The Outfit Needed
In addition to the colonies of bees properly hived, the beekeeper needs some other equipment. This chiefly consists of a small house in which to prepare the equipment and extract the honey, keep miscellaneous tools for fitting out the apparatus, and usually an automobile truck for moving bees and honey. It is usually not profitable to keep more than 100 colonies in one apiary. It therefore becomes essential to rent or buy small tracts of land—about 4 miles apart—so that 100 colonies may be kept in each place. This necessitates moving supplies and from time to time colonies of bees. For this a small 1-ton truck is preferred by most commercial beekeepers. At first necessary hauling may be hired. The home apiary is usually best equipped, and frequently it is the practice to haul in the honey to the home apiary after extracting. Many use a small auto for this service. Another plan is to have an extracting house rigged up on a trailer to the auto or truck, so that it may be moved from place to place as needed. Usually the only labor employed at the time of extracting is unskilled, but if your disability is troublesome when preparing for winter or in doing other work, you can hire such help as you may need. Even during the swarming season you may hire somebody to take down the hives while you examine the combs for queen cells and perform the various operations necessary for swarm control.