744 



TH® mvmmMi^mm mmm jowmnmiL. 



R. B. Leahy said that he had experi- 

 mented with feeding unsealed sugar 

 syrup. He had wintered 50 colonies 

 successfully in a wet cellar. 



J. C. Stewart, of Hopkins, Mo., win- 

 tered bees in chafl" hives two years ago 

 on sugar syrup, and they did well. 

 They had 15 to 20 pounds fed to each, 

 beginning on Dec. 6 ; those fed first, 

 lived, and those fed later all died. 

 These stores were unsealed, and the 

 bees were out-of-doors. 



Dr. Miller asked what amount of 

 sugar syrup and honej- was consumed. 



President Taylor said that when the 

 stores wore sugar syrup the consump- 

 tion was much less. Those fed with 

 honey, consumed 22 pounds ; while 

 those fed on sugar syrup consumed 

 from 3 to 7 pounds. 



W. J. Finch asked whether the 

 strength of the colonies would not ac- 

 count for the difference ? and whether 

 those fed with honej' did not come out 

 stronger ? 



President Taylor thought not, as 

 they seemed of equal strength. All 

 were destitute of brood in the spring. 

 Those fed with sugar syrup had more 

 vitality in the spring. Honey is stimu- 

 lative, and more is used. 



R. McKnight said that the amount 

 of brood-i'earing makes an enormous 

 difference, as the weight of brood is of 

 great importance, and the weight of 

 the hives does not show the amount of 

 consumption. It is therefore not an 

 accurate test. 



President Taylor said that bees 

 without brood would present a good 

 test. Taking the average of testimony, 

 the sugar syrup will go further. 



A. I. Root said that he could not 

 advise the use of cheap honey for feed- 

 ing bees, as there was danger of its 

 being tainted with foul brood. He 

 ■would not take away sealed honey and 

 feed sugar syrup. 



S. A. Shuck asked if bees that con- 

 sume less will do as well in the spring 

 as those that consume more. 



President Taylor always expected 

 and found better progress in the colo- 

 nies wintered on sugar stores. Honey 

 is stimulating, and not so powerful for 

 food, but makes the bees active — stirs 

 them up. Sugar .syrup is wh.it is 

 wanted for winter — good food keeps 

 them quiet. 



A. I. Root said sugar is sweeter than 

 honey. 



Chas. Dadant said the best sugar 

 should be used. 



Mrs. Harrison asked : Is there any 

 difference in the sugar from cane and 

 that from beets ? 



A. I. Root said that pure sugar was 

 the same from each source. 



C. P. Dadant said that the beet 

 sugar used in Europe was just as good 

 as any cane sugar. 



Dr. Miller — All must agree that we 

 must feed granulated sugar if we have 

 to feed, whether the sugar comes from 

 cane or beets. 



Eugene Secorsaid that Orange Judd, 

 in his last paper, asserted that sugar 

 from cane and beets is precisely the 

 same. He had just returned from the 

 large beet-sugar factory at Grand 

 Island, Nebr. 



Dr. Mason — Get the granulated 

 sugar, and do not trouble about the 

 scientific part. 



President Taylor said that if a man 

 has the time, and is willing, it will 

 pay to extract the honey, and feed 

 sugar syrup, but for himself he did not 

 like the business of extracting and 

 feeding. 



C. P. Dadant said that he did not 

 believe it paid to do it at all. 



J. C. Stewart said that it would not 

 pay. for the honey extracted is a 3rd 

 or 4th class article, and not marketable. 



R. McKnight said that it would not 

 do, no matter whether it paid or not, 

 to encourage the practice of extracting 

 honey for the purpose of feeding 

 sugar-syrup. 



W. F. Clarke said that the bee- 

 keeper should not needlessly feed sugar 

 syrup to his bees, and run the risk of 

 some of it going to his customers. An 

 undisturbed brood-nest, stored with 

 the best honey, is what he wants. 



Apicultural Journalism was the next 

 subject, and the following bj' W. Z, 

 Hutchinson was read by Dr. Miller : 



Apicultural Journalism. 



