BEE-spoke-data/bees-v0 huggingface dataset:
The production of bulk comb honey has been of a gradual development and a healthy growth until it has developed into an industry of no little-importance. While, undoubtedly, the conservative element will regard its advent as a sort of innovation that it is their duty to squelch in its infancy, progressive bee-keepers will recognize the advent of the product as one of the most important adjuncts to bee-keeping of modern times. When viewed from the standpoint of economy of labor and simplicity of equipment (the two most important factors in the cost of honey-production), the production of bulk comb honey offers great inducements to the bee-keepers, especially to those who are so situated that they can deliver their product direct to their patrons. When we consider that bulk comb honey can be produced on a large or small scale with much less expense for both labor and equipment than either extracted or section honey we can better comprehend its possibilities. As yet this branch of bee-keeping is chiefly carried on by Southern bee-keepers. There is no reason, however, why Northern bee-keepers should not profit by the rich experience of their Southern brethren. Of course, no one should rush blindly into an industry of which he knows very little. On the other hand, concerning what I have had to say upon this subject, as well as upon every other subject upon which this book deals, go slow; prove all things, and hold fast to that which is good.
## 10.4 Packages for Bulk Comb Honey.
For putting up bulk comb honey for market there is, perhaps, nothing better than the friction-top pails for a retail package, and the round jacketed five-gallon can, having a four-inch screw cap, for a wholesale package. From my limited experience, which has been confined to a home market, I do not favor the practice of mixing extracted with the bulk comb in the North, on account of the liability of the former to candy at the approach of cold weather; and nothing but strictly white, first-class honey should be offered in bulk. Off grades should be extracted and sold upon their merits. Extracted and bulk comb honey are two as distinctly separate products as are extracted and section honey; and a point that I wish to impress upon the minds of Northern bee-keepers is that it is a mistake to mix them promiscuously together in either case.
## 10.5 Extracted Honey and Bulk Comb Honey.
On account of its economy of production, as well as the difficulty in the past to control swarming in the production of comb honey, many bee-keepers have turned their attention to the exclusive production of extracted honey. As might reasonably be expected, that branch of bee-keeping has not only assumed vast proportions, but rapid strides have been taken toward advancement and reform along the line of the production of this important product of the apiary. It is safe to assume that in no other branch of bee-keeping has there been such marked improvement as in the methods and appliances of extracted-honey production, nor does the improvement end with methods and appliances for the greatest improvement of all; and the one most needed has been the improvement in the quality of the product. Extracted, on account of the convenience of handling without breakage, as well as low freight rates, will appeal to the specialist. However, we should not lose sight of the fact that this class of honey comes into direct competition with cheap syrups that have a tendency to keep prices of this product from advancing in proportion to that of comb honey. Add to this the fact that three consumers out of five will prefer comb honey, it should not be a difficult matter to understand that the correct solution of the market problem will not be found in the exclusive production of any one of the three kinds of honey mentioned.
Undoubtedly the time is not far distant, however, when the exclusive production of bulk comb honey will claim the attention of a large majority of the bee-keepers of the country. This should be evident from the fact that it can be produced at considerably less expense for both labor and equipment than either comb or extracted honey. Moreover, bulk comb honey will bring from \(2
icefrac{{1}}{{2}}\) to 3 cents more per pound than extracted.
## 0.7.4 Producing a Fancy Article of Extracted Honey.
One of the chief causes that will, perhaps, always act as a leverage to keep down the price of extracted honey is the inclination of unwise bee-keepers to extract before the honey has become thoroughly ripened and capped. Honey that is extracted before it is sealed, or honey ripened in open vessels, loses its essential oils by evaporation, while honey that is thoroughly ripened in the hive, extracted, and sealed up in air-tight containers immediately after it is taken out of the combs, will retain that delicious aromatic flavor that adds a peculiar charm to comb honey, and which, when once lost, can not be restored by any amount of evaporation.
