Gleanings In Bee Culture 



Published by The A. I. Root Co., Medina, Ohio 



H. H. Root, Assistant Editor E. R. ROOT, Editor A. L. Boyden, Advertising Manager 



A. I. Root, Editor Home Department J. T. Calvert, Business Manager 



" Entered at the Postofflce, Medina. Ohio, as Second-class Matter. 



VOL. XXXVIII 



JANUARY 15, 1910 



NO. 2 



Editorial 



By E. R. Root. 



In view of the fact that A. I. Root, in his 

 Florida home, where he goes for rest and 

 recreation, has no stenographer, all corres- 

 pondence relating to bees and general busi- 

 ness, and all other matter except that re- 

 quiring his special attention, should be sent 

 to the A. I. Root Co., at Medina. Mr. Root, 

 Sr., has paid comparatively little attention to 

 bees since his elder son, the writer, took 

 practical editorial charge of the journal 24 

 years ago last December. While A. I. R. did 

 not at that time drop all connection with api- 

 cultural writing he gradually let go; and 

 now, and for many years back, all matters 

 relating to bees and bee-keeping are taken 

 care of by his sons. All matters relating to 

 the Home talks and special agricultural sub- 

 jects may be referred to Mr. Root at Braden- 

 town, Florida; but the reader should remem- 

 ber that, owing to the lack of facilities for 

 taking care of correspondence, his replies, if 

 any, will have to be very brief or answered 

 in Gleanings. It would be a physical im- 

 possibility for him to reply to all the kind 

 friends who have written him. If they wish 

 him to continue the writing of those Home 

 papers they should spare him all the letter- 

 writing they can. 



THE FUTURE OF CHUNK HONEY. 



In the January issue of The Bee-keeper's 

 Review there are two articles on the subject 

 of bulk comb honey, or chunk honey, as it 

 is called in the South. Mr. J. J. Wilder, of 

 Georgia, tells of its merits, both as regards 

 production and selling. Following this arti- 

 cle is one by M. P. Cady, of Wisconsin, 

 showing why chunk honey does not meet 

 with favor in the North. As a reflection, 

 after looking over these two opinions, we 

 may say that we believe our Southern bee- 

 keepers do not realize that the condition of 

 the honey market in the North is such that 

 the sale of chunk honey is much more diffi- 

 cult than in the South, and that our Northern 

 bee-keepers, who possibly have not paid 

 enough attention to this branch of the indus- 

 try, do not realize that the public will not 

 accept chunk honey in large quantities at the 

 start, but that the sales must be stimulated 

 by careful and painstaking efforts on the 



part of the producer or the salesman. There 

 is no question that chunk honey can be more 

 cheaply produced than comb honey, and 

 there are many other advantages attendant 

 upon its production, such as the easier con- 

 trol of swarming, the smaller amount of la- 

 bor required, etc. However, the experi- 

 ence of such a man as Mr. Cady, who, we 

 think, gave the production of chunk honey 

 a fair trial, should not be overlooked. The 

 following, in Mr. Cady's own words, is a part 

 of the description of his experiment and its 

 result, as given on page 17 of the Review. 



In order to test thoroughly the desirability of chunk 

 honey, and at the same time to develop a market for 

 the new product, a good salesman was employed to 

 solicit orders direct from the consumers. A fine sam- 

 ple in a flint-glass pail was used in securing orders. 

 The salesman explained the superior money value of 

 the chunk honey, and, being a silver-tongued hustler, 

 he made sales very readily at 12M cents per lb., at the 

 same time selling, to those who preferred, extracted 

 honey at 10 cents and section honey at 15. However, 

 most of the sales were chunk honey. 



While the immediate results were very satisfactory, 

 the final results were disappointing. An occasional 

 patron was pleased with the chunk honey; but more 

 than nine-tenths of the purchasers were emphatic in 

 expressing their preference for either extracted or sec- 

 tion honey; and, finding it impossible to make sales 

 of the chunk honey, I was obliged to discontinue its 

 production. On the part of the consumers there were 

 three principal objections to chunk honey, as follows: 



1. Its mussy condition — being much more so than 

 either straight extracted or comb honey. 



2. The flavor of the bulk comb honey was not equal 

 • to that of section honey— presumably due to the coat- 

 ing of extracted honey, as in many cases the comb 

 honey in the chunk-honey packages was cut directly 

 from sections that were nearly filled. 



3. Candying of the extracted honey in the chunk- 

 honey packages spoiled the comb honey for table use. 

 An effort to liquefy the candied honey melted the 

 combs, and the resulting mixture of honey and bees- 

 wax was a rather disgusting mess to the purchaser 

 who had listened to the salesman's honeyed words in 

 praise of his "pails of fancy comb honey chinked 

 with the finest comb-free honey; " for when the smil- 

 ing salesman again took the field the sentiment in re- 

 gard to chunk honey was this: 



" Throw physic (chunk honey) to the dogs. I'll none 

 of it." 



It may be said by the chunk-honey advocates that 

 the foregoing objections are not good; but they were 

 good enough to cause my customers to call for either 

 comb or extracted honey in almost every instance, 

 much to my regret and financial loss, as I had pro- 

 cured a special outfit for comb-honey production. 



SHAKING OR BRUSHING TO CURE FOUL BROOD. 



A CORRESPONDENT thinks we are inconsis- 

 tent when we advise shaking to cure foul 

 brood, and in another place recommend 

 shaking and brushing, or brushing only. In 

 the former case we have used the term 

 "shaking " as ind\c2iimg s. general method of 

 cure that involves both shaking and brush- 



