Jan. 28, 1904. 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL, 



55 



I Convention Proceedings j 



CHICAGO- NORTH WESTERN. 



Report of the Chicag-o-Northwestern Bee-Keep- 

 ers' Convention, Held in Chicag-o, Dec. 

 2 and 3, 1903. 



The convention was called to order by Pres. George W. 

 York, after which Pres. J. Q. Smith, of the Illinois State 

 Bee-Keepers' Association, offered prayer. 



Pres. York — I am sure we are all rejoiced this morning 

 to find as many here as we have to begin with. I am sure 

 we shall have a pleasant gathering in this nice, quiet room. 

 The first on the program is introduction of bee-keepers from 

 a distance. After this I wish you would speak to them as 

 you meet them. 



Dr. Miller — Is there any law against speaking to any 

 others who are not introduced? 



Pres. York — Yes. You must not speak to others at all ! 



At this point, Mr. Griggs, Mr. Hutchinson and Mr. 

 Binger of Michigan, Mr. Coverdale and Mr. Benton of Iowa, 

 Mr. Whitney and Miss Candler of Wisconsin, and Mr. Niver 

 of New York, were introduced to the convention. After this 

 the annual report of the Secretary-Treasurer was read. On 

 motion, the financial report was referred to an auditing com- 

 mittee. 



Blank paper slips having been distributed for questions, 

 they were gathered up, and then discussed. The first sub- 

 ject was : 



GRANULATION OF WELL-RIPENED HONEY. 



"Will thoroughly-ripened honey granulate?" 



Pres. York — Don't all speak at once, because the reporter 

 couldn't take it all down ! 



Mr. Niver — I would like to ask a question. Is there any 

 honey known that will not granulate? 



Mr. Whitney — I asked that question. I have some honey 

 that is uncapped, that I have had three years exposed to the 

 air and it does not granulate. I have it here with me in my 

 room. I think it is thoroughly ripened; it is just like wax, 

 but there is no granulation. I took from my honey-house 

 last spring a number of frames of honey that I had stored 

 away for use among the bees in the spring, 30 or 40 of them, 

 and not one of them that passed through zero weather, gran- 

 ulated. That prompted the question whether thoroughly- 

 ripened honey will granulate. I think that that was thor- 

 oughly ripened. 



Mr. Niver — To explain my question. I have had a good 

 many calls for honey that will not granulate. I would be very 

 glad to be able to get it. I was told that the Cuban honey did 

 not granulate. I sent there for 500 pounds of it. I was want- 

 ing it to supply the patent medicine trade. Their trouble is 

 to .get honey that will not granulate, but I found that Cuban 

 honey in our country will granulate as any other honey. If 

 Mr. Whitney has any way to keep it from granulating, or 

 bees that produce honey like that, he struck something good. 

 Mr. Abbott — The honey made from Mexican Spanish- 

 needles doesn't granulate for me. I have had some for three 

 years and it has never granulated any ; but I have never got- 

 ten any Spanish-needle honey that did granulate. 

 Mr. Niver^ — How are you keeping it? 

 Mr. Abbott — It is just in the cans. I suppose it is no 

 trade secret. I mix alfalfa with it, half and half, and I can 

 keep honey in the stores the whole season through without 

 granulating. 



Pres. York — That's the kind of "adulterating" or mixing 

 that the bee-keeper is permitted to do. 



Mr. Abbott — I supposed so, or I wouldn't have told it 

 publicly! I don't know that that is characteristic of all 

 Spanish-needle honey, but I had noticed that, and it never 

 granulated on my hands. 



