contain three kinds of bees which are easily distinguished one from the other. They are the Queen, Drones, and WorkersThe queen (Fig. 2) is the mother of all the bees in the hive, and she has really only one duty to perform, viz., that of egg-laying. From early in the season to some time after the close of the honey-flow, a good queen will be busy depositing eggs in the various cells, out of which will proceed in due course a Queen, a Drone, or a Worker. A very large amount of work is thus of necessity the share of the queen bee, but the beekeeper, with a view to large returns, will endeavour, by careful and systematic management, to regulate the egg-laying of the queen in such a manner that the
hive shall be full of bees at the commencement of the honey-flow, and that, instead of ceasing to lay at the close of the honey-flow, she shall continue her work until about the middle of September, thus ensuring the presence of a large proportion of young bees when the stock is closed for the winter about the 1st of October.
The queen is produced in sixteen days from an egg exactly similar to that from which a worker issues. In order that a queen and not a worker may be produced, the egg is deposited in an acorn-shaped cell, usually built, on account of its size, on the bottom edges of the combs. Sometimes, however, they are found on the face of the comb among the worker cells.
The queen may live three or four years, but it is generally admitted that she is in her prime, and consequently of most value to the bee-keeper, in her second season. It is for this reason that some beekeepers make it a rule not to allow a queen to remain more than two years at the head of a colony, except in rare cases. When it is considered what an enormously increased number of eggs above the natural average the queen may be induced to lay each season, by the management of the bee-keeper, her removal at the close of her second season appears to be a matter of necessity, if the colony is to be kept up to a proper standard of strength.
During manipulations in the summer, a bee-keeper may have the misfortune to crush or drop a queen outside the hive. Deprived of its queen the colony will naturally diminish in numbers, and would ultimately die out were it not for the fact that at such times there are eggs in the worker cells. From these eggs, as has already been stated, if they are deposited in queen cells, queens will be produced. It is, therefore, only necessary for the bees, upon the loss of a queen, to produce another from an egg in a worker cell. As the grub will require more space for full development than a worker cell provides, the cell walls, around the egg, or grub, are cut down, and then over the larger space thus given a queen cell is built. The grub then receiving exactly similar treatment to that of a grub in an ordinary queen cell, will be converted into a perfect queen in from twelve to sixteen days. The difference in the time of issue from the cell is regulated mainly by the age of the egg or grub on the loss of the queen. Queens should be raised from a newly-hatched egg, or a grub not more than a day old, in order that it can have full and proper treatment. Unless the queen accompanies the swarm, she only leaves the hive once during her life, and that is four or five days after she issues from the cell, for the purpose of mating with a drone or male bee. If successful in her wedding flight she will in about forty-eight hours be found depositing eggs in worker cells.
Drones (Fig. 3) are the male bees, and they are easily distinguished from the workers by their large size, and, when flying, by their loud hum. They are produced in twenty-five days from an unfertilised egg deposited by the queen in the larger horizontal or drone cells. Drones appear early or late according to the season and the strength of the colony, usually about April. They are particularly numerous in cottagers' apiaries, where thousands are to be found, although as many hundreds would be ample. They are often known as the lazy bees and great consumers of honey, consequently their production should in all well-managed apiaries be limited. This is an easy task to the bekeeper who uses " foundation," for with that valuable aid to success he can in a day or two ensure combs of worker cells only. The drones are only allowed to exist during the summer months ; and as soon as the honey-flow is over the bees turn them out of the hive to die.
Very frequently a massacre of drones takes place earlier in the season, but this is a sign that food is running short owing to unfavourable weather ; and if in addition to the turning out of the drones white grubs are found outside the hive, that circumstance may be taken as a sign that food is absolutely necessary to save the stock, if not from actual starvation, at any rate from being rendered practically useless for the season. The weight of a stock at such times is not a safe guide to the amount of stores, as the hive may be weighty in consequence of the presence of a large quantity of brood in various stages.
## Workers or Neuters.
Workers (Fig. 4), or as they are sometimes termed _neutters_, are really undeveloped females. As such they have not the power normally of egg-laying. The worker is produced in twenty-one days from an egg deposited in one of the small horizontal cells. Upon bees of this class devolves the work of the hive. For the first fortnight or thereabouts of their existence, they remain at home, preparing, in their capacity of nurses, the food for the grubs and queen. When this duty ceases, a work commences that, comparatively speaking, soon terminates their existence. Henceforward the worker bees labour unceasingly from morning to night, weather permitting, in gathering nectar and pollen from honey-producing flowers. The life of a worker bee is in the summer time at the most only seven or eight weeks, the average length of life being forty-six days. Those bees which are hatched in the autumn, say, in September, and having little work to do, will, as a rule, pass through the winter and come out strong and vigorous in the spring.
## Fertile Workers.
It occasionally happens that when a queen dies or is killed, and the bees have not the power, for want of worker eggs, to replace her with another queen of their own raising, a worker is found to have the power of egg-laying. This is thought to result from the bees hatched near queen cells having, when in their larval state, received a share of the queen jelly, as the food administered to the queen is termed ; but whatever may be the cause of so extraordinary a change in their functions, they are useless for the reproduction of species, as the eggs they lay only produce drones.
The presence of a fertile worker in a hive may be detected by the irregular manner in which she deposits her eggs in the cells, and also by the fact that the eappings of the worker cells will be found to project when the bees begin sealing over the grubs which will produce drones.
