STATE AGRICULTURAL BOCIETY. 209 



marketed in their natural state, as we feel sure the actual consumer would 

 be much better plea- d. 



While we have looked upon the south as the home of the walnut, the 

 late Northern Citrus Fair at Sacramento brought to view samples of wal- 

 nuts from Northern California which hi<l fair, with a little care ami culti- 

 vation, to equal our best southern nuts. 



Prices obtained this year have been, we think, remunerative to the 

 growers, and this industry, like the almond. is one susceptible of great 



development. both California almonds and walnuts have the United 

 States for a market. 



Honey. Extracted. — We could scarcely expect in 1885, from various 

 adverse circumstances, to equal the output of 1884, which was a phenom- 

 enal honey year, but we make a very respectable showing nevertheless. 



The very large exports of this article in 1884 to Europe, so abundantly 

 supplied our friends on that side that we entered upon the honey cam- 

 paign of 1885 to a very dull and sluggish demand, which has continued 

 throughout the year. While some exporting has been done at about five 

 cents a pound, a very liberal stock still remains unsold, though it is 

 believed as the season advances a renewed demand will set in. The out- 

 turn of honey east last year was very good, which, also selling at low 

 prices, curtailed our usual shipments of California extracted honey to that 

 part of the country. 



California honey, both comb and extracted, is now recognized every- 

 where as the finest produced in the world; and while bad seasons and low 

 prices will be met from time to time, on the whole the bee industry of this 

 State, one year with another, promises as fair returns, for the labor and 

 capital invested, as any other growing industry of the Golden State. 



Honey Comb. — Like extracted, and for the same reasons, the product of 

 1885 is considerably lessened from that of 1<SS4, but unlike the extracted 

 there has ruled such a brisk demand on eastern account for our comb 

 honey that at this date w T e may safely say the bulk of the crop has already 

 been marketed, and at prices all the way from twenty-five to one hundred 

 per cent over the figures obtained in 1884. While the output therefore in 

 pounds fell short from the year previous, in actual dollars and cents, a 

 large portion of this shortage has been covered. The quality this year, as 

 a whole, has been much under the average of last "year, the greater portion 

 being of a " C " or an " Extra C " grade, comparatively little white or extra 

 white being found. To still further increase and extend the sale of Cali- 

 fornia comb honey we again repeat our former suggestions, that a one-pound 

 frame be adopted instead of the two-pound now so generally used, and that 

 at least one half of the cases be made to hold but thirty pounds instead of 

 making them all sixty pounds or thereabouts, as is now the custom. 



Our friends east, and throughout the Territories, frequently write us that 

 our cases are too large for convenient handling, and that if we had one- 

 pound frames they could double their sales. 



Where the sixty-pound cases are used, a groove or slit should be cut on 

 each end of the case, so that it can be more readily picked up and handled 

 by the employes of transportation companies. 



If this was done much money would be saved that is now lost by the 

 lack of facility for handling the cases easily without the smashing of the 

 honey and the attendant loss thereon. 



14 90 



