Chap. 430.—An ACT to provide for the protection and promotion of the bee
industry in Virginia; to provide for the appointment of a State Apliarist
and bee inspectors ; to define the powers and duties of the State Entomologist,
State Apiarist and bee inspectors under the provisions of this act; to prescribe
penalties; and to repeal Chapter 444 of the Acts of the General Assembly
of 1924, approved March 21, 1924. [H B 203]

Approved April 1, 1938

1. Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Virginia, as follows:

Section 1. (a) The term “apiary” shall mean any place where
one or more colonies of bees are kept.

(b) The term “appliances” shall mean any apparatus, tools, ma-
chine, or other device, used in the handling and manipulating of bees,
honey, wax, and hives. It shall also include any container of honey
and wax which may be used in any apiary or in transporting bees and
their products and apiary supplies.

(c) The term “bees” shall mean any stage of the common honey
bee, Apis mellifera L.

(d) The term “bee diseases” shall mean American foulbrood or
any other disease pronounced detrimental to good bee-keeping by the
State Entomologist.

(e) The term “bee equipment” shall mean hives, supers, frames,
veils, gloves, comb, honey and equipment.

({) The term ‘‘colony” shall mean the hive and its appliances,
including bees, comb and equipment.

(g) The term “hive” shall mean frame hive, box hive, box, barrel,
log gum, skep or any other receptacle or container, natural or artificial,
or any part thereof, which may be used or employed as a domicile for
bees.

(h) The term “persons” shall mean individuals, associations, part-
nerships and corporations.

(i) The term “Queen Apiary” shall mean any apiary or premises
in which queen bees are reared or kept for sale or gift. Words used
in this act shall be construed to import either the plural or singular,
as the case may be.

Section 2, The Commissioner of Agriculture and Immigration is
hereby authorized and directed to appoint a competent State Apiarist,
who shall have adequate experience and training in practical bee keep-
ing, and who shall work under the direction and supervision of the
State Entomologist. The duties of the State Apiarist shall be to pro-
mote the science of bee keeping by education and other means, to in-
spect or cause to be inspected apiaries, bee hives, and bee keeping
equipment within the State. The State Entomologist is authorized
to appoint one or more competent assistants, if needed, with or without
pay, who shall be known as State bee inspectors. In the appointment
of such bee inspectors preference shall be given in so far as possible
to such individuals as have the recommendation of the local bee keep-
ers or an association of bee keepers. Upon the written request of one
or more bee keepers in any county of the State, the State Apiarist or
the inspector shall examine the bees in that locality suspected of being
affected with foulbrood or any other contagious or infectious diseases
of bees, and, if found to be affected, shall cause suitable approved meas-
ures to be taken for the eradication or control of such disease.

Section 3. For the enforcement of this act, the State Entomologist,
the State Apiarist and the State bee inspectors shall have authority
to enter upon any private or public premises, and shall have access,
ingress and egress to and from all apiaries or places where bees, combs,
or apiary appliances are kept, for the purpose of ascertaining the ex-
istence of the diseases known as American foulbrood or any other dis-
eases known to be dangerous or detrimental to good bee keeping ; and
if any of the said diseases exist in such apiaries it shall be the duty of
the State Apiarist or bee inspector, subject to the approval of the
State Entomologist, to declare such apiaries to be the center of a
quarantine zone, which zone shall extend three miles in every direction
from said center.

The owners of bees kept in box hives within such zone shall trans-
fer such bees to movable frame hives. Whenever any infectious or con-
tagious disease is found in any apiaries, or any owner of bees kept in
box hives in a quarantine zone fails to transfer such bees to movable
frame hives, or whenever in either case the owner of such apiaries or
bees fails or refuses to take such steps as may be prescribed by the
State Apiarist, to eradicate any infectious or contagious disease from
such apiaries or bees, the State Apiarist shall cause such bees together
with the hives, honey, and appliances to be destroyed in such manner
as he may deem best, after first giving to the owner of such bees, hives,
honey and appliances fifteen days notice thereof in writing and an
opportunity to be heard, and shall take such further steps as he may
deem necessary to prevent spread of the disease. Any such owner may,
within ten days from the receipt of such notice, appeal from the de-
cision of the State Apiarist to the circuit court of the county or cor-
poration court of the city in which such bees, hives, honey and appli-
ances are located, by filing therein a petition setting forth the facts
and making the State Apiarist a party defendant. Such appeals shall
be heard and determined by the court as expeditiously as possible.

Section 4. No owner, possessor, agent or lessee of any apiary,
honey or appliances, shall sell, barter, give away or remove from the
premises, without the consent in writing of the State Apiarist, any
bees or equipment from diseased colonies, provided, that honey from
such premises may be sold in closed containers for commercial pur-
poses but not with bees nor for food for bees.

Section 5. The State Apiarist shall have authority to forbid the
movement of bees, honey, wax, combs, hives or other used bee keep-
ing equipment from any apiary or apiaries known to have a contagious
disease until all colonies in said apiaries shall have been inspected and
the disease found to be completely eradicated.

