596 



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SEPT£iMBER. 



BY SOPHIE L. SCHENCK. 



A change creeps over Nature. A deep flush 

 MouDts to the maple-leaf : the air is clear : 



The (Trapes are purpling, and a crimson blush 

 Spreads o'er such flowers as declithe waning year; 



Ripe apples bend the trees, while golden-rod. 



By roadside, lane and meadow, gayly nod. 



Now whistlings of the quail are often heard 

 From buckwheat fields. while, on the calm air.floats 



The drumming of the partridge. Not a bird 

 Builds now a nest ; but night is thrilled by notes 



From crickets near, and locusts' drowsy hum 



That seems to say : " September time has come I" 

 —Ladies Home Joub.sall. 



The Toronto liidiiiitrial ICxIii- 

 bitioii, which is to be held from Sept. 8th 

 to the 20th, at Toronto, Ont., has prepared 

 a splendid premium list for its Bee and 

 Honey Department, and Canadian apiar- 

 ists should avail themselves of this oppor- 

 tunity of making a display which shall be a 

 credit to the industry of bee-keeping in the 

 great Dominion. Regarding the list of 

 premiums, Mr. K. F. Holtermann, of Rom- 

 ney, Ont., writes thus : 



I believe that Toronto leads in giving 

 encouragement to an attractive display of 

 honey and bee-keepers' supplies, and for 

 this the Manager deserves great credit, as 

 also does Mr. D. A. Jones. I say that they 

 deserve credit, because there is no doubt 

 this display from year to year has done 

 much in popularizing honey, not only in 

 Toronto, but throughout our broad Domin- 

 ion. 



As will be seen by the appended prize- 

 list, the present year, take it as a whole, is 

 a credit to the committee— Messrs. Vail, 

 McKnight, Emigh and Otter, and the Asso- 

 ciation. The prizes offered amount to 

 $302, and 3 silver and 3 bronze medals. 



By carefully studying the list, it will be 

 seen that every encouragement has been 

 given to bee keepers who can only exhibit 

 in small quantities. This is as it should 

 be, and will doubtless bring out a great 

 many exhibitors — in fact, I have heard that 

 the exhibit in the honey-building will be 

 greater than any previous year. 



There is just one little point of difference 

 which I have— it will be seen that the prizes 

 offered to supply dealers pure and simple, 

 are three silver medals and -^T.OO. In my 

 humble opinion, this is not as it should be, 

 surely, for bee keepers go to exhibitions to 

 learn what different appliances are being 

 made, and also what new inventions. It 

 probably pays a supply dealer no better to 

 show his wares irrespective of prizes, than 

 it would the beekeeper, and we know that 

 in Toronto supply dealers have almost 

 ceased showing ; they say that it pays 

 them better to send out extra circulars for 

 the amount that it would cost them to 

 exhibit. 



I regret to see no prize offered for va- 

 rieties of honey. When only the lightest 

 boney is shown at Fairs, the public are apt 

 to think that anything varying from that 

 color must be impure. But let me repeat, 

 I never saw a prize-list before which, in my 

 estimation, is so well suited to give satis- 

 faction to bee keepers and the Exhibition 

 Association. R. F. Holtermann. 



The following is the Premium-List for 

 "Honey and Apiarian Supplies," referred 



to by Mr. Holtermann, a copy of which, 



with the rules governing the same, may be 



had by sending the request on a postal 



card to Mr. H. J. Hill, the Secretary, at 



Toronto, Ont. : 



ist. 2d. 3d. 4th. 

 Best display of 200 lbs. of extracted 



granulated honey in glass »10 $5 13 I 



Best display fof 5iXi lbs. of liquid ex- 

 tracted honey, of which not less 



than 2-iO lbs. must be in glass.quality 



to be considered 20 15 10 5 



Best display of 500 lbs. of comb honey 



in sections, quality to be considered 25 20 12 6 

 Best display of 2o lbs. of comb boney 



in sections, quality to be considered, 



tf-at is to say.clean sections and best 



filled 10 6 4 2 



Best display of lOO lbs. of extracted 



liquid linden honey, in glas8,quality 



to be considered !. 8 5 3 



Beat display of lOO lbs. of extracted 



liquid clover honey in glass, quality 



considered 8 5 3 



Best beeswax, not less than 10 lbs. 



i manufacturers of comb foundation 



excluded) 6 4 2 



Best foundation for brood-chamber. .321 



Best foundation for sections 3 2 1 



Apiarian supplies 1. Silver Medal. 



2. Bronze Medal. 



Best style and assortment of tins for 



retailing e-xtracted honey 1. Silver Medal. 



Best style and assortment of tins for 



retailing extracted honey 2. Bronze Medal. 



Best style and assortmentof glassfor 



retailing extracted honey 1. Silver Medal. 



Best style and assortment of glassfor 



retailing extracted honey 2. Bronze Medal. 



