GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



January, 1919 



FROM THE FIELD OF EXPERIENCE 



ones and 30 that were not diseased, or a 

 total of 30 saved as against 40 lost. I have 

 extracted a nice lot of honey from each 

 colony, including the nursery colony, and 

 gained one colony of bees. Had I applied 

 the old method of shaking in June, what 

 would I now have? I would have four colo- 

 nies of bees that might have to be fed to 

 get thru the winter. J. F. Kight. 



Indianapolis, Ind. 



[Some of our readers, especially foul- 

 brood inspectors, might question the advisa- 

 bility of publishing this method of cure, for 

 the simple reason that, while the plan is all 

 right for experts, the average beekeeper, not 

 carrying out the directions properly, would 

 spread the disease rather than hold it under 

 control. We were a little undecided what 

 we should do ourselves. On referring the 

 matter to Dr. Miller, he said: "The care- 

 less man is not likely to try it, for he will 

 not discover the disease till well started; 

 and, if he does try it, he can at the most 

 only prolong the disease. The benefit to 

 the careful man will outweigh the harm to 

 the careless one." 



We believe that Dr. Miller is right, and 

 therefore we are submitting the plan to the 

 public. We may say that this has been 

 tried before by some good beekeepers, and 

 it has given excellent results. While it is 

 true that the disease may apjjear in some 

 other combs, yet, if the process is continued, 

 American foul brood will be eliminated with 

 little or no expense. It should be under- 

 stood that, while this plan is good for a 

 few stray cells that may appear, it will be 

 wholly inadequate where the colony is badly 

 infected. Nothing short of shaking on 

 frames of foundation will suffice. — P]ditor.] 



NOVEL MARKETING IDEA 



Do the Work of Taking Comb Honey Out ot the 

 Super in the Presence of Customers 



To retail a bit of comb honey, take an un- 

 touched super to a big factory that em- 

 ploys a lot of hands, and open it at the 

 lunch hour. The work of getting out the 

 sections will draw the crowd; and the busi- 

 ness of breaking the propolis, a visible 

 proof that you are opening the original 

 package sealed by the bees themselves, 

 helps give the crowd confidence that this 

 is the real, unadulterated stuff. Women are 

 best customers on the whole, tho men are 

 more apt to take more than one section at 

 a time. Most of what is bought will be 

 bought to take home, but some will be taken 

 for eating with lunches on the spot. 



In such sales you naturally do not scrape 

 the sections. Purchasers don 't object to 

 propolis under these circumstances, when 

 they see for themselves that it is the seal 



of the bees' packing and not an accidental 

 defilement by human hands. At the same 

 time, of course you sell better by making a 

 lot of interesting talk about the bees and 

 their work, and among this talk it is as 

 well to get in something about the antisep- 

 tic varnish with which the bees cover all 

 cracks in which germs might lodge. "Anti- 

 septic varnish ' ' is not only a better name 

 for selling purpose than bee glue, but is 

 really more truthful; for it is for the pur- 

 pose of antiseptic varnish that the bees use 

 it, not for gluing; the gluing effect comes 

 incidentally, just as the same result com.es 

 from our own varnishes and paints. That 

 we name it "bee glue" is a piece of the 

 conceitedness of the human race, talking as 

 if the important aspect were that which con- 

 cerns our personal convenience. Give your 

 bystanders scraps of propolis the size of 

 an apple seed or smaller, and tell them to 

 rub these between their fingers and then 

 smell the delicious scent of the woods on 

 their finger-tips. 



The fact that you don 't scrape the sec- 

 tions nor furnish cartons enables you to go 

 just a cent or two below the grocer's price 

 without being really a price-cutter; but I 

 am not sure of your needing to do it, for you 

 have a good selling proposition without any 

 discount. The question will depend on your 

 personal temperament. Don 't go a nickel 

 below the grocer. It is doubtful whether to 

 make a difference in price between fancy 

 sections and No. 1; but, if you have sections 

 quite imperfectly filled, you give them a dis- 

 count price proportioned to the amount of 

 honey in them, and then they go off all right, 

 especially to the customers who buy for eat- 

 ing with li;nch. 



Obviously this is primarily a method for 

 the backlotter who can take this super to 

 the factory where he works every day, 

 where personal acquaintance increases every- 

 body's confidence in his reliability, and who 

 can leave the unsold part of the super there 

 to meet the requests that will keep coming 

 day after day from those who want another 

 section, or who did not buy at first, but 

 have now heard from somebody how good it 

 was, and perhaps have been given a spoon- 

 ful to taste. But I don 't see why the large 

 producer, if he has section honey, should 

 not follow this method if he has business in 

 town at such an hour as nmkes this conven- 

 ient for him. If you sell at twelve and a 

 half cents above what the wholesaler would 

 give you (which is a low estimate for this 

 year), and if in 60 minutes you sell a dozen 

 sections (which even a bad salesman ought 

 to do in his first attempt by this method, un- 

 less he had struck a very unlucky factory), 

 that is $1..50 for an hour's pleasant work, 

 and you build up tlie public demand for 

 honey. Stephen T. Byington. 



Ballard Vale, Mass. 