**Bee-keeping by Twentieth Century Methods.** **53**
In order to produce a really fancy article of extracted honey, it is necessary to have a sufficient stock of empty combs to hold the season's crop, and leave them on the hives until the close of the season before extracting. Such a practice, generally followed, would go further to boom the price of extracted honey than thousands of dollars spent in advertising thin unripe nectar.
## 7 Expansion and Contraction.
**Expansion and contraction by means of shallow sectional hives is not without its peculiar advantages when practiced in connection with the new system--expansion up to the time of the honey-flow by giving the queen unlimited room for brood-rearing, and contraction at the beginning of the honey-flow by shifting the working force over into a single division of a sectional hive having full sheets of medium brood foundation in brood-frames, and full sheets of extra thin foundation in sections.**
**If an extracting-comb in which no brood has ever been hatched is placed on each side of the section-frames there will usually be no trouble from pollen in the sections. A second shift ten days after the first will re-enforce the swarm for a continuous honey-flow, and the extreme contraction of the brood-chamber will force practically all the honey into the sections.**
**The old queen is given to the swarm at the first shift, and the young bees in the parent hive are allowed to rear a queen. If no increase is desired, the single division of brood-chamber containing the swarm may be united with the parent colony at the close of the harvest. All that is required to do this is to place it on top of the old hive and throw the switch, shifting the returning bees over into the parent hive.**
**By this method swarming is held under perfect control; all the honey is stored in the sections, and every colony in the yard is requeened, and with very little manipulation. For comb-honey production and swarm control, in locations where the honey-flow comes from clover and basswood, followed by a fall flow, this method will give excellent results. If there is no fall flow it will be necessary to feed sugar syrup for winter stores which can be furnished for less than half the price of honey.**If increase is desired, another division of a brood-chamber is given to the swarm after work in the sections has nicely begun. This will not materially interfere with work in the supers if placed at the bottom next to the bottom-board. By this method out-apiaries can be run for comb-honey production with the minimum of labor, and swarming held under perfect control with a visit once in eight to ten days. When uniting the swarm with the parent colony the old queen should, of course, be removed.
## 55 Conveniences.
Convenience in manipulation involves the question of whether it is desirable to have our bottom-boards rest upon the ground or upon a stand five or six inches from the ground. There are some very good reasons why it would be well to have them a foot from the ground. First, one could manipulate them in a standing position, which is far preferable to sitting or kneeling. Second, they would be out of the reach of skunks, that do far more harm to bees than many suppose. Grass and weeds would be less likely to interfere with the entrances. On the whole we have about decided that, for our own use, our double-bottom-board equipment must be provided with legs ten or twelve inches long.
A box of smoker fuel and a box of matches, as well as a goodly supply of Dr. Miller's saltpetered rags, about complete the equipment of minor items. Of course, there should be bee-escapes on all windows, as well as a goodly number of Miller introducing-cages, wooden and wax cell cups, queen-cell protectors, etc. After having tried nearly all the different methods of lighting smokers we have come to regard Dr. Miller's saltpetered rags as about the best of all.
To prepare them, soak cotton rags in a solution of saltpeter and water, and hang them up to dry. When thoroughly dried, take a small rag, touch a lighted match to it, and drop it into the smoker, filling up with planer-shavings, rotten wood, chips, or whatever is most convenient, and the work is done. The rags will hang fire until the last scrap is consumed, during which time the fuel will have become ignited without extra effort in working the bellows. If the solution is too strong the rags will burn too rapidly. A little experience will determine the proper strength of the solution.