Bee-keepers have good reasons for 

 being proud of their literature. Scarcely 

 a point arises upon which we cannot lind 

 tlic recorded experience of our best api- 

 arists ; wliile new discoveries are at once 

 described, illustrated and discussed in 

 the bee-keeping ixTiodieals, Perhaps 

 bee-keepers have given the matter little 

 thought, but. notwithstanding the excel- 

 lence of these periodicals, might they 

 not be improved ? If so, how ? Have 

 they faults ? If so, wliat are they ? \Vc 

 believe that "apicultural journalism" 

 may be profitably made the subject of 

 special discussion. 



Time was when many of the industries 

 were represented in one family. Flax 

 and wool were grown, spun and worked 

 up into cloth, and made into <-lothing. 

 Cows were kept, and cheese as well as 

 butter mad(! for home use. Poultry and 

 a fc^w colonies of bees added to the com- 

 forts of the lionsehold. But there is no 

 need of going into detail ; every one 

 knows how ]ieo])l(' lived lOO years ago. 

 Cheap and rapiil transportation has en- 

 couraged the in\<'ntion of machinery, 

 the building of factories, and the elassiii- 

 cation of labor. This has brought aliout 

 HpccUtUy. With specialty in production 

 came the need of specialty in periodicals 

 devoted to the intia'csts of producers. 

 For the genera! farmer we had and still 

 have, agricultural journals devoted to 

 the cultivation of grain, stock-raising. 



gardening, fruit growing, bees, poultry, 

 etc., and they answrr their pm-pose well, 

 but when a man makes a specialty of 

 scjme one of tliese brandies of rural 

 industry, he then wishes a periodical 

 devoted to that business as a specialty. 

 not one mixed up with some other spec- 

 ialty for wliich he cares little or nothing. 

 These other toiiics are all right in their 

 jjlaces. but bi'e-keepers who do not care 

 tor them, dislike to pay for their diseus- 

 sicm, or to wade thrimgh the discussions 

 in order to got at what information there 

 is about bees. As a rule, bee-periodicals 

 that attemi)t to •■mix in" other topics, do 

 SI) at a loss. We Ix'lieve that they will 

 best serve the interests of their sub- 

 scribers, and at tlie same time secure 

 their own prosiierity, by letting severely 

 alone all subjects not pertaining to their 

 spei'ialty. We would not expunge any 

 wit. humor or eloini'ence that may bub- 

 ble up spiintancdusly, but the publication 

 of sneli iittrinptK at wit as luive appeared 

 in some, is enough to kill any journal tliat 

 it is possible to kill. 



After having decided that only such 

 matter as pertains to bees shall go into 

 the journal, then the matter of (pmlity 

 must be looked after. Some matter that 

 appears in some of the bee-papers could 

 be placed only under the head of '• twad- 

 dle," What does possess editors to 

 publish such trash ? A woman tells in a 

 would-be-funny way of her troubles in 

 clipping a queen's wing, or a man starts 

 out with : -'I am a bee-keeper. I began 

 the season with 2-1: colonies. Some were 

 weak, but — " What is the use of going 

 any further ? You have all seen these 

 things in the periodicals. ^Vhat good 

 are they ? Do they help bee-keepers ? 

 Maxt such things be used, in order to fill 

 the pagi'S V No ; not if editors will bestir 

 themselves, and, if they cannot do this, 

 they are unlit for tlie positions they 

 occupy. 



Friends, how do you read the bee- 

 papers ? We read them in this manner. 

 We glance at the heading of an article, 

 then at its author's name, and sometimes 

 this is all we do. By the way, we wish 

 all would place the author's name at the 

 head of the article. It saves the bother 

 of looking up th(^ end of the article (over 

 the leaf, perhaps) to see who wrote it. 

 Perhaps some think that the knowledge 

 of tlie authorshiii is immateial : if the 

 article is good, it is good irrespective of 

 who wrote it. True, but show us the 

 man who does not wish to know who is 

 doing the talking. 



To return, if the heading and author- 

 sliip are favorable, the first paragraph is 

 glanced over. (Do you know that the. 

 gist of a paragraph can be taken in at a 

 glance'?) Then the next paragraph is 

 given a glance, then the next, and so on 

 thriingh the article. Frequently this is 

 all the reading the article receives. 



Tliere are some copies of some of the 

 be<'-papers that wc^ have read through in 

 this m.iiiner in about five minutes. 

 About once a month there comes to this 

 office a paper claiming to be a bee-paper, 

 that we don't read nt all — it simply is 

 not wortli it. 



Wlien we learn, by glancing through 

 an article, that it contains something of 

 value, we then read it through carefully. 



