The six essential factors in securing a good crop of surplus honey having been discussed in Chapter II (Six Essential Factors In Profitable Honey Getting And How To Provide Them), it is now necessary to consider the method of management which will put these essential factors into operation.

Definitions Of Terms Used In This Book

1. A method of management is a general plan which may include several systems of management based on the principles which distinguish that method of management from another, as (1) the "let alone" method or (2), the CLEAR BROOD NEST METHOD.

2. Brood chamber may be one or more hive bodies in which the brood nest is located.

3. Brood nest is that part of a brood chamber in which the queen lays eggs and in which the young bees are reared.

4. CLEAR BROOD NEST is one which always has enough clear, usable worker cells to permit the queen to lay freely during those parts of the year when her offspring will be valuable to the operator.

All methods of management may be classified under (1) the "let alone" method or (2) the "CLEAR BROOD NEST" method.

The Let Alone Method

This is a system of management in which the operator does not intentionally confine the queen to a certain part of the hive, but allows her to have free range as far as colony conditions permit, through the brood chambers and supers. She may be unintentionally confined and restricted in egg laying space by poor combs, by storage of nectar or honey in the brood combs, or by too few supers.

Although honey may be produced with the queen moving freely through the hive and establishing a brood nest anywhere, this method has little place in commercial honey getting. It is the one followed by the man who does little more than place bees in a good location, put on plenty of supers, take off honey, and market it. He hopes, by little attention, and by keeping many colonies, to get a large amount of honey with low per colony production.

While sometimes successful, this method is also the one in which "bad luck" is most often experienced. Seemingly simple, it becomes complicated through crowded brood nests, poor combs, much swarming, poor crops, poor wintering, and all the ills that beekeeping is heir to, as well as by cross bees which become a nuisance and a danger except in isolated locations.

Operators using this method usually brush or shake bees from combs in great haste, injuring many, and surrounding themselves with a cloud of angry, stinging insects, ready to pounce on any exposed honey as soon as a hive is opened. Robbing is prevalent and any disease is spread rapidly. It is becoming difficult to obtain locations where bees can be handled in this rough way; whereas the beekeeper who keeps his bees as gentle as he would if he lived in a city, experiences little difficulty in securing his choice of locations.

The let alone method may be successful by chance, or when an expert operator uses it in locations where its use will not interfere with friendly associations with his neighbors.