**Bee-keeping by Twentieth Century Methods.****55**
**Bee-ESCAPES.**
**Bee-keeping is largely made up of small details, and our success in honey-production will, in a great measure, depend upon how well we attend to them. One of the minor items of apiarian equipment that help to make things run smoothly is the Porter spring bee-escape, without which no equipment is complete. The day is past when bee-keepers can afford to remove surplus honey a frame at a time, meantime subjecting the bees to harsh and cruel treatment and blinding them with smoke and crippling thousands of bees by roughly brushing them from the combs. Such methods are unscientific, laborious, and of a most primitive nature, not at all in keeping with modern economical methods. The bee-escape turns the instinct of bees to the account of the bee-keeper by ridding the supers of bees automatically, and is right in line with twentieth-century methods of controlling bees.**
**QUEEN-EXCLUDING Honey-BOARDS.**
**Under the new system it will seldom be necessary to use Queen-excluders except for a few days after the first shift, and where contraction is practiced with sectional hives. As soon as work has nicely begun in the supers, and the brood-chamber has become established, they should be removed, except when producing extracted honey, when it is advisable, under the new system of controlling bees, to limit the queen to the brood-chamber.**
**Such an arrangement will insure a finer grade of honey, and will leave the colony in better condition at the close of the season. We want a brood-chamber for brood, and it is a source of annoyance to extract honey from combs that are partly filled with brood. Another objection to the scattering of brood promiscuously throughout the supers is that such supers can not be freed from bees by the use of bee-escapes, as they refuse to leave the brood. It is a mistake to suppose that
**Bee-keeping by Twentieth Century Methods.** **57**
**ing is allowed. Under the new system the use of drone-traps is limited to the legitimate purpose of trapping undesirable drones.**
**Bee-TENTS.**
**Since the bee-keeper (and especially the queen-breeder) is often compelled to work with his bees during a dearth of nectar when robber bees are prying around hunting for an opportunity to appropriate the sweets of exposed hives, a little carelessness at such times will soon cause a serious disturbance in the apiary that would most effectually put a stop to further manipulations with bees for that day, and perhaps cause no little inconvenience for several days afterward; for, let a robber once get a taste of stolen sweets from a certain hive, and it will continue to prowl around that hive for several days after, endeavoring by every means within its power to outwit the guards and gain an entrance. At such times it is very convenient to have a tent large enough to cover a hive and the operator. It should be six feet high, and covered with wire cloth or mosquito netting, except the top, which is left open. The operator stays inside and carries it about from one hive to another, setting it over the hive to be manipulated. When the manipulation is over, and the tent removed, every thing is in a normal condition and the robbers are outwitted. During these intermittent periods of a dearth of nectar it is advisable to use as little smoke as possible, and avoid undueexcitement of the bees, which has a tendency to throw them off their guard and give the robbers an advantage of which they are are ever on the alert to avail themselves.
It is also very convenient to have one or two small cages just large enough to set over a hive. These are covered over the top as well as the sides with wire screen, and are handy
to set over a hive that has been manipulated for a few minutes until the bees have regained their composure sufficiently to protect the entrance.
##### ROBBER-TRAPS.
As a rule, robbing is begun by a single bee, which is followed by others of the same hive until the whole colony is engaged in a free-for-all fight to gain access to the pillage hive. If taken at the beginning, quiet may be quickly restored by removing the colony that is being robbed and placing on its stand a robber-trap. In a few minutes all the robbers will be jailed, and quiet is again restored. The trap is simply a hive-body with the entrance closed, and a \(\mathcal{Y}_{4}\)-inch hole bored just above it. Over the hole, on the inside of the hive is tackeda conical bee-escape projecting inward two or three inches. The hole at the apex of the cone should be about the size of a common leadpencil. In five minutes every robber will have been caged, and should be speedily executed as the surest means of restoring peace and tranquillity in the apiary.
If two colonies are on a double switch-board, and one is being robbed, all that is necessary in order to give the robbers the surprise of their lives is to throw the switch, shutting off outward communication with the colony that is being robbed, and opening communication with the rousing colony by its side. The robbers will meet with a hot reception, and get their just dues in short order. In 24 hours the switch may be reversed, and all will be quiet and serene, for the robbers will either have been killed outright or \(80\) badly punished that they will give that entrance a wide berth in the future.
