Published Meekly at 91. OO a. Veur by Oeorge %V. York Jk. Vo., sai l»earborn St. 



Entered at the Post-Offlce at Chicago as Second-Class Mail-Matter. 

 QBORQE W. YORK, Editor. CHICAGO, ILL, DEC 1, 1904. VoL XLIV— No, 48. 



" Spread with Honey." 



J-t. E. Anderson, of Tennessee, has sent us a clipping 

 of an advertisement put out by the National Biscuit Co., 

 in which they advise people to eat their biscuits " spread 

 with honey ". This is certainly good advice, and if given 

 repeatedly in advertisements it should help to increase the 

 demand for honey. Surely, the National Biscuit Co. has 

 set a good example. As Mr. Anderson says, it sounds 

 somewhat better than "spread with maple syrup ". When- 

 ever the day comes that the National Bee-Keepers' Associa- 

 tion feels that it can spend some money in advertising 

 honey, we believe that bee-keepers will find a greatly in- 

 creased demand for their product. 



Sugar vs. Honey for Bees. 



In the European bee-papers the question of feeding 

 sugar to bees is being discussed with some warmth. Testi- 

 mony from actual experience is given on both sides. All 

 are agreed it is better to feed bees sugar than to let them 

 starve ; and that it is better to replace unwholesome stores 

 with sugar. It seems to be understood, also, that with 

 nothing but sugar syrup in the hive no brood can be reared, 

 because the building of tissue requires the nitrogenous mat- 

 ter that is contained in honey and in pollen, but absent in 

 sugar. 



Indeed, in this country reports have not been lacking 

 where bees refused to rear brood in spring when confined 

 to honey alone, the amount of floating pollen in honey 

 seeming insufficient for that purpose. The anti-sugar men 

 seem to have pretty good reason on their side when they 

 claim that a food which lacks material to build up young 

 bees must also lack material to keep up the vigor of old 

 bees ; and that although it may not be easy to demonstrate 

 the difi'erence, it is reasonable to suppose that a colony 

 supported for a time on the nitrogen-lacking sugar will not 

 have quite the same vigor as when supported on the fuller 

 food. 



In any case it seems a pretty safe thing to consider a 

 good quality of honey the standard. If something else had 

 been better as a general rule, would not Dame Nature have 

 so provided ? 



The Combat with Foul Brood. 



It may be going a long ways from home to find in a 

 trans-Atlantic journal what is being done on this side the 



water ; but nowhere probably can a finer resume of the 

 situation here be found than in a report made by Mr. Thos. 

 W. Cowan, and published in the British Bee Journal. That 

 gentleman evidently did no small amount of correspondence 

 to secure the facts so fully, which are thus given : 



They had two different plans in the States ; in some 

 cases an inspector was appointed for the whole Slate, while 

 in others inspectors were appointed for the different coun- 

 ties. A single inspector for California (which was as large 

 as England and Scotland together) would be of no use at 

 all. There were large tracts of country in that State in 

 which no bee-keepers were located. Therefore, the county 

 plan was adopted. He had written altogether to ten differ- 

 ent States for information, namely, Michigan, Colorado, 

 Wisconsin, New York, Ohio, Texas, California, Idaho, 

 Nebraska and Utah, and had received from each the laws 

 and regulations under which they work, and comprehensive 

 reports. He had inquired how the inspectors were ap- 

 pointed, also about cost of administration, and statistics of 

 results. 



Michigan stated that the State Bee-Keepers' Associa- 

 tion recommends, and the Dairy and Food Commissioner 

 appoints. The salary is SSOO a year for one inspector, but 

 is not enough, and will be increased. The inspector says : 



" This law was passed three years ago, and at that time 

 the lower half of the lower peninsula of our State was prac- 

 tically seeded down with the disease. It is almost a Hercu- 

 lean task to free the State from the disease. A few locali- 

 ties have been cleared, in others it is kept in check, and is 

 being kept out of the northern part of the State. It is 

 largely a matter of education and getting bee-keepers to 

 recognize it, and try to get rid of it." 



Colorado had 14 counties and 14 bee-inspectors. The 

 cost of each inspector varied from S25 to $350, the average 

 being SlOO, that was S1400 for the whole State, or $5 per day, 

 and $2 per half day in payment of work done. His inform- 

 ant called attention to defects in the State's law, an im- 

 portant one being there was no clause which would prevent 

 the importation of disease ; also, that there were no means 

 of exacting a faithful fulfilment of duty by the inspectors, 

 who were inclined to shirk their work when it was incon- 

 venient to attend to it. 



Wisconsin's Act had been in operation for seven years ; 

 $700 per annum was allocated to the work, and the one in- 

 spector was appointed for two years. This inspector, ac- 

 cording to the last report, visited 230 apiaries containing 

 12,493 colonies. In 66 apiaries there were 1608 diseased 

 colonies. 



In New York State the Commissioner of Agriculture 

 appointed four inspectors, the State being divided into four 

 partitions for the purposes of bee-inspection. Each in- 

 spector received a salary of $800 and expenses annually. 

 The Commissioner had supplied him (Mr. Cowan) with a 

 voluminous report, from which it appeared that in the year 

 1900, in the contaminated localities, about 30 percent of col- 



