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THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW. 



have this subject discussed further. It 

 would be a great boon to bee keepers and 

 honey merchants if a national system of 

 grading could be adopted. It should be 

 broad enough to be free from local interests, 

 and yet be specific enough to cover every 

 sort of honey." 



Let TIs Have One Grade that is Perfection. 



Last mouth the Review gave Mr. Byron 

 Walker's objection to the Chicago rules for 

 grading honey. Mr. Baldridge, who drew 

 up the rules, has replied, through the -4 . B.J., 

 to those objections, and from his reply I 

 quote as follows : — 



"The main trouble with Mr. VV. is, as I 

 surmised, he does not like the instructions 

 for grading honey as adopted by the North- 

 western convention, especially for first grade. 

 And why ? Mainly because a large percent- 

 age of what has in the past been classified 

 as first grade comb honey, by dealers and 

 producers, would have to go into some other 

 grade. Now, this is one of the reasons why 

 those instructions were prepared as adopted. 

 The intention was to stimulate bee keepers 

 to produce as much first grade honey as pos- 

 sible, and to protect them in so doing. And 

 this is as it should be. There are some who 

 seem to think the instructions for first grade 

 are too "superfine." But all should bear 

 this fact in mind, namely, that words mean 

 something — that first grade does not and 

 should not mean second grade nor third 

 grade — that it means " fancy," "premium," 

 " gilt edge," etc., the same as in grain. 

 Please examine the Chicago market reports 

 on grain, and notice how seldom any sales 

 are reported for first grade corn, wheat or 

 oats. When comb honey is graded by as 

 strict rules as grain, fancy poultry, and 

 dairy products, and the fact becomes known, 

 then the first grade will command a fancy 

 price, say twenty cents per pound wholesale, 

 and twenty-five cents to thirty cents at retail 

 — no matter what the other grades may sell 

 at. And why ? Because there is always a 

 class of consumers who are both able and 

 willing to pay a fancy price for first class 

 goods, and honey, as the writer happens to 

 know from experience, is no exception. 



Comb honey of the second grade should 

 also be good honey— good enough for general 

 consumption, and should command as high 

 a price at wholesale or retail as what is now 

 sold as "choice" or "fancy," for, in fact, 

 if honestly graded as per instructions, it 

 will average as well and perhaps better in 

 general appearance. 



I was in hopes that Mr. W., in his reply, 

 would copy the instructions in each grade, 

 and then analyze them separately, and point 

 out their defects, if any. Perhaps he thinks 

 he has done so in substance. 



By this time Mr. W. may be prepared to 

 give instructions for grading comb honey 

 that will be more satisfactory than those 

 adopted by the convention. If so, I hope he 

 will send them along for publication, so 

 others can see what they are. 



St. Chables, Ills., Jan. 11, 1892." 



Are the Bees of Italy a Fixed Race 1 



This question is being again resurrected. 

 Upon this point, W. C. Frazier makes some 

 very pertinent remarks in Gleanings, and 

 following them are some more remarks of a 

 similar character by the editor. Below will 

 be found these I'emarks : 



"I noticed a communication by Mr. Ar- 

 thur T. Goldsborough, on page 842, 1891, in 

 which he asserts that the bees of Italy are 

 not three-banded. I was in hopes some of 

 the older writers would give us a chapter on 

 the color of the Italian bee ; but so far I 

 have not seen such a communication. It 

 seems strange that this writer, being as close 

 an observer as he claims to be, should assert 

 that no bee would show more than one yellow 

 band. Now, the fact is, among all classes of 

 bees, all mixtures and crosses, I have never 

 been able to find a single bee with only one 

 yellow band. Wherever I find a bee with 

 yellow on any bands, there is yellow on the 

 three : and, again, if the bees of Italy are 

 not three-banded, how comes it that, of all 

 the bees that are yearly imported from there, 

 no importer has received a single bee that 

 does not show the three yellow bands ? Any 

 importer will guarantee this. Another thing, 

 all the queens that are brought from Italy 

 are not tested queens. Especially last spring, 

 the breeders of Italy could not fill all their 

 early orders with tested queens, and get 

 them here as soon as the importers wanted 

 them : and yet the bees of Italy, so far as 1 

 have seen them ( and 1 have received queens 

 from several breeders in various pai-ts of 

 Italy), are three-banded. The bands are not 

 bright yellow, but more inclined to red ; and 

 I believe tJie darker colored these bands are, 

 the better workers the bees prove to be. 



I notice, both by the circulars of breeders 

 and by several letters which I have, that the 

 first thing the average American tries to do 

 is to improve the Italian bee. This is a 

 characteristic of the American, and "im- 

 provement " is his motto : but how is a per- 

 son to undertake to improve a thing that 

 already has fixed characteristics ? I find 

 that this "improvement" (V) consists in 

 making it yellow, yellorcer, yellowest. 



While I have no objection whatever to 

 these yellow bees, and have and intend to 

 continue to keep the yellowest bees procur- 

 able, yet I will say for them that they will 

 not reproduce themselves. Out of ten queens 

 from a five-banded mother, mated in an 

 apiary where drones from five-banded moth- 

 eis abound, not more than two of the un- 

 tested queens will prove to be five-banded. 

 I find the five-banded bees as gentle as the 

 imported stock ; but the bees from queens of 

 five-banded stock that produce bees with 

 only three bands are not gentle. 



Last season there were many of these 

 queens sold. Last fall at the fairs I found 

 many disappointed purchasers of them. 

 They had bought untested queens of them, 

 expecting to get some five-banded. They 

 had failed, and consequently they were dis- 

 appointed. 



