BEE-spoke-data/bees-v0 huggingface dataset:
In the early '60's the honey-extractor and comb foundation were brought out. These, together with the invention of the movable frame, lifted bee culture up to a plane where there was " money in it." Very soon a large number were keeping anywhere from fifty to one hundred colonies. Others began to have a series of out-npiaries running anywhere from five hundred to three thousands colonies. In the meantime bee-supply factories sprang up all over the United States. Thousands and thousands of queen-bees were reared and sentthrough the mails, to improve stock. Periodicals on bees came into existence; the old _American Bee Journal_, edited by the lamented Samuel Wagner, a contemporary of Langstroth, did much to expound the nex principles in the early days of modern bee culture. Shortly after, _Gleanings in Bee Culture_, edited by A. I. Root, came into existence. A devoted follower of Langstroth, he threw his whole soul into the keeping of bees. So ardenit was his enthusiasm that his little quarterly, and shortly after a monthly, grew amazingly; and, even after the editorial management was transferred from father to sons, as noted in the preface, it continued to grow until it now has a circulation of over thirty-three thousand copies. It has passed from the stage of a small monthly to a dignified illustrated magazine issued twice a month.
The honey business continued to develop from small beginnings so that there was a total aggaegte of from one hundred and fifty to one hundred and seventy-five million pounds of honey produced and marketed annually in the l'United states. These figures can scarcely be comprehended; but if this amount were all loaded into freight-cars it would make a s-lid triupload, without a break, something like fifty miles long. Some states, in good years, notably California, have been known to produce as much as five and even six hundred cars in a season. Other States will produce anywhere from one hundred to two
hundred; but in most of the Eastern States the amount produced is sold locally, so that it does not show up in carloads as it does in some of the Western States, particularly those in the alfalfa and mountain-sage districts; and it may be said that the amount of honey that is annually produced at the present time in the arid and mountainous districts is very small in comparison with what probably will be produced in years to come. The new irrigation projects, both state and national, will make room for immense averages of alfalfa, and this will doubtless mean in the near future a trebling of the amount of this beautiful honey.
In addition to the large amount of literature on bees that is being distributed, there are numerous local and State bee-keepers' societies that hold bee conventions in various parts of the country, and some of these are affiliated with the National Bee-keepers' Association with a membership of nearly twenty-five hundred.
Besides these different organizations there have been held various field-day exhibitions in different parts of the country. At a recent one held in Jenkintown, near Philadelphia, at the apiary belonging to the authors of this work, over a thousand people interested in bee culture were present to witness the various operations in the handling of bees.
But this is not all. So great has been the growth of the bee-keeping industry that even our national government is giving substantial recognition to the business. The Bureau of Entomology of the United States Department of Agriculture sets aside some thing like nine thousand five hundred dollars per annum for the study of apiculture. Some five or six trained experts are devoting their whole time to the study of bees, including one bacteriophage, who is giving his entire attention to the investigation of bee diseases. In addition to all this, many State agricultural colleges and experiment stations are giving more or less attention to the subject\(-\)so much so that bee culture has come to be recognized as one of the great national industries.
Honey is now found on the tables of nearly all of our best families. A large percentage of the cakes and cookles now manufactured by some of the extensive baking companies contain honey, for it has been found that honey is not only a sweetener but a preservative as well. As an indication of the large amount of honey used for the purpose, it may be interesting to note in this connection that the National Biscuit Company is said to have placed an order for one hundred ears of honey. We have also been informed that the independent bakers have formed an association to buy honey and other supplies. This organization buys for its members anywhere from ten to twenty-five carloads of honey at a time. Honey is also used in a large way by the makers of soft drinks. They require a sweet that has plenty of flavor, and honey fills the bill.
Beeswax, of which there are now annually hundreds of tons produced, is now used in the arts and sciences as it never was before; and while paraffine and ceresine have to a limited extent taken its place, yet there is a peculiar quality about the product from the hives that makes it far superior to these mineral waves. The very fact that it can command two or three times the price of its inferior competitors gives some idea of its value.
But there is an ethical as well as a commercial side to bee culture that should be mentioned. Thousands of people all over the world have found health and happiness in the keeping of bees; for, be it noted, they may be kept in any back yard in any climate, and yield not only a large amount of pleasure but profit as well. Many thousands more make bee-keeping a side issue in connection with some other business or profession, and who, by such work as this, are enabled to increase their already modest income, thus making a comfortable living.
