1908 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



85 



ing honey that we may expect from one less populous. 

 Such a colony feels instinctively that its abode will 

 soon be too small, and the swarming fever sets in, 

 and we know that when that is awakened the bees 

 will continue to loaf. At the most, only as much hon- 

 ey will be gathered as is needed for making the swarm- 

 ing preparations. A colony with the swarming fever 

 is of little value as a honey-gatherer. 



5. The best honey-gatherintr colonies are not kept 

 at home during the best honey-flow by the nursing of 

 too much brood. If there is too much brood in pro- 

 portion to the working force, most of the honey gath- 

 ered will be consumed by the brood. The bee-keeper 

 whose bees rear a large amount of brood during the 

 main honey harvest, or near its close, will find, as he 

 stands before his colonies at the close of the harvest, 

 that, although they are strong in bees and the combs 

 faultless, the latter will be empty and will stay so. 



SMALL NUCLEUS HIVES FOR QUKEN-REARING. 



The queen- breeders over the country have 

 adopted various means for providing uuclti, 

 or small colonies, in which young queens 

 may be temporarily placed until after they 

 have been fertilized. Many have made use 

 of two or three frame nuclei in standard- 

 size hives; but a few years ago " baby nuclei" 

 were advocated on account of the small 

 number of bees needed to fill them and the 

 general inexpensive equipment required. 

 But because of the care necessary to main- 

 tain such abnormally small clusters of bees 

 the larger twin-mating boxes were develop- 

 ed for the purpose of providing a small hive 

 large enough to hold two clusters of bees 

 that would, in a measure, take care of them- 

 selves. These have proven very satisfactory, 

 although some of the experts are beginning 

 to feel that it may be perhaps cheaper, after 

 all, to use nuclei on full-size combs and 

 frames, thus saving the expense of odd-size 

 hives and fixtures. 



In this connection it is interesting to note 

 the report of W. H. Laws, a veteran queen- 

 breeder, as given in the November issue of 

 the Bee-keepers' Review. 



Small nuclei for queen-rearing are still a success 

 with W. H. Laws, but he now reports that, taking the 

 whole season through, there is really less labor by 

 employing three-frame nuclei of the regular size. 

 Such nuclei take care of themselves right alohg, month 

 after month. 



WAX-PRESSES. 



The readers of this journal will remember, 

 doubtless, that we have advised against the 

 use of hot-water wax-presses except in the 

 case of very large producers — those whose 

 output is 300 lbs. or more of wax per year. 

 One of the reasons for our opinion was the 

 discoloration of the wax due to the long-con- 

 tinued heat to which it is almost of necessity 

 subjected. Of course, if the wax is not al- 

 lowed to remain for any length of time on 

 the surface of the boiling water it will not 

 be discolored to a great degree; but it is not 

 an easy matter to keep the wax running off 

 as fast as it rises to the top. 



At the convention of the Ontario Bee-keep- 

 ers' Association, which was held in Toronto, 

 Nov. 13, 14, and 15, the Hershiser hot-water 

 press was compared to the Hatch press. Mr. 

 J. L. Byer, in the American Bee Journal for 

 December, gives the following report of this 

 discussion: 



Relative to a question on wax-presses, those who 



had tried the Hershiser admitted that, while more wax 

 could be obtained, yet the quality was not so good as 

 that taken with the Hatch-Gemmill press. Later on 

 during the convention, Mr. Sibbald, by means of a 

 model, explained the workings of a press (one member 

 called it a cross between the Gemmill and Hershiser 

 presses) which he thought superior to either the 

 Hatch-Gemmill or Hershiser. (Cuts of this press with 

 Mr. Sibbald's explanations will appear in the printed 

 annual report of the convention.) 



SOME VITAL POINTS IN BUILDING UP A HON- 

 EY MARKET. 



It may be that salesmen are born and not 

 made; but we are inclined to doubt it. At 

 any rate, any salesman may improve. Mr. 

 M. V. Facey has an excellent article in the 

 Bee-keepers' Review for November in which 

 many sound doctrines are preached. We 

 should like to give his thought in full, but 

 we have room for only a part of the article. 

 He mentions the fact that he now has about 

 1000 customers; and under the heading of 

 "Don't Argue, but Give the People what 

 they Want," he says: 



In building up this trade I have at all tim9s placed 

 myself in the place of both buyer and seller. You 

 have, first of all, to learn the tastes of your customers. 

 If you are building up a home trade, you will, as you 

 start out, find that one persbn likes basswood honey, 

 another clover, another an amber, and a fourth buck- 

 wheat. A great many salesmen will try to persuade 

 certain ones that their taste is a mistaken one; that 

 such and such honey is better than the one their taste 

 calls for. This is a great mistake. No man wants 

 the salesman to dictate to his tastes, as he knows per- 

 fectly well that the honey he likes the best istie best 

 for him; and this is what the wise salesman should 

 offer him. And right here I would say that the idea 

 of cultivating the public taste for this or that kind of 

 honey is largely a mistake. People have their tastes; 

 they are largely fond of honey; and, instead of culti- 

 vating a taste, we have only to cater to it. I find this 

 is an art that bee-keepers learn very slowly. We are 

 too apt to set up our own standard, and expect every- 

 body else to adopt it because it is ours; and thus, in 

 the supposed perfection of our own knowledge, we are 

 unable to detect our own defects. We should rather, 

 while we have an eye turned upon the public, study- 

 ing its demands, have the other eye turned back upon 

 ourselves, studying owr own defects of both trade and 

 production. 



Therefore, instead of trying to build up a trade by 

 belittling your rival, you should learn wherein his 

 goods excel yours, and bring your goods up to or be- 

 yond his standard. See that your honey is the best 

 ripened, the best graded, and the best put up, and 

 then, as you go out and sell this honey, people will ap- 

 preciate it; and when you have a man's honey trade, 

 and furnish him with such goods, he will stick by you 

 and even give you a cent or two a pound more than he 

 will give your neighbor. 



Every sale should oe made as though your whole 

 tradf depended upon that one transaction. I once 

 bought honey of a man who kept out his inferior goods 

 for his home trade, with the remark that it was 

 " good enough for them." That was the opposite of 

 what I am trying to impress upon my readers. If that 

 man had valued his home trade, and if he cared in the 

 least to build it up, he should have kept his very choic- 

 est honey for it, and, instead of a small trade at a low 

 price, he might have had a good trade at a good price 

 that would easily have taken all his honey. 



I said it was necessary to furnish each buyer with 

 the kind of honey his taste preferred. To do this we 

 must learn to grade honey. This is a weak point with 

 many bee-keepers and with some dealers. I have 

 been offered " clover honey," by large and experienc- 

 ed bee-keepers, that seemed to have hardly a trace of 

 clover in it; besides, it was dark in color and strong in 

 flavor at that. I have bought a lot of white honey 

 and of dark honey of a dealer, wherein much of the 

 dark honey was whiter than the white. 



To hold a person's trade, we must furnish him what 

 he wants. If a man is dainty in his tastes, and wants 

 clover honey, and we furnish him honey-dew a time or 

 two, we will find he will very promptly avoid our hon- 

 ey quite as persistently as our satisfied customers 