**THE HAND SWITCH-LEVER DOUBLE-BOTOM**
**BOARD; WHERE TO GET IT.**
Doubtless many will attempt to manufacture the equipment for their own use from the description given in this book, and some will, perhaps, condemn the system when the fault is in the improper construction of the equipment. For this and other reasons the inventor has thought it best to protect it by letters patent, and offer the equipment for distribution through his regular authorized agents. All inquiries relating to the equipment should be addressed to The A. I. Root Co., Medina, Ohio.
No one should attempt to manufacture the equipment, even for his own use, without a license from the inventor, accompanied with a sample board complete as a working model, as there are some points not clearly shown in the engravings. As a rule it will doubtless be cheaper for bee-keepers to buy the equipment from a supply-house equipped with modern machinery for the turning-out of accurate work; yet we do not wish to deprive those who are remote from shipping-points of the privilege of making the equipment for themselves. Individual rights will be granted at a nominal price, licensing the purchaser to manufacture the equipment for his own use, but not for sale. Applications for individual rights must be addressed to J. E. Hand, Birmingham, Ohio.
This book may be kept
FOURTEEN DAYS
A fine of TWO CENTS will be charged
for each day the book is kept overtime.
# **BEE-KEEPING IN ONTARIO.**
**The information contained in this report has been taken from answers to questions sent out in a circular to all the bee-keepers of the Province, dated May 15th, rgo8. While the Province has been fairly well covered by the reports received, there were over 1,500 bee-keepers who did not return the blanks sent to them. Until a greater proportion of those engaged in the industry take enough interest to answer the few questions asked, it will be impossible for the Department of Agriculture to prepare as full and accurate a report as is desired.**
**Of the reports received, only 10 per cent. answered that the industry was carried on at all extensively, and this percentage is perhaps high, as in some cases, more than one individual so reported in the same vicinity. Others noted that while the business was once in a. flourishing condition, the losses of the past two years had made a material change, and that now few large apiaries were left, while the smaller ones were in many cases wiped out of existence. The census report of rgo1 gave the Province a total of 116,403 colonies, but from the information at hand, this total for the present year must be decreased at least 33 per cent. to cover the heavy loss of 1907 and 1908. These changes will doubtless tend to keep up prices for the better quality of honey, and those who have any bees left should give them special attention, as the natural increase and the surplus honey gathered will both prove sources of profit at the present time.**
**Very little disease was reported. While the percentage of dysenter seems high, in every case the correspondent stated that the attack was slight, generally occurring in only one or two hives in an apiary. Of the instances where foul brood was reported, in only two cases was the attack a severe one. European Foil Brood'has appeared in the vicinity of Trenton in rather a virulent form, and has caused heavy losses in two apiaries.**
**The work of the six Inspectors appointed last year has shown itself favorably in the reports received, and the decrease in the disease has been evident. This year, the Province has been divided somewhat differently and the Inspectors' names. with their districts are as follows :--**
_W. A. Chrysler,_ **Chatham: Counties of Essex, Kent and Lambton.**
_John Newton,_ **Thamesford: Counties of Elgin and Middlesex.**
_D. Chalmers,_ **Poole: Counties of** **Perth** **and** **Huron.**
_Jas. Armstrong,_ **Cheapside: Counties of Norfolk, Oxford, Waterloo and Wellington.**
**[1]**_Wm. McEvoy_, Woodburn : Counties of Haldimand, Welland, Brant, Lincoln, Wentworth and Halton.
_H. G. Sibbald_, Claude : Counties of Bruce, Grey, Simcoe, Dufferin, Peel and Muskoka.
_J. L. Byer_, Mt. Joy : Counties of York, Ontario, Victoria and Durham.
