This section is from the book "Bees For Pleasure And Profit", by Samson G. Gordon. Also available from Amazon: Bees for pleasure and profit; a guide to the manipulation of bees, the production of honey, and the general management of the apiary..
If the rent of the farm selected for the self-supporting home is fifteen or twenty dollars a month less than the apartment or house occupied in the city, remember that, after deducting the "Goodman's" commutation ticket, every cent for the first few months must be devoted to purchasing the nucleus of the stock which is to render the home self-supporting. After the hens, ducks, and pigeons are established, money can be devoted to guinea fowls and bees, two members of a farm colony which bring heavy loads of grist to the mill and demand little in return.
Few city people realize that apiculture has developed into a practical money-making industry during the last twenty years, until now the average amount of honey put on the market each year is upward of a hundred million pounds, representing a money value of from eight to ten million dollars.
In a favorable locality one hive, with its average colony of thirty-five thousand workers and a queen, will turn out from thirty to forty pounds of honey, besides the fifteen or twenty necessary to feed the hive through the winter.
A few hives, in an ordinary country district, should each bring in a clear two dollars a year profit at the lowest estimate. On a poultry and fruit farm where clover, sunflower and millet are grown for the poultry the yield of honey should be much larger, if the apiary is restricted to twenty or thirty hives. Their care will infringe but little on working hours; they feed themselves, so expense is confined to the necessary new hives for the fresh colonies, comb foundations and other equally small outlays.
If you commence by purchasing a colony and hive that has been well cared for during the winter, they will come out strong in the spring, the queen will start laying again, and each day thousands of bees will be born, soon causing the hive to be so vastly crowded that the old queen and a swarm will issue from the parent hive, leaving the young colony in possession of the home and stores.
If the old queen has had her wings properly clipped the season before, she will not be able to fly, so will be found on the ground near the hive with a group of bees around her and the principal swarm not very far away. Approach very quietly and place a small wire trap over the queen (the traps are sold by all bee supply firms and cost twenty-five cents, I think). Then place the trap in the opening of the hive you desire the swarm to occupy, cautiously approach the full swarm, and with a soft broom sweep the bees into the hive, if the position they occupy makes it possible, as in the picture; if not, use a box or pan and carry them to the hive and empty them in front. They will soon commence to occupy the new home. The slide of the queen trap can be opened and the bees inside will settle down to business. Should the queen not have been clipped the swarm may all go up in a tall tree, or even travel some distance and be lost, unless some one is watching. For this reason it is well to have the hives located in some place where they are easily seen from the house, and make a rule to have a close inspection once or twice a day during the early spring. When the swarming fever has taken possession of the occupants, you will notice bees going in and out of the hive in a state of excitement, a sort of bustle that will convey the information that something unusual is going on inside the hive.
You may wonder that I have said nothing about stings during this hiving process. The truth is, before leaving the old home, all the bees that are going out with the queen load themselves with so much honey to insure food for themselves and the royal mother, as well as with propolis-a sort of gummy varnish which they use to stop up cracks or cover rough surfaces-that they are rarely able to sting; but, if nervous, you can subject the main bunch to a few whiffs of smoke. A queen never uses her lance except on a rival queen. This condition, of course, does not obtain at other times, so before such work as removing and replacing sections or foundations, the smoker, a bellows-like arrangement, must be lighted. When burning freely, blow a few whiffs of smoke into the entrance and about the corners of the hive. This stupefies the bees and renders manipulation of them and invasion of their domain comparatively safe, though it is always advisable to wear a veil, made of mosquito netting, to fit on the hat and hanging well down on the shoulders. Gloves can also be worn. But the Italian bee, the best to keep, is such a gentle little creature that familiarity will end in the gloves being discarded.
After the abdicating queen and her following have left the old hive, there remain some few thousands of imperfectly developed females of mature age, called "workers," a few hundred males called "drones," a few thousand young workers, and many thousands of eggs reposing each in its own particular cell. The most perfect system of government prevails in the hive, each individual insect having alloted duties, which are apparently intuitively understood, accepted and conscientiously performed in unerring routine, from hour of birth. When the baby breaks from its cell it walks out into the busy world of the hive, and, after a few hours, dips into an unsealed cell of honey and sips its first meal; not, however, to be selfishly consumed by its own body, for the larger portion of this honey is secreted and, after a little, is converted into a predigested milky food, the quality of which this wonderful little nurse has the power of regulating as it wanders from cell to cell feeding the one to seven days-old larvae. Occupants of royal cells receive the most carefully digested food, next in quality come the workers, then the drones. At the end of six days the cells are capped over by workers with a paper-like surface, and the well-fed. worm-like occupant is left for eleven or twelve days, during which time it develops shape and strength to gnaw its way out. After the six or seven days of nursing duty come six or seven days of building combs, cleaning the hive, and then, being strong enough, the worker commences the arduous task of foraging.
 
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