43d YEAR. 



CHICAGO, ILL, FEB, 26, 1903, 



Na9. 



Honey North and South. — There is 

 always a possibility that two persons looking 

 from different standpoints will see the same 

 thing in different lights. The following let- 

 ter illustrates this : 



Editor A.mericax Bee JorRN.\L.— 



Commenting upon Editor Hill's paragraph 

 as quoted on page 51, I wish to say that, in 

 the minds of some, there is some doubt that 

 the South puts upon the market a larger per- 

 cent of /oK'-(/ra(7(' honey than any other sec- 

 tion of the country. 



Again, "The unprogressiveness of many 

 sections of U(e South is well Jiiiown." (Is 

 this unprogressiveness confined to the Sunih f) 

 " The product of the bee-keeping element in 

 such localities is necessarily inferior.'' Why 

 so 1 Does man's laziness or ignorance have 

 any effect upon the bee ? Is it necessary 

 that the bee-keeper be of the general type ? 

 Escambia Co., Fla. C. C. Parsons. 



Editor Hill, himself a Southerner, and, in- 

 deed, a fellow-Floridan with Mr. Parsons, is 

 pleading for justice to the South, and, no 

 doubt, both men are of the progressive type, 

 and if all men of the South had been just like 

 them, it is likely that there never would have 

 been any occasion for Mr. Hill to make his 

 plea. 



There is unprogressiveness in the North as 

 well as the South, but whatever may be said 

 as to the proportion of each, the fact remains 

 that when honey has been put on the market 

 as Southern honey, it has been quoted at a 

 lower rate becmise it was Southern honey. No 

 doubt, the nectar collected by the bee of the 

 most up-to-date bee-keeper is not a whit bet- 

 ter than that collected by a bee belonging to 

 the ignorant and shiftless, but when that 

 product is ready for the market there may be 

 a distinct difference in appearance, and also 

 in real value. One sample may be thoroughly 

 ripened and luscious, while the other is thin, 

 watery, and unpleasant to the taste. There 

 may also be a marked difference in two sam- 

 ples of comb honey, both gathered from the 

 same honey-plant. 



Somet/iliti/ has given ground for the belief 

 that Southern honey, in general, is more or 

 less inferior. It is unfair to Mr. Parsons to 

 say that his honey should bring any less in 

 the market than another sample exactly like 

 it produced farther north. This injustice 

 should not continue. If he can make it ap- 

 pear that it was all a mistake to suppose that 

 any considerable quantity of honey produced 

 in the South was inferior, he may in time 

 change the significance of the term " Southern 

 honey.'' But that would take a good deal of 



time, and possibly no amount of time would 

 make the effort successful. Possibly he will 

 find it a shorter task to take the ground that 

 justice requires that his honey should stand 

 on its own merits for what it is, without hav- 

 ing any classification that shall arouse preju- 

 dice against it. 



Duty on Honey to Canada. — In the 



report of the Ontario convention, on page 39, 

 reference is made to the fact that Cuban 

 honey is shipped to Toronto. It would, per- 

 haps, more clearly represent the market it it 

 had been said that there is a specific duty of 

 3 cents per pound on all honey going into 

 Canada. Mr. Holtermann has called atten- 

 tion to the fact that he mentioned this duty 

 particularly to the convention in this con- 

 nection. So writes Mr. Morley Pettit, who 

 reported the Ontario convention for the 

 American Bee Journal. 



The Texas E.vperiment Station Re- 

 port has been received. It is a neatly printed 

 pamphlet of 53 pages, six of which are occu- 

 pied by the report proper, and Bfl Ijy an ele- 

 mentary treatise on bee-keeping for farmers 

 and others desiring to keep a few bees. Prof. 

 Fred W. Mally is professor of Entomology at 

 the Agricultural and Mechanical College, as- 

 sisted by Wilmon Newell, the latter having 

 immediate charge of the apiary, and appar- 

 ently the laboring oar in the preparation of 

 the Report. 