A stock may be freed from a fertile worker by taking the hive some distance away from the site it occupies, and then shaking all the bees from the combs. In a queenless hive all bees, except the fertile workers, fly daily. Therefore, when they are shaken from the frames, they will return to their old site, while the fertile worker will be rendered homeless and meet with her fate if she attempts to enter any other hive.
## Chapter 4. _Natural Increase_.
**Egg-Production.**
Ir a strong colony be examined early in the new year the centre combs will be found to contain small patches of brood. These are extended as the season advances, provided there is an ample supply of food, until by the time of the honey-flow the queen is laying over two thousand eggs daily.
The first eggs of the season are deposited in the small horizontal cells, and, after being exposed to the heat of the hive, they hatch in three days, a small white grub appearing. The grubs are then fed by the nurse bees, with a food composed of honey and pollen, for five days, by which time they will have increased in size to such an extent that they almost fill the cells. The bees then cover the mouths of the cells with a capping, differing from that placed over honey in that it is not air-tight. Behind the capping the grub is gradually transformed into the perfect insect, which eats its way out of the cell in about thirteen days, or twenty-one days in all from the laying of the egg. The queen continues to deposit eggs in the worker cells until the hive is becoming crowded with worker bees,then eggs -- unfertilised -- are placed in the larger horizontal or drone cells from which issue drones in twenty-five days.
Later on, as the population of the hive gradually increases, and there is no more room for workers or drones, cells shaped somewhat like an acorn are built on the lower edges of the combs, and in these the queen deposits eggs exactly like those placed in the worker cells ; but in consequence of the grub being supplied with a food richer in the nitrogenous element contained in pollen, and greater in quantity than that supplied to the worker grubs, and also because the cell gives more space for full development of the organs, in sixteen days a perfect queen issues.
Swarming.
When, for want of room, the bees form queen cells it will not be many days before a part of the population of the hive leaves for a new home. This exodus is known as swarming, and it usually takes place as soon as the new queen cells are sealed over. When the bees leave the hive they are accompanied by the queen, and they fly about in the air until some begin to settle on the branch of a tree or elsewhere. In a very short time a large cluster is formed, which should be dislodged and placed where it is to stand for the rest of the season.
Hiving the swarm is not a difficult operation, unless the bees, instead of forming, as they usually do, a large pear-shaped cluster hanging from the branch of a tree, spread themselves round the trunk, or choose some other place from which they cannot easily be transferred into the skep. Presuming that the swarm is hanging from the branch of a tree, a skep should be held in the left hand under the cluster, while the right hand is used to shake the branch sharply and thus cause all or the bulk of the bees to fall into the skep. Many bees will doubtless fly about in the air, but the skep must at once be turned over gently, and placed either on the ground, if the bees clustered on a low branch, or on a table, if higher on the tree. Under one side of the skep must then be placed a stone or brick to give access for the bees flying about, and also for ventilation, which will be much needed, as the temperature of the cluster is very high during the commotion which ensues. The queen must be secured in the skep, otherwise the bees will return to the branch. When the bees cluster round the hive and some form themselves into lines at the entrance fanning with their wings we may conclude that the queen is safe inside.
Should the bees desert the skep and return to the tree the operation must be repeated. There may still be several bees flying about the spot and settling on the branch. This is because of the scent left behind. As soon, therefore, as the swarm is lived, that part of the tree upon which the bees settled should be well syringed with water ; or a few handfuls of soil should be thrown over it to destroy the scent. As soon as the swarm has been safely lived the skep should be moved carefully to its stand, there to remain unless it is to tenant an "Ivo " or movable-comb hive. In either case re-hiving had better be deferred until evening, as swarms when much disturbed during a not day occasionally take flight and may be lost to the bee-keeper.
In living swarms it is of the utmost importance that the skeep should not be left in the rays of the sun, or the great heat may cause the bees to leave their temporary home. If the swarm must remain for some time where it has been hived, and cannot be placed in the shade, a white sheet should be thrown over the skeep, except on the shady side where the bees enter.
It is also advisable, supposing the swarm to settle half a mile, more or less, away from the apiary, to bring it home as soon as the bees have become settled in the skeep; for as soon as clustering is completed the bees will be busy for the rest of the day, going to and fro in search of nectar, and the following morning after their first journey to the fields they will return to the spot they had become accustomed to the previous day. If, however, the hive had been taken home the previous night many bees would be lost; and the loss might be great, in case a storm came on while they were clustering on the ground, where the skeep had been placed the day before.
Casts.
"A swarm of bees in May
Is worth a load of hay:
Is worth a silver spoon;
Is not worth a fly."
The above familiar rhyme will be admitted by most bee-keepers to be near the truth, so far as the first two lines are concerned ; but the other lines convey information that is far from correct, for casts or afterswarms may be and often are of great value. In the first place they are headed by a young queen, which is a matter of prime importance, and, if the bees are fairly numerous, a fair amount of surplus may be gathered during the honey-flow.
After a swarm has issued from a stock the latter is queenless for eight days, at the end of which period the young queens commence to issue from their cells. The first to appear will endeavour to reach the cells containing the other queens for the purpose of killing them ; if prevented she makes a peculiar noise, which may often be heard by the bee-keeper. This " people, people," heard on the evening of the eighth day, has long been taken as an almost sure sign that on the marrow a second swarm or cast will issue.