Section 6. It shall be unlawful for any person to give false infor-
mation in any matter pertaining to this act, or to resist, impede, or hin-
der the State Entomologist, the State Apiarist or inspector in the dis-
charge of his or their duties.

Section 7. After inspection of infected bees or fixtures for handling
diseased bees the State Apiarist or inspector shall, before leaving the
premises, or proceeding to any other apiary, take such measures as
shall prevent the spread of the disease by infected material adhering to
his person or clothing or to any tools or appliances used by him, which
may come in contact with infected materials.

Section 8. No person in the State of Virginia engaged in rearing
of queen bees for sale, shall use honey in the making of candy for use
in mailing cages. Every person engaged in the rearing of queen bees
shall have his or her queen rearing and queen mating apiary or apiaries
inspected at least once during each summer season by the State Apiarist
or inspector and on the discovery of the existence of any disease which
is infectious or contagious in its nature and injurious to bees in their
eggs, larval, pupal or adult states, said person shall at once cease to
ship queen bees from such diseased apiary until the State Apiarist shall
declare the said apiary free from disease and issue a certificate to that
effect.

Section 9. It shall be the duty of all persons engaged in bee keep-
ing to provide prior to July first, nineteen hundred and forty, movable
frames in all hives used by them to contain bees, and to cause the bees
in such hives to construct brood combs in such frames so that any
of said frames may be removed from the hive without injuring other
combs in such hive. It shall be the duty of any person keeping
bees within the State of Virginia to securely and tightly close the
entrance of any hive or hives in apiaries not free from disease in which
the bees shall have died either during the winter or at any other
time, and to make the hive or hives tight in such manner that robber
bees cannot enter or leave such hive or obtain honey therefrom. The
sealing of such hives must be maintained so long as the hives remain in
the yard or in any place where honey bees can gain access to them.

It shali be the duty of any person keeping bees in the State of Vir-
ginia to notify the State Apiarist immediately upon receipt of knowl-
edge of diseased colonies affected with contagious diseases in his or
neighboring apiaries, provided such person is not experienced in treat-
ment of brood diseases and does not care to destroy by fire such in-
fected colonies or equipment through personal efforts.

Section 10. No person shall move bees or used bee-keeping equip-
ment from one county to another in this State unless accompanied by
a valid State or Federal certificate of inspection for the current calendar
year.

Section 11. All bees in combless packages which may be brought
into this State from other states or other countries shall be accompanied
by a certificate of health issued by the proper official of the place of
origin. The transportation of bees or combless packages into this State
without said certificate of health by any person or persons is expressly
prohibited.

Section 12. No person shall bring into this State any bees or combs,
used hives or other used apiary appliances from any other state or coun-
try without first having received a permit so to do from the State Api-
arist of this State. This permit shall be issued only upon satisfactory
proof that said bees and used bee-keeping appliances are free from dis-
ease. Said permit shall be attached to shipment containing bees or
goods so transported. Bees brought into this State shall be inspected
by the State Apiarist or his duly appointed inspectors after the expira-
tion of thirty days from date of arrival and within forty-five days after
arrival. Provided, however, inspection shall not be made if said bees
are removed from this State within forty-five days after arrival.

Section 13. No bees, combs, or used bee-keepers’ supplies shall be
sold or offered for sale or removed from the premises without having
been inspected by the State Apiarist or inspector and a permit issued
by him authorizing sale and movement. All shippers of bees and
queens in the State shall register with the State Entomologist.

Section 14. Whenever it is determined by the State Apiarist or
inspector, that unsanitary conditions exist or are permitted to exist in
the operation of any honey houses or building or portion of a building
in which honey is stored, graded or processed, the operator or owner
of said honey houses or buildings shall be first notified and warned by
the State Apiarist or inspector to place such honey house or building
in a sanitary condition within a reasonable length of time. Failure to
correct the insanitary condition referred to in this section by the owner
or operator, after notification by the State Apiarist, shall constitute
a violation of this act and shall be dealt with as provided herein.

Section 15. Any person knowingly violating any of the provisions
of this act or any order or quarantine regulation issued by authority
of this act or interfering in any way with the duly appointed repre-
sentatives of the Commissioner of Agriculture and Immigration of this
State in the discharge of the duties herein specified shall be deemed
guilty of a misdemeanor and upon conviction shall be punished by a
fine of not less than ten dollars nor more than one hundred dollars for
each offense or by imprisonment in jail not exceeding ninety days,
or by both such fine and imprisonment.

Section 16. If any clause, sentence, paragraph, or part of this act,
shall for any reason, be adjudged or decreed invalid by any court of
competent jurisdiction, such judgment or decree shall not affect, impair
or invalidate the remainder of said act, but shall be confined in its
operation to the clause, sentence, paragraph, or part thereof directly
involved in the controversy in which said judgment or decree shall
have been rendered.

Z. Be it further enacted by the General Assembly of Virginia, That
an act entitled an act for the protection and promotion of the bee in-
dustry ; to segregate bees for State taxation only; to levy a tax on bees,
and to provide for the disposition of the revenue raised by the same,
approved March twenty-first, nineteen hundred and twenty-four, be,
and the same is hereby repealed.