In addition to all this, the study of bees opens up a new world and a new science. The professional and business man finds that he can give his fagged brain a rest and a respite from the cares of the day. It is no small wonder, then, that the A B C of 1877, of 200 pages in the early days, should find so extensive a demand for it that it should not only be increased in size, but reach the enormous sale of 131,000 copies.
If there was ever a rural pursuit that made greater progress in half a century in this country than bee culture the writer does not know it; and yet many are so optimistie that they believe the industry is only in its infancy.
Jan. 1, 1908.
[_Note._--Strangely enough, some of our A BC school acts have attempted to take up each subject in this work in its consecutive order. As this is a cyclopedia on bee culture it should not move the read in this manner than a dictionary or a cyclopedia. As a guide to the beginner we would suggest that be take for his course of reading the following subjects in the order named: beginning with Bess Hives Franes, how to Mapulate; Aacep M. Bess; Susses; Robins A. Ajtaiev; Tasserringring, Nuclia; Pribribson; Swashington and Ascasoning or Swarups; Cornflower; Estradson Honey; Opensens; Green's-Harving; Dehting; Wy Wyithong; Other subjects may be taken up as deemed best, for then the learner will be able to read anything in the book understandings.
## 2 Absounding Swarms
Perhaps nothing is more aggravating in bee culture than to have our bees all on a sudden abscond for parts unknown, without so much as stopping to give us a parting word of "fare-well", or a single token of recognition of the debt they owe us, in the shape of gratitude for our past kindinesses in providing them with a home, shelter, etc. Perhaps no part of animated creation exhibits a greater love of home than does the honey-bee. No matter how humble or uninviting the surroundings, bees seem much attached to their home ; and as they parale in front of their doorway after a hard day's work, plainly indicate that they have a keen idea of the rights of owner-hip, and exhibit a willingness to give their lives freely, if need be, in defense of their hard-earned stores. It is difficult to understand how they can ever be willing to abandon it altogether, and with such sudden impulse and common consent. No matter if they have never seen or heard of such a thing as a hollow tree, but have for innumerable bee generations been domesticated in hives made by human hands, none the less have they that instinctive longing that prompts them to seek the forest as soon as they get loose from the chains of domestication. It is possible that the bees,us they go out foraging, keep an eye out for desirable places for starting new homes, and it may be that they have the hollow trees picked out some time before they decide to leave. Many incidents have been reported that pretty clearly show this to be the ease. We once found our bees working strongly on a particular locality about a mile and a half from the apjary, where the white clover was blooming with most unusual luxviance. Very soon after, a colony swarmed, and the bees, after pouring out of the hive, took a direct line for a tree in this clover-field, without so much as making any attempt to cluster at all. Did they not figure out the advantage of having only a few rods instead of over a mile to carry their honey, after having patiently gathered it from the blossoms, little by little? Perhaps it will be well to remark here, that it is very unusual for a swarm to go to the woods without clustering; the bees usually hang from 15 minutes to an hour, and many times several hours; in fact, we have known them to hang over night; but perhaps it would be well to take care of them inside of 15 or 20 minutes if we would make sure of them. Long before swarming-time, hives should all be in readiness, and they should also be located near where the new colony is to stand. If one is going to have a model apiary, he should not think of waiting until the bees swarm before he lays it out, but take time by the forelock, and with careful deliberation decide where every hive shall be before it is peopled with bees, if he would keep ahead and prevent his bees from taking "French leave."
But they sometimes leave, even after they have been carefully lived in modern hives on frames of foundation. If the swarming mania gets well under way in a bee-yard, a swarm is more apt to come out the second time, even when hired in a new location in a different hive, than where there is only a very little swarming. It was once thought that giving a frame of unsealed brood to these second-time absconders would hold them. While this, no doubt, acts as a restrainer, yet when a swarm leaves its new quarters we would recapture it, hive it back into the hive, and then carry hive, bees, and all down cellar and keep them there several days until they get over their mania. They may then be set out on their permanent summer stands.
The plan of holding the bees with unsealed brood does very well if one can get them into the hive ; but it is necessarily somewhat like the one of catching birds with a handful of salt; how are we to obviate losing the occasional swarm that goes off without clustering at all? or the quite frequent cases of coming out unobserved, or
## Absounding Swarms.
when no one is at home? We are happy to say there is a very certain and safe remedy for all cases of first swarming, in having the wings of the queen clipped so she can not _ily_; this plan is in very general use, and answers excellently for all first swarms; but, alus: the after-swarms are the very ones that are most apt to abscond, and we can not clip the wings of _their_ queens, because they have not yet taken their wedding-light. What shall we do? In the first place, second or after swarms should _not be allow_. If the parent hive, after it has cast its first swarm, is treated as recommended under the head of Aftei Swarns, there will be no further swarming from that colony for that season. We recommend the Heddon method. See page 1.
