660 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 



I think we can credit the white sweet clover that grew by the road 

 sides with furnishing the greater part of it. 



I don't claim to be an expert in the production of extracted honey, 

 and am not able to produce any more extracted honey than I can 

 comb honey per colony, the best report I have seen in our bee journals 

 tMs fall is that of H. H. Root on the yield of Mr. Holterman, of On- 

 tario, one of the largest producers of extracted honey in the east, who 

 with modern utensils and plenty of help produced something like 100 

 pounds per colony, which at 9 cents per pound, the price in Iowa, would 

 bring him an income of $9.00 each, his best apiary producing 160 pounds, 

 or an average of $14.40 each. I think you will all admit 100 pounds 

 or $9,00 per colony to be a fair average for the extracted Ihoney pro- 

 ducer the last year. 



Comparing this with Dr. Miller's 266 sections per colony from seventy- 

 two colonies, or an average of $39.90 per colony, or even my own av- 

 erage of $22.15 with an increase of 100 per cent, it would seem to me 

 a good business proposition for you to produce more comb honeiy. 



And another thing our western brothers are each year producing more 

 and more extracted honey on account of the high freight rates and 

 breakage. For this reason we, as producers in Iowa, withi a market 

 in our own state, should produce more comb honey. 



I have regular customers whom I supply each year and when my 

 own stock is exhausted I buy to supply my trade. 



I have found that it is almost impossible to buy Iowa white clover 

 comb honey after the first of December, and if I am fortunate enough 

 to locate any, the price will be so high that there will be no profit 

 in ha,ndling it, or, many times, an actual loss. 



For this reason I advise you to produce more comb honey. 



The demand is greater than the supply. 



But not so with extracted honey. 



I can buy the finest white clover every fall at from 8 to 9 cents per 

 pound wholesale, because your extracted honey comes in competition 

 with western honey, w'hich is shipped into the state by the carload 

 every year, thereby increasing the supply until it is greater than the 

 demand, for this reason I advise you to produce moire comb honey. 



There is a legend that has been handed down to us from olden times 

 that reads something like this: A colony or an apiary of bees will 

 produce twice as much extracted ihoney as they will comb honey, under 

 the same conditions. Now this might have been true when they pro- 

 duced comb honey in boxes six inches square and twelve inches long, 

 with glass sides, as they did when I was a boy, or even later when they 

 used a small triangular piece of starter in the top of the section only, 

 but not today. 



With our present management and full sheets of foundation in the 

 section I don't believe there is a man in Iowa that can produce 50 per 

 cent more extracted honey than I can comb honey (under the same 

 conditions) ; no, not even 25 per cent more. 



You will have to show me, I am from Missouri. 



And after reading the report of Dr. Miller's crop for 1913 in the 

 American Bee Journal it seems to me that the rule should be trans- 



