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A neighbor of mine sliipped extracted 

 honey, of the very best quality, to New 

 York last 3'ear, and comb honey with 

 it in the same car. He told nie that 

 the extracted honey netted him 6 

 cents a pound, while the comb honey 

 brought him 15 cents, clear of all ex- 

 pense. Thus we have at the present 

 time 12.39 more for SOD pounds of 

 comb honey than we would have for 

 566 pounds of extracted honey. 



Until extracted honey brings readily 

 two-thirds as much as comb honey, I 

 prefer to work at producing comb 

 honey. Why I say " readily," is be- 

 cause, with me, extracted honey al- 

 ways drags, while comb honey sells 

 quickly. 



Borodino, N. Y. 



HONEY. 



The Article that Costs a Dollar 

 Per Pound. 



Written for the Western Plowman 



BY C. H. DIBBERN. 



September sometimes gives us quite 

 a dash of fall honey, but if it turns out 

 like everything else this year, it will 

 not amount too much. If it will only 

 put the bees into good condition for 

 winter, we shall be well satisfied. It 

 has certainly been a very peculiar sea- 

 son^ and as far as bees and honey go, 

 a very unsatisfactory one. But very 

 little comb honey has been secured, in 

 a marketable shape, and there is no 

 new honey in the market, at least in 

 our home market. I do not think that 

 merchants and dealers yet realize how 

 very short the honey crop will be. The 

 places where a reasonable crop has 

 been gathered are so few and so lim- 

 ited that it will be but a drop in the 

 bucket to supply the 66,000,000 people 

 o^ the United States, to say nothing of 

 the rest of the world. 



HONEY WOKTH $1.00 PER POUND. 



The prices quoted in our general 

 markets are still very low, but then 

 these chaps have little or nothing for 

 sale, and I imagine when they come to 

 really have honey to sell their prices 

 will be much higher. Why, a dollar a 

 pound would not pay us for all we 

 have produced this year, and we can 

 name a great many bee-keepers who 

 have done no better. Of course an}' 

 such figures are almost out of the reach 

 of any one, even for medicine, and it 

 will make little difference to us, as we 

 have none to offer. 



It will not be necessary to give 

 directions for packing, marketing and 

 shipping the crop, as many of us will 

 have hard work to get enough to butter 

 our own biscuits. Well, now would 



be the time for those smart ones who 

 have been manufacturing comb honey 

 from parafline and glucose, if it could 

 be done. That it cannot be done has 

 been shown over and over again, and 

 it is pretty certain that such a thing 

 never will be done. It is wonderful 

 however, how this story is kept going 

 the rounds of the papers, and how 

 many variations can be made of it. 



Another thing that bee-keepers have 

 been accused of, without any founda- 

 tion, is that they feed sugar syrup to 

 the bees in such quantities that they 

 will be compelled to store it in sections, 

 and that this honey is sold at a great 

 profit, as white clover honey. Why, 

 they tell us you can buy granulated 

 sugar for 7J cents per pound, and nice 

 honey is worth 15 cents, and surely 

 there is a big profit ! When this mat- 

 ter was first brought up, I thought to 

 myself that there was something in it, 

 and that perhaps it was practiced by 

 some bee-men who report such fabu- 

 lous crops. 



I have lately experimented some in 

 this direction, and have been forced 

 to the conclusion that with honey at 

 anything like present prices, it won't 

 pay. To say nothing about the ques- 

 tionable honesty of such a thing, it 

 must be remembered that the bees in 

 no way change the syrup fed to them, 

 and that although stored in comb, it is 

 not equal in quality or appearance to 

 our fine clover honey. 



Experiments also show that it re- 

 quires fully two pounds of granulated 

 sugar to get the bees to store one 

 pound of honey, and this would bring 

 the actual cost up to 15 cents per 

 pound. Then sections and comb foun- 

 dation also cost money, and it is lots 

 of bother to prepare and feed the 

 bees. 



Some may doubt that it requires two 

 pounds of sugar to produce a pound of 

 this kind of " honey," and ask what 

 becomes of the other pound. Well, 

 this constant feeding greatly stimulates 

 the bees, and they commence breeding 

 rapidly, which consumes large quanti- 

 ties of stores, and it requires some 20 

 pounds of liquid sweets to produce a 

 pound of wax. Then the extra labor 

 and activity consumes more food, and 

 that is what becomes of full)' one-half 

 the honey or sugar syrup fed to them. 



Now any one can easily figure out 

 that this kind of "manufacturing" 

 honey does not pay, as the actual cost 

 in cash would not be much less than 

 20 cents per pound, and that it is not 

 much practiced, even in very poor sea- 

 sons like the present. What bee-keeper 

 would care to invest 15 to 20 cents per 

 pound in a questionable sort of honey, 

 at present prices for a good quality of 

 genuine honey ? Had he not better go 

 to some place where honey is pro- 



duced, and buy of some brother bee- 

 keeper, and supply his customers with 

 a fair article, or otherwise frankly ac- 

 knowledge that he has none to sell ? 



IMPROVE THE STOCK OF BEES. 



Is there anything that the bee-keeper 

 can do in a poor season to make the 

 business pay ? This is a question that 

 has bothered me a good deal, and 

 after much thought I have come to the 

 conclusion that there is not. The best 

 that can be done is to keep everything 

 in shape, and see that the bees have 

 stores enough to live on. 



Something, of course, can.always be 

 done to improve the stock. If there 

 are any colonies that are very cross, 

 or not up to the standard in any way, 

 their queens should be exchanged, for 

 choice ones. But as to making any 

 money out of the business, it cannot 

 well be done. Even if one became so 

 discouraged as to wish to sell the bees 

 and all the fixtures, he would find that 

 in a poor season no one wants to buy. 

 All that can be done is to " watch and 

 wait" for that "good time coming." 



FEED FOR WINTER STORES. 



One thing must be attended to now, 

 if we expect to have our bees alive and 

 ingood condition next spring ; that is, 

 see to it that every hive is supplied in 

 the early part of September with stores 

 enough to carry them through the 

 winter. In some sections the bees 

 may gather an abundant supply from 

 the fall bloom, but in others they will 

 have to be fed. 



If this is not attended to now, they 

 must starve during the cold months 

 and early spring. Every colony ought 

 to have at least 20 pounds of sealed 

 honey when cold weather sets in. It 

 is perhaps better to do some feeding in 

 the spring, as that will then greatly 

 encourage breeding. Store away all 

 the empty hives and fixtures where 

 they will be safe, so that we may have 

 them when needed again. 



Milan, Ills. 



IOWA. 



Report of the State Bee-Keep- 

 ers' Conveution. 



Written for theAmerlcan Bee Journal 



BY EUGENE SECOR. 



The Iowa State Bee-Keepers' Society 

 met at their Tent on the Fair Grounds 

 at Des Moines, Iowa, on Sept. 3, 1890, 

 with President Thos. Chantry in the 

 chair, and Wilson Sherman as Secre- 

 tary. No programme nor order of 

 business had been arranged. After 

 some informal discussion of various 

 matters, and after the report of the 