From Northumberland east to the boundaries of the Province, a special Inspector will be sent out to look over the apiaries at every important point. At the present time outside of the outbreak of European Foul Brood at Trenton, the Department has no definite information in respect to the prevalence of foul brood or otherwise in most of this territory, and it has been thought advisable to select a man from elsewhere in the Province who is thoroughly conversant with the disease in all its stages to make a careful investigation in the east. All suspected apiaries will first be visited, and any bee-keepers wishing to clear up any doubt as to the presence of this disease in their apiaries should send word to the Department of Agriculture at an early date.
Apiarists in other districts should report all cases of suspected foul brood either direct to the Inspector for their district or to the Department of Agriculture, Parliament Buildings, Toronto.
Reports were received from every county in the Province, but those counties where bee-keepers' associations have been organized sent in by far the largest number of answers. Evidently these associations have proved of much assistance and encouragement to those engaged in the industry, this being shown in the greater number of reports received and the care taken in answering the questions submitted.
The following data have been taken from the information received :
apiaries will feel the loss most, as in the majority of cases almost every colony was wiped out. A great deal has been heard of the disastrous effects of foul brood and of the ravages attending this disease, but these have been trifling compared with the total losses of the past few seasons from other causes.
Much of the loss has been due to neglect and carelessness. The larger bee-keepers have specialized in this industry, and, being dependent upon it alone for their livelihood, have studied the requirements of their stock and have given their colonies the best attention. Many others have engaged in bee-keeping as a side line, and left the bees largely to themselves, except perhaps at the time of honey flow when they have taken off whatever surplus was available. Others, again, have kept from one to five colonies to produce enough honey for home use only, and these also have suffered for lack of proper attention, as their owners are generally too busy at the proper season with other farm labor to bother with them.
Yet, to the farmer who will make a business of keeping and looking after from to 25 or 50 colonies, a splendid profit may be made on the necessary investment. Like every other business, care and knowledge is required, and most of the latter can be gained only by experience. Small beginnings should be made and the natural increase under favorable conditions will soon give the number of colonies required. It must be understood that the profits are as great as from any other part of the farm, provided the same care is exercised in looking after the bees as is usually given to other stock or to the orchard. In addition to the crop of honey harvested, the bees are valuable adjuncts to the proper fertilization of blossoms in the orchard and in the alsike clover fields. They take nothing from the soil or other parts of the farm yet give handsome returns for their keep.
In many parts of the Province are districts now unoccupied by beekeepers, where larger apiaries could be kept with profit. Alsike, white clover, buckwheat, basswood and other honey producing crops are grown more or less everywhere, while in certain sections these occur in such abundance as to furnish large surpluses of honey in favorable seasons. By means of out-apiaries, from 200 to 300 colonies or over may be run in these places with good results by a person giving his time to this work.
Honey-producing crops have stood the winter well, and are growing luxurindy. The cool, wet spring, and subsequent hot weather, have brought forth rapid growth and all prospects indicate an abundance of clover bloom. Many fields intended for spring grains, but untouched owing to the wet land, will be planted to buckwheat, ensuring a good harvest of this honey later in the season. Altogether the outlook is very promising for a good yield of all kinds of honey to those who have by care and skill carried their bees through the past two unfavorable springs.
Owing to the tremendous losses during 1907, the total crop will be much reduced even if every colony should harvest a good average of both clover and buckwheat. This shortage combined with the rapidly increasing markets in the west will undoubtedly tend to keep up the prices to about what they were during the past season. This applies specially to the better grades, as the poorer grades are now being imported in large quantities, and can be laid down in Ontario at a very low price. As many of the careless bee-keepers have been cleaned out by disease and the cold springs, the quantity of the poorer grades will fortunately decrease. This should result in a better quality on the market and in increased consumption. Very little adulteration is being practised, and the reports of the Inland Revenue Department, Ottawa, have served to call attention to the excellent quality of our Ontario honey.