9)&&&&&&&&&&&€i&&^S^@^^@^S&^&&&e&&*9'&&e&&&&&&&&e'&&&i 



'J861 >^ 



Entered at the Poet-OfEce at Chicago as Second-Class Mail-Mailer. 

 Published Weekly at 81«00 a Tear by Ceorge W^. Tork & Co., 334 Uearbom St. 



aBORQB W. YORK, Editor. 



CHICAGO, ILL., MARCH 2, 1905. 



VoL XLV.— No, 9, 



=^ 



(Ebttortal rtotes 

 anb (Eomments 



=/ 



Advertising the Value and Uses of Honey. 



We believe il was at the Denver National convention, in 1903, that 

 the advertising of the value and uses of honey was first discussed 

 publicly. Since then more or less has been said and written about it. 



At the Wisconsin convention at Madison, in February, 1904, we 

 read a paper on this subject, but it never appeared in print, for the 

 reason that it was burned among other papers in the fire that swept 

 away the ofUce and factory of Secretary Dittmer. When Secretary 

 Brodbeck invited us to furnish a paper for the St. Louis National 

 convention, and to select our own subject, we quite naturally took up 

 the honey-advertising question again, and tried to write as best we 

 could on it. 



The more we think on this subject the more we are convinced that 

 the thing for bee-keepers to do in order to overcome the apparently 

 stagnated honey market, especially in the larger cities, is to do some 

 good advertising of honey. The fact is, most people are afraid to buy 

 honey. They have so often read the infernal lies about comb honey 

 being manufactured that they have come to believe them true. Also, 

 they think that all the extracted honey found on the market is adul- 

 terated. 



Now, what is to be done to counteract the effect of the misrepre- 

 sentations about honey that have been going the rounds of the news- 

 paper press for nearly 25 years? What can be done to get the great 

 consuming public to regain confidence in honey? Our answer to 

 these two questions is, Advertise ! 



" Oh, but that will cost lots of money !" some one says. Surely, 

 it will. But il will cost a lot more in loss by a continuation of the 

 present low prices on honey, or no sales at all, than it will ever cost to 

 put the advertising idea into effect. 



What if 5000 or 10,000 bee-keepers should each pay $1.00 each 

 (6om^ would pay more) within the next 30 days, for the purpose of 

 advertising the great value of honey as a food, in say two of the lead- 

 ing daily newspapers of New Tork, Chicago, Cincinnati, Boston and 

 Philadelphia— don't you think the good effect would be felt very soon? 

 We believe it would. And the newspapers that nilverlised the Inilh 

 about honey would perhaps not be so likely to publish false state- 

 ments about honey very soon. 



We believe this is the "next move" on the honey-producers' 

 checker-board. 



Sugar-Feeding Among Bee-Keepers Denounced. 



In the December number of the American Bee-Keeper Arthur C. 

 Miller denounces sugar-feeding in such vigorous style as to warrant 

 the editor in giving the sub-head, " Baneful Results of the Practice 

 Forcibly Presented ". Seven pages farther along in the same journal, 

 L. E. Kerr, M. D., says, " All intelligent bee-men now rely to a great 

 extent upon the sugar-barrel '". Which raises a question as to Mr. 



Miller's intelligence; although he may console himself with the 

 thought that " there are others " lacking in intelligence in the same 

 way. 



One part of Mr. Miller's argument that may well be pondered, 

 reads as follows : 



Suppose it is possible to so feed the bees that all of the syrup is 

 consumed and that none of it goes into the surplus; the average con- 

 sumer won't believe it. It maybe said the consumer does not know. 

 Perhaps not in many cases, but he does in others, and suspects all. 

 Then if he asks the bee-keeper what is the result? We know that 

 the small amount of syrup that gets into the honey from stimulative 

 feeding (when this is carefully and honestly done) is small indeed. 

 But there are the looks of the thing, and the name of it, and such a 

 name does not react to our advantage. 



But none too few among us are careful with stimulative feed- 

 ing, and as for fall feeding they crowd the brood-chamber with food. 

 Any one who is familiar with the various feeding systems advocated is 

 well aware that most of them afford ample opportunity for some of 

 the syrup to get into the honey. If there is a probability or a possi- 

 bility of any being there, then the bee-keeper can not honestly say 

 that his honey is absolutely pure. And until we can say that, we can 

 not raise our hands or voices against others who buy our honey and 

 then add more syrup of some kind. 



Do Bees Starve or Freeze ? 



Entire unanimity as to the answer is lacking. There are some 

 who are very positive that a colony of bees never dies from cold, and 

 it seems that a diametrically opposite view is also held. C. H. Oldham, 

 in the British Bee Journal, asserts, as a fa;t, " that when bees have 

 consumed all their winter stores, they do not die of starvation, but of 

 cold ". As proof of the assertion, he says that on a number of occa- 

 sions during the past year he has found bees apparently dead, their 

 stores all gone, yet upon warming them up they revived, and were all 

 right after being fed. His argument seems to be that as feeding did 

 not and could not restore them so long as the cold remained, it could 

 not be a case of starvation ; and as warming could and did revive 

 them, it was cold that sent them into their temporary death — a death 

 that would have become permanent if the cold had been continued. 



Pear-Blight and the Bees. 



A paper upon "Pear-Blight in Northern California ", published 

 in the Newcastle News, has been sent to this oflSce by H. Vogeler. 

 The writer, Prof. Ralph E. Smith, of the State University, paints a 

 vivid picture of the terrible ravages of the disease, and wisely urges 

 that thorough investigation of it be made under the auspices of the 

 State. In the course of his paper he says : 



Infection takes place largely in the blossoms, whither the germs 

 of the disease are brought by bees and other insects."' 



He quotes from a recent publication the following statement : 



" Spraying, fumigating, and all other external remedies are utterly 

 worthless, as the disease is in the sap-wood of the tree, protected from 

 all external influences." 



In this statement he thinks too much is taken for granted, and 

 proceeds to argue in favor of the possibility of efficacious spraying 

 after the following fashion : 



" If, then, we may well ask, the disease is ' protected from all ex- 

 ternal agencies', and its germs on that account not to be reached by 

 any spray or similar treatment, how does the honey-bee obtain such 

 germs to carry to the blossoms? Why, then, if the germ of pear- 

 blight is accessible to the honey-bee, is it so certain that a proper 