Clipping the wings of the queen or putting on drone-traps (see Drones) will prevent losing first swarms by absconding, it is true; but it does not always prevent losing the queen. She goes out with the bees as usual, and, after hopping about in front of the hive, sometimes gets ready to go back at about the same time that the bees do, after having discovered she is not in the crowd. Even if she gets some little distance from the hive, the loud hum they make as they return will guide her home many times; but unless the apiralist is at hand at such times to look after affairs, many queens will be lost, and the bees will rear a lot of young queens, and go into after-swarming in good earnest, making even the first swarm an "after-swarm. \(\Lambda\) (terman friend, who knows little of bee-enlure, once told us our bees were swarming, and if we did not ring the bells, etc., they would certainly go to the woods. As we quietly picked up the queen in passing the hive, we told him if they started to go away, we would call them back. sure enough, they did start for the woods, and had gone so far that we really began to be frightened ourselves, when, away in the distance, we saw them suddenly wheel about, and then return to the hive at our very feet. While he gave us the credit of having some supernatural power over bees, we felt extremely glad we had taken precautions to clip all our queens' wings but a few days before. After this we felt a little proud of our control over these wayward insects,until a fine swarm of Italians started off under similar circumstances, and, despite our very complement, positive remarks, to the effect that they would soon come home, they went off and stayed "off." In a humbler, and, we dare say, wiser frame of mind, we investigated, and found they had joined with a very small third swarm of black bees, and had just come from one of the neighbor's hives. We tried to "explain," but it required a five-dollar bill to make matters so clear that we could carry back our rousing swarm of yellow bees, and sort out the black unfertile queen, that they might be made to accept their own. Thus you see how many a slip there is, in bee culture, between cup and lip, and how very important it is that you keep posted, and also "post" yourself in some conspicuous place near or in the apiary if you allow natural swarming, and do not want your golden visions--and bees--to take to themselves wings and fly away.
Abscoding for want of food. Perhaps bees oftener desert their hives because they are short of stores than from any other cause; and many times, in the spring, they seem to desert because they are nearly out. They issue from the hive, and alight in a tree very much like a normal swarm during the swarming season. The remedy, or, rather, preventive, for this state of affairs, is so plain we hardly need discuss it. After they have swarmed out, and are put back into the hive, give a heavy comb of sealed stores; if that can not be obtained, feed them a little at a time, until they have plenty, and be sure that they have brood in the combs. If necessary, give them a comb of unsealed larvae from some other hive, and then feed them until they have a great abundance of food. One should be ashamed of having bees also for want of food.
Absounding in early sprung. This seems to occur just at a time when we can ill afford to lose a single bee; and, worse still, only when our stocks are, generally, rather weak, so that we dislike the idea of losing any of them. In this case they do not, as a general thing, seem to care particularly for going to the wo.ds, but rather take a fancy to pushing their way into some of the adjoining hives,and, at times, a whole apiary will seem so eray with the idea as to become utterly demorized.
A neighbor, who made a lobby of small hives--less than half the usual size--one fine April day had as many as 40 colonies leave their hives and cluster together in all sorts of promiscuous combinations. To say that their owner was perplexed, would be stating the matter very mildly.
Similar cases, though perhaps not as bad, have been reported from time to time, ever since novices commenced to learn the sciences of bee culture; and although cases of
## Absounding swarms.
swarming out in the spring were known once in a great while before the recent improvements, they are nothing like the main that has seemed to possess entire apirales--small ones -- since the time of artificial swarming, honey-extractors, etc. We would by no means discourage these improvements, but only warn beginners against making too much haste to be rich. We would not commence dividing our bees until they are abundantly strong. They should go into winter quarters with an abundance of sealed honey in tough old combs as far as may be ; and should have hives with walls thick and warn, of some porous material, such as chaff or straw, with a good thickness of the same above, and we shall have little cause to fear any trouble from bees absconding in the spring.
Absonding sucleus swarms.
A very small nucleus--if it contains no more than a couple of hundred bees--is liable to swarm out. Queen-breders, in attempting to mate queens in baby nuclei containing only one or two section-boxes, had considerable trouble in keeping the bees in the hive, especially when the young queen went out to mate. Accordingly it was found necessary to make the baby hives much larger, with frames 5%x8 inches, and two nuc'el to a hive. See Queen-rearing. With these there is not much trouble from swarming out, providing that they are well supplied with bees, some brood, and honey.
Assounding for more satisfactory quartees.