Best section super for top story and 



system of manipulating, product to 



be exhibited in super as left by the 



bees 3 2 1 



Best and most practical new invention 



for the apiarist, never shown be- 

 fore at this Exhibiti<m 5 3 2 



Largest and best variety of uses to 



which honey may be put,illustrated 



by individual samples of the ditTer- 



ent things into which it enters as a 



component ; forexample,say one or 



two samples each in canned fruits, 



cakes, pastry, meats, vinegar, etc. .. 8 5 3 

 Best and most useful queen-nursery 



cage 2 



For most tasty and neatly arranged 



exhibit of honey in the Apiarian 



Department, all the honey to be the 



production of the exhibitor. ?20 of 



this prize is given by the Ontario 



Bee-Keepers' Association 35 15 10 



Extracted Honey.- The following is 

 on Mr. R. Wilkins' honey-labels : 



Honey is one of Nature's purest sweets, 

 valuable both as food and medicine. It has 

 always been esteemed a luxury — the food 

 of kings ; eaten in small quantities with 

 other food it is very nourishing, and favors 

 the cure of pulmonary diseases and colds. 



The scientific management of bees, and 

 the use of the honey-extractor, make ex- 

 tracted honey so abundant that all may 

 use it. 



Honey is very diversified in its color, 

 taste, odor, and disposition to become can- 

 died, or granulated, depending mainly on 

 the variety of bloom it is collected from, 

 and the weather in which it is gathered. 

 Cold weather favors speedy granulation ; 

 its becoming granulated is one of the best 

 evidences of its purity, yet .some of the best 

 California honey requires two seasons to 

 become candied. 



This honey was gathered mainly from 

 sage blossoms on the mountains of Califor- 

 nia. Of course, we cannot entirely avoid 

 having it mixed with honey from other 

 flowers. I am sorry that it is impractica- 

 ble to give our customers positive evidence 

 of the genuineness of our goods unless their 

 own taste is reliable. I merely assert that 

 our honey is pure and good, at the same 

 time realizing that the mere say so or 

 guarantee of a stranger who is interested 

 in the sale of his goods, is but slight com- 

 mendation. But I will suggest that our 

 honey comes from the southern part of the 

 State of California, noted for its producing 

 a greater quantity of choice honey than 

 any other part of the world, yielding it 

 here by the hundreds of tons. 



BesiniuuK^* — AH things must have a 

 beginning, and it is sometimes interesting 

 to look back over the beginning of an en- 

 terprise and note the losses, successes and 

 failures. The Kno.xville, Iowa, Express, 

 last spring, contained nearly a column arti- 

 cle concerning the apiary of Mr. J. W. 

 Bittenbender, and in it is given Mr. B's 

 expeiience for 17 years as follows : 



In the spring of 1873 I purchased 4 colo- 

 nies of bees, and being successful, in the 

 spring of 1875 I had 15 colonies to begin 

 the season with, and in the fall they had 

 increased to 24, and I had sold $300 worth 

 of comb honey, selling it readily at 25 

 cents per pound. 



In the fall of 1875 I invested $150 in 

 bees, in all conceivable kinds of hives, but 

 mostly in straight- framed hives, with holes 

 cut in the top of the frames for the bees to 

 enter the boxes ; but my success was turned 

 to sorrow in the spring of 1876, and only 

 18 of my 50 colonies were left to cheeV 

 me on my way. 



I hived the swarms in the empty hives as 

 they issued, with the old comb remaining, 

 and as the season was good, in the fall I 

 had nearly all of my hives filled with a fair 

 crop of honey, giving me about S200. 



In the spring of 1877 1 suffered a loss of 

 1 1 colonies, leaving me with 34, the loss 

 being in the tight-frame hives. Satisfying 

 myself on this point, I began transferring 

 the combs and making kindling wood of 

 these hives, using new hives of the Lang- 

 stroth pattern only. 



As this was a poor season until fall, I had 

 no swarms, but did have a surplus of about 

 35 pounds to the colony, and the bees had 

 plenty to winter on. 



In 1878 there was but little honey until 

 July, when the linden was in bloom, then 

 for two weeks the bees tried to " break 

 their backs," so that 1 increased them to 

 49 colonies, and sold about $450 worth of 

 honey, and came out in the spring of 1879 

 with 45 colonies, and was quite successful 

 until the season of 1883, when so many 

 bees suffered destruction throughout the 

 United States, Iowa being no exception ; 

 but not being discouraged, although suffer- 

 ing a heavy loss, and seeing a prospect of a 

 good honey season, I proceeded to buy up 

 all the bees that were for sale, and suc- 

 ceeded in filling up my hives and receiving 

 fair pay for my season's work. 



lioney-IJew tor ^Vinter Stores. 



-Dr. Southard, of Kalamazoo, one of the 

 brightest and most expert bee-keepers of 

 the day, used to doubt the utility of honey- 

 dew. Several years ago, however, when 

 everybody's bees all over the country gath- 

 ered so much honey-dew, and were all 

 going to perdition with it in the wnnter, the 

 doctor thought he would like to know some- 

 thing positive about it ; so he saw to it that 

 5 or 6 colonies had nothing but honey-dew. 

 He winters them out-doors, and usually 

 loses but one or two out of a hundred, and, 

 sure enough, the 5 colonies having honey- 

 dew exclusively, wintered as nice as a pin. 

 It has been demonstrated that diarrhea 

 among bees (the one and only cause of 

 winter losses), is not caused by honey-dew 

 nor cider, nor anything of the kind, but by 

 the consumption of nitrogen from bee- 

 bread or floating pollen. Well-ripened 

 buckwheat honey is as good stores for win- 

 ter as any in the world.— J5.rc)iaMge. 



Supply Dealers who desire to handke 

 a good Bee-Veil, should write for our dozen 

 rates on the"Globe" Bee-Veils, to sell again. 



