Rational Bee-Keeping and the Prevention of Acarine Disease

By A. M. Sturges

"Rational Bee-Keeping and the Prevention of Acarine Disease" is a vintage handbook on bee-keeping with a special focus on the ailments and diseases of bees. It aims to outline the basic principles of keeping bees for the amateur, and presents a wealth of useful information and tips for successful hive management. This handbook is highly recommended for modern readers with a practical interest in keeping bees. Many vintage books such as this are becoming increasingly scarce and expensive. This book has been selected for reproduction due to its educational importance, and we are proud to be republishing it now in an affordable, modern, high-quality edition complete with a specially commissioned new introduction on Bee-keeping.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Home Farm Books
• Release date: Sep 21, 2017
• ISBN: 9781473342538

Book preview

Rational Bee Keeping

and the

Prevention of Acarine Disease

by

A. M. Sturges

Copyright © 2013 Read Books Ltd.

This book is copyright and may not be reproduced or copied in any way without the express permission of the publisher in writing

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Bee Keeping

Beekeeping (or apiculture, from Latin: apis ‘bee’) is quite simply, the maintenance of honey bee colonies. A beekeeper (or apiarist) keeps bees in order to collect their honey and other products that the hive produces (including beeswax, propolis, pollen, and royal jelly), to pollinate crops, or to produce bees for sale to other beekeepers. A location where bees are kept is called an apiary or ‘bee yard.’ Depictions of humans collecting honey from wild bees date to 15,000 years ago, and efforts to domesticate them are shown in Egyptian art around 4,500 years ago. Simple hives and smoke were used and honey was stored in jars, some of which were found in the tombs of pharaohs such as Tutankhamun.

The beginnings of ‘bee domestication’ are uncertain, however early evidence points to the use of hives made of hollow logs, wooden boxes, pottery vessels and woven straw baskets. On the walls of the sun temple of Nyuserre Ini (an ancient Egyptian Pharo) from the Fifth Dynasty, 2422 BCE, workers are depicted blowing smoke into hives as they are removing honeycombs. Inscriptions detailing the production of honey have also been found on the tomb