There is still another kind of absorbing that seems to be for no other reason than that the bees are displeased with their hive, or its surroundings, and, at times, it seems rather difficult to assign any good reason for their having suddenly deserted. We have known a colony to swarm out and desert their hive because it was too cold and open, and we have known them to desert because the combs were soiled and lithly from dysettery in the spring. They _own_own_ swarm out because they are out of stores, and this generally happens about the first day in spring that is sufficiently warm and sunny. We have known them to swarm out because their entrance was too large, and, if we are not mistaken, because it was too small.
We have also known ten to swarm out because they were so "'pested" with a neighboring ant-hill--seAts--that they evidently thought patience ceased to be a virtue.
## After-swarming.
Absonding in the spring.
They often swarm out in spring where no other cause can be assigned than that they are weak and discouraged, and in such cases they usually try to make their way into other colonies. While it may not always be possible to assign a reason for such behavior with medium or fair colonies, we may rest assured that good strong colonies, with ample supplies of sealed stores, seldom, if ever, go into any such foolishness.
By way of summing up, it may be well to say: If you would not lose your bees by natural swarming, clip the wings of all queens as soon as they commence laying; then look to them often, and know what is going on in the apirary every day during the swarming season; if you would not have runaway swarms in the spring, and while queens are being fertilized, confine your experiments to peels of bees instead of pints.
**Additeration of Honey.** See Honey Adulteration.
**After-swarming.**--We might define this by saying that all swarms that come out, or are led out by a vriboin queen, are termed after-swarms; and all swarms that come out within eight or fifteen days after the first swarm are accompanied by such queens. There may be from one all the way up to a half-dozen or even more, depending on the yield of honey, amount of brood or larvae, and the weather; but whatever the number, they are all led off by queens reared from one lot of queen-cells, and the number of bees accompanying them is, of necessity, less each time. The last one frequently contains no more than a pint of bees, and, if hived in the old way, would be of little use under almost any circumstances; yet when supplied with combs already built and filled with honey, such as every enlightened apirist should always keep in store, they may be made the very best of colonies, for they have young and vigorous queens, and often are equal to any in the apirary the next season.
There is one very amusing feature in regard to these after-swarms. When they have decided to send out no more swarms, all the young queens in the hive are sent out, or, it may be,allowed to go out with the last one ; and every few days during the swarming season, some "'new hand "writes as about the wonderful fact of his having found three or four, or it may be a half-dozen queens in one swarm. On one occasion, a friend, who weighed something over 200,AFTER-SWARMING.
AFTER-SWARMING.
'-survival of the fittest " being, of course, a hot July day to have a very small third swarm. He soon came down, in breathless taste, to inform us that the swarm was _all queens_; and, in proof of it, brought two or three in his closed-up hands.
Years ago after-swarming was considered a sort of necessary evil that had to be tolerated because it could not be obviated ; but in no well-regulated apiay should it be allowed. Many consider it good practice to permit one swarm--the first one. After that all others are restrained. Cutting out all the queen-cells but one may have the effect of preventing a second swarm; but the practice is objectionable--chiefly because one _can not be sure_ that he destroys all but one. If there are two cells the occupant of one of them, when she latches, is likely to bring out an after-swarm; indeed, we may say that, as long as there are young queens to match, there are likely to be after-swarms up to the number of three or four.
But the practical honey-producers of today consider cell-cutting for the prevention of these little swarms as waste of time, although they may and do cut out cells to prevent prime or first swarms. There are some who deem it advisable to prevent swarming altogether. The plan usually adopted to prevent second swarms is about as follows:
The wings of all queens in the apiay should be clipped, or else there should be entrance-guards over the colonies. As soon as the first swarm comes forth, and while the bees are in the air, the queen, if clipped, is found in front of the entrance of the old hive. She is caged, and the old hive is lifted out the old stand, and an empty one containing frames of foundation or empty combs is put in its place. A perforated zinc honey-board is next put on top, after which, the supers, now on the old stand. The queen in her cage is placed in front of the entrance, and the old hive is next carried to an entirely new location. In the mean time the swarm returns to find the queen at the old stand; and when the bees are well started to running into the entrance she is released, and allowed to go in with them. Most of the old or flying bees that happen to be left in the old colony, now on the new location, will go back to the old stand to strengthen further the swarm. This will go uponplate the parent colony that there will hardly be bees enough left to cause any after-swarming, and the surplus of young queens will have to fight it out among themselves--the's survival of the fittest " being, of course, the only one left. She will be mated in the regular way, and the few bees with her will not, of course, follow her, as there will not be enough of them to make a respectable after-swarm.