BUCKWHEAT. 



71 



BUCKWHEAT. 



JAPANESSE BUCKWHEAT THIRTY-FOUR INCHES HIGH IN A LITTLE OVER THREE WEEKS FROM 



THE TIME THE SEED WAS PLANTED. 



is more or less rank ; and j^et those who 

 have always been used to buckwheat honey, 

 or at least a good many of them, prefer it 

 even to clover or bass wood. 



A lady from the East once called at om- 

 store and looked over our honey. We 

 showed her several samples of choice clover 

 and basswood comb honey. 



" I do not like this.'" she said. •• It looks 

 like manufactured sugar honey. Haven't 

 j-ou any buckwheat V" 



" Yes, but we did not suppose you would 

 like that, because such honey rarely sells in 

 our locality.'' 



We then placed before her some sections 

 of buckwheat honey, and these suited her 

 exactly. 



" That is real bee honey," said she, with a 

 look of satisfaction, and she carried home 

 several sections. 



It seems that her father had been a bee- 

 keeper, and about all the honey she ever saw 

 was buckwheat: and unless it had the strong 

 flavor and dark color of the honey she was 

 familiar with in her childhood days it was 

 not honey to her, and there are thousands 

 and thousands like her in the East. 



Yes. there is a fancy trade that prefers 

 buckwheat ; and this trade is so large that 

 buckwheat honey in the New York market 

 brings almost as high a price as the fancy 

 grades of white : but in the Western mar- 

 kets, principally in Chicago, "• the stuff " 

 goes begging a piu'chaser. and sells as an 

 off grade of poor honey. 



Notwithstanding the color of buck- 

 wheat honey itself is purplish, the cappings 

 of the combs, especially if made by black 

 bees, are almost pearly white. Buckwheat 



comb honey— some of it at least— is very 

 pretty, and especially when it is put up by 

 practical bee-keepers who know how to pro- 

 duce a first-class grade of any honey. 



IS BUCKWHEAT A RELIABLE SOrRCE FOR 

 • HOXEY, AND WHEX ? 



In York State, buckwheat can be depend- 

 ed upon almost every year for a crop of honey 

 but in the West it is rather uncertain— some 

 years yielding no honey, and others domg 

 fairly well. But when it does yield, the bees 

 work on it almost entirely in the morning, 

 the nectar supply lasting until about ten 

 or eleven o'clock. There are, however, ex- 

 ceptions. 



In the East, if we are not mistaken, on ac- 

 count of the immense acreage, the bees are 

 kept busy gathering honey from morning 

 till night ; and owing to the fact that it can 

 be depended on almost absolutely for a yield 

 of honey— when even basswood or clover 

 fails, as it does sometimes in any locality 

 —the bee-keeper is able to make at least ex- 

 penses and something besides. Indeed, some 

 years when there is almost a total failure of 

 white honey, the York State honey-pro- 

 ducers are enabled to make a fair living 

 from buckwheat alone. 



DIFFERENT VARIETIES OF BUCKWHEAT. 



The first buckwheats of which very much 

 became known were designated as the bhick 

 and the gray. Later on, the silverhull came 

 into prominence. Both of these varieties 

 were finally displaced almost entirely by the 

 celebrated Japanese. This variety is not 

 only very much more prolific, but the ker- 

 nels, or seeds, are very much larger— so much 

 larger, indeed, that it necessitates the use of 



