Bee-keeping Can Be Exacting But Fascinating

Lake County Mail, Issue 28, 3 December 1947, Page 9

Bee-keeping Can Be Exacting But Fascinating

Jane Sanderson of Quechee, Vermont, has long been recognised as one of Northern New England’s outstanding woman beekeepers. From the Vermont Beekeepers’ Association she has received an award for maintaining the largest colony of any woman beekeeper in the State; and she was runner-up in a nation-wide contest for a slogan to aid in increasing the crop of beeswax, sponsored by the American Beekeepers’ Journal during the war. Her interest 'in. bees, dates back to early childhood, when she played hide-and-seek behind the hives in a neighbour’s field. This neighbour showed Jane the eggs, explaining to her broodhatching and other interesting bee lore. About 15 years ago, then a busy housewife and the mother of two young children, Jane Sanderson turned to bee-keeping as a hobby, finding it both happily absorbing and a profitable sideline. Others Can Do It, Too She believes that other farm and village women can achieve an equal degree of success with bees, provided they are willing to give the same amount of time and attention to them that she does. “ Bee-keeping is an exacting business,” she says. “ One must be continually on the alert; you must do things at the right time. Furthermore, you must always be prepared for the unexpected and act quickly when it comes! ” At the very start, she strongly advises anyone • interested in bee-keeping to start with only one hive, in order to learn whether he or she can get along with bees; for it seems there arc people who do not —Mrs Sanderson’s husband, for example. “He can not take care of my bees,” she says, “ for they do not like him. However, if the bees like their keeper and are properly handled, stinging is almost negligible. Twoi Extractions of Honey Usually, two extractions of honey are made each year—one in July, the other in October. When the supers (upper part of the hives) are full, the frames are taken into the house where they are uncapped with an electrically heated knife (wax cappings are carefully saved. Then the frame is put into an tractor and whirled, first on one side then the other, until nearly dry. From the extractor, the honey goes to a strainer and bottler, then the filled jars are labelled and ready for customers. Always some comb honey is reserved for those who prefer it in that form. Finally, all wax is melted and sold. “ People always ask that! ” laughed Jane Sanderson when asked whether beekeepers take time off in the winter while the bees are asleep. They do not, “ Why, just keeping the snow away from the opening in front of each hive to let in the air can be almost a fulltime job! ” she explained. “You know we have a lot of snow up here in Vermont.” Nearly every spring, she. orders some

package bees from the south. These bees, with a queen, arc shipped in a wire cage, by express usually. In common with all beekeepers she listens eagerly for the welcome soqnd of humming as spring approaches. “It is just as much a part of the season,” she says, “ as early frogs or robins.” That loud hiim announces that the bees are out and starting to work on willow and maple blossom. “ This year,” she said, “ I removed the packing from my wintered-over bees on Easter Sunday, and they came out and started to work at once.”