Dr. Miller — To answer that very fully there ought to be 

 some modification, possibly, of the question. The question 



might arise. What do you mean by thoroughly ripened? Will 

 it granulate? Some would say, and I think very fairly, if it 

 doesn't granulate within a year we say it doesn't granulate, 

 yet it may granulate in two or three years. I want to sug- 

 gest in the first place that there is no question but what 

 there is honey that doesn't granulate. There are two or 

 three samples right here. There are samples of honey that 

 do not granulate, and I am quite a little of the opinion that 

 almost any honey that you or I have may be made non- 

 granulating, simply by ripening for a very long time. By 

 keeping it warm enough, long enough. Those two things — 

 warm enough, long enough. I saw some samples of comb 

 honey in two places, one in Pennsylvania and one out in this 

 State, tliat had been kept over the winter in a zero place, that 

 were not granulated and the comb not cracked, and I don't 

 know any reason why it might not have kept for years in that 

 way: and all the secret was, the honey had been kept during 

 the summer season up in one of those hot garrets where 

 you can hardly breathe, and you wish you could get out. If 

 you put your honey in one of these places and let it stay 

 long enough, I am of the opinion it will not granulate, and 

 it will be as Mr. Whitney says, it will be waxy. That will 

 fill your trade, Mr. Niver. That's one of the things all of us 

 need to learn, whether it be extracted or comb, to keep it in 

 a warm place if you have any, or a place warm enough, long 

 enough, and it will be non-granulating. 



Mr. Wilcox — Won't you say in an open vessel ? 

 Dr. Miller — You must remember my weakness. I am a 

 comb-honey man. Extracted honey should be open enough 

 to allow the air to penetrate. 



Mr. Kanenburg — I had an experience with my own honey. 

 I have an attic where I keep my honey for over winter, in 

 an attic with just shingles on the roof where it is zero almost 

 all of the time. I have had honey there for at least two 

 years. I had a couple of boxes up there in the summer, and 

 in the winter I let them stay right in the attic. 



Dr. Miller — How near zero does it get in that attic in 

 the summer? 



Mr. Kanenburg — There is no zero there in the summer! 

 Mr. Wilcox — I have had quite a considerable experience 

 in the line suggested by Dr. Miller, and I have found from 

 repeated trials that it does not granulate if you will evaporate 

 it. It is no longer a syrup, but it gums; but it is impractica- 

 ble to do that for the market, therefore I cannot see much 

 benefit, and some honey, if placed where it will absorb 

 moisture from the air, will granulate. It isn't in the char- 

 acter of the honey, but simply the care that is taken of it. 



Pres. York — What we want is something that will pre- 

 vent it from granulating in grocery stores. The great dif- 

 ficulty I have found in selling honey in the city is to prevent 

 the granulation in all kinds of temperature. Some of the 

 groceries are warm and some are cold, some don't have fire 

 all night in the winter. What we want is more than a little 

 sample of it. If a honey-bottler had a carload or two he 

 would get a good price for it. What we want is a large 

 quantity that doesn't granulate. 



Mr. Whitney — I stated that I took a number of frames 

 from my honey-house that had passed through zero weather, 

 and that didn't granulate. Honey in a shipping-case would 

 keep, it seems to me, from granulating just as well as that 

 comb honey from the honey-house during zero weather, pro- 

 viding it has been thoroughly ripened. I don't know why the 

 grocer cannot keep tons of it unless as Mr. Wilcox says, the 

 weather should be very damp. Of course, it would gather 

 moisture, but in any ordinary dry weather I don't see why 

 they couldn't keep tons of it through zero weather from 

 granulating. 



Mr. Hutchinson— It is possible we don't know yet what 

 makes honey granulate. Mr. Boardman claims to have some 

 secret process, at least he doesn't tell what it is. that pre- 

 vents honey from granulating in the comb. We found that 

 when years ago I was rearing queens, I would unite nuclei 

 in the fall and lots of combs would have unsealed cells, and 

 we would naturally think that that honey wasn't ripened, be- 

 cause it was not sealed. That would be in the very warm 

 weather. In the winter those combs would hang there with 

 the Iioney in the unsealed cells all winter long and not gran- 

 ulate. There may be some point in the granulation of honey 

 we haven't gotten onto yet. 