The Experimental Apiary was established 

 in 1002, with seven colonies of bees, which 

 were increased during the season to 31. The 

 sum of $.500 was voted by the Legislature for 

 use in the year, and was invested in bees, 

 queens, hives, books, honey-house, etc. 



The effort has been to breed to the highest 

 standard of excellence, keeping careful recoj-d 

 of all colonies, and selecting the best as 

 mothers of queens and drones. 



It is proposed during the coming year to 

 make a comparative study of the different 

 strains or races of bees, and especially to 

 determine approximately the comparative 

 length of life of the different races. This is 

 believed to have an important bearing upon 

 the harvest in seasons of special drouth. 



The study of honey-plants will also be con- 

 tinued. It seems a little curious to note that 

 while American varieties of buckwheat are 

 set down as partial or total failures, Japanese 

 buckwheat gave the best results of all plants 

 tested. The report says : 



With medium or even poor soil, and a very 

 small amount of moisture, this plant can be 

 depended upon to begin blooming 30 days 

 after planting, and will continue to bloom for 

 30 days, at the end of which time the sceil is 

 ready to gather. It will be seen that it is a 



very easy matter to regulate the time of sow- 

 ing, so that a honey-flow will be had from 

 this plant at the beginning of a dearth of 

 natural forage for the bees. ~^~y 



Japanese buckwheat thrives best when 

 drilled in rows about three feet apart, and 

 cultivated during growth. The seed brings 

 from $1.00 to 1..50 per bushel. In case seed is 

 not desired the buckwheat can be cut and 

 cured as in other hay, and is found to make 

 valuable feed for farm animals. If grown 

 more extensively there is no doubt that such 

 hay would bring a good price in the open 

 markets. 



The cowpea, especially the speckled variety, 

 16 commended. 



In the treatise on bee-keeping, in a list of 

 eight reliable text-books adapted to the be- 

 ginner, Maeterlinck's " Life of the Bee " 

 stands next to the highest, and Doolittle's 

 " Queen-Rearing " last. Otherwise the infor- 

 tion is reliable, and calculated to be of good 

 service to the class for whom it is intended. 



Age of Brood-Combs. — In this country 

 it has long been held that so long as worker- 

 comb is in good condition there is no need to 

 renew it in the brood-nest, and in Europe 

 this view has also gained ground. In England, 

 however, a different view is held. A late 

 number of the British Bee Journal advises 

 that brood-combs be gradually renewed, two 

 or three each year, but not more than three 

 in a single .season. That means that in some- 

 where from three to six years, age alone in- 

 capacitates a comb for further service. ■, The 

 question is whether it is the climate of Eng- 

 land, or what it is, that throws a comb out of 

 service in so few years when there have been 

 so many proofs that elsewhere a comb 30 

 years old is as good as new — in some respects 



better. 



• 



Honey in Bait-Sections, in the prac- 

 tice of most bee-keepers, is never allowed, the 

 honey Ijeing scrupulously cleaned out of the 

 combs by the bees in the fall before it has 

 time to granulate. Some, however, have no 

 fear as to ill results from having a little 

 honey left over in the sections to be used as 

 baits. Bearing upon the subject is the fol- 

 lowing in the British Bee Journal, from 11. S. 

 Shorthouse: 



The occasional crystallization of one jar of 

 honey which granulates, while the others re- 

 main bright and liquid, is accounted for by 

 the fact that the bottle either contains a small 

 portion of grit, or is slightly rough or irregu- 

 lar in some particular part of the inside, 

 which lends a starting point of crystallization 

 to the sugars which are contained in the 

 honey in what we will term a state of super- 

 saturation. 



An experiment (on crystallization), using 

 sulphate of soda for the purpose, most beau- . 

 litully illustrates this theory. If we take a 

 (|uautity of sulphate of soda, dissolve it in a 

 minimum quantity of hot water, and whilst 

 warm tie over the neck of the vessel in 



