280 



GLEANINGS IS bEE CULTURE. 



Mar 1 



STUDYING THE MARKET. 



I 'want you to tell us in Gleanings something 

 ahout markeiing honey. If I succeed in increasing 

 my bees, as I hope to do, what am I going to do with 

 my honey? Because you old 'vets' know how to do 

 tliese things, don't soar so high that the beginners 

 are lost from sight. E. M. Beown. 



Well, perhaps we old writers do lose sight 

 of the beginners to a certain extent in our 

 writings: but I had always considered that 

 Gleanings gave a fair share of its space to 

 those who were in the A B C of apiculture. 

 I know that, when referring to the manage- 

 ment of the apiary for a crop of honey, the 

 common advice is to study one's field, as 

 well as the bees, so that the field and the bees 

 may be brought together in such a way that 

 the best results can be secured. But I am 

 confident that we should just as thoroughly 

 know our field for marketing, so that our 

 honey and the field may be brought together 

 as effectually for the best results as are the 

 bees and the field. 



Producing a crop, without the least idea of 

 what is going to be done with it when pro- 

 duced, is a fault not confined to the bee- 

 keeper alone. The agricultural masses are 

 as often afHicted in this way as are the api- 

 culdurists, I should like every reader of 

 Gleanings to consider this matter fully, if 

 he has not done so already, for on our abili- 

 ty to market our honey crop successfully 

 turns much of our happiness and success in 

 our apicultural life, to say nothing of the 

 contents of our purse or bank account. Study 

 this matter thoroughly; turn it over and over 

 again, if need be, till this matter of market- 

 ing strikes down as deep into your very be- 

 ing as has any thing which has been the most 

 interesting to you about the bees, for on it 

 hangs one of the greatest secrets of success- 

 ful apiculture. Oh the folly of working from 

 early morn till late at night, day in and day 

 out, only to throw the larger part of it away 

 because the whole mind is bent on a big 

 crop, instead of how much we can secure 

 from the crop after it is obtained: Such a 

 course is only on a par with several of the 

 farmers I used to know when a boy, who 

 would go intothe woods in late fall and early 

 winter and pick up all of the fallen wood 

 about their woods, cut it into stove length, 

 and carefully pile it, so as to save all that 

 was going to waste, and then leave those 

 piles of wood, many of them, to rot down, 

 rarely using it afterward. I used to ask 

 inyself the question, "Would it not have 

 been better to allow the wood to rot with 

 out such great exppnditure of human energy 

 rotting with it?" Then many would make 

 butter at a great expense of feed, milking 



cows, skimming milk, making the cream in- 

 to butter, and carefully packing the same 

 into tubs and firkins, only to have it stand 

 in some poor cellar or other place, before 

 selling it, till it was nearly spoiled, when the 

 whole had to be sold for a song. Of course, 

 under our present-day state of affairs, with 

 the timber nearly all cut off, and our butter 

 being made almost wholly in creameries, 

 this lack of ability in the farmer has been 

 largely overcome, but scores and scores of 

 our bee-keepers keep right on dumping their 

 honey on the town and city markets for 

 "what it will fetch," with no thought re- 

 garding a better market or the great injury 

 they are doing others through their paying 

 no attention to this part of the bee business. 

 Far better, produce only half as much, with 

 only half the cost in expense and labor, while 

 being alert in the selling of the same, thus 

 securing equal results without the wear and 

 tear of producing a big crop. 



All of our bee-keeping work should be 

 done with an "eye single" to the turning of 

 the finished product to the best possible ad- 

 vantage to us and ours— not that I ever 

 wanted to receive more for my product than 

 would be honest between man and man, but 

 I do think that we should do all that is pos- 

 sible to keep the price up to a parallel to 

 what we have to buy. An even exchange is 

 said to be no robbery. In those early days 

 of my bee-keeping, butter and honey went 

 hand in hand, and I thought that I was in 

 no way robbing my brother- farmer when I 

 let him have as many pounds of my fancy 

 white-clover and basswood honey as I took 

 of his gilt-edged butter in exchange. But 

 under this present age of "creamery extras " 

 he takes more than two pounds of my fancy 

 section honey for one of his butter, because 

 he has a chance to do this on account of our 

 having passed from the days of barter to the 

 dollar system. However, if we turn our 

 eyes to sugar, whifh, on the "sweet-for- 

 sweet" idea, may be a nearer parallel, we 

 find that our honey has a greater purchasing 

 power than it had forty to sixty years ago. 

 With honey at 25 cents and sugar 12^, we 

 got two pounds of the latter for one of the 

 former; but now, with sugar at 5 cents and 

 section honey at 15, we get three pounds of 

 sugar for one of honey. I have used only 

 these two items to give us something of an 

 idea of what our knowledge should be based 

 upon in calculating the market price where 

 our honey is disposed of in our home market. 



Before our crop is produced we should be 

 calculating what we are going to do with it. 

 We want to have some idea of whether we 

 can sell it at home, or whether we shall have 

 to send a part or all of it to a distant city. 

 We want to consider the ability of our neign- 

 bors to buy. The most of us are not fortu- 

 nate enough to have wealthy customers who 

 can buy our honey at any price. Most of 

 our neighbors are, like ourselves, buying the 

 necessaries as cheaply as possible, and dning 

 without the luxuries. If wheat and potatoes 

 are cheap, and wages low, those about us 

 who would buy honey will buy sugar if we 



