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THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIE"W 



Bridgeport, Wis., Oct. 27, 1905. 

 Friend Hutchinson: 



That picture of comb honey on the 

 front pag^e of the Review for October, 

 makes my mouth water; I should not 

 wonder if it would use a whole lot of 

 people that waj'. There is something' 

 about broken, dripping- honey comb 

 that attracts more than anything- else 

 in the food line. Your picture is as 

 near as anything could be to the real 

 thing- and not be it. I believe chunk 

 hone}'-, displayed under proper condi- 

 tions, (protected from dust and Hies) 

 would make more sales than the fii:est 

 section honey, which is not near so 

 suggestive. 



W. Z. H., I cannot doubt your motives 

 but j^our advice does not seem to be 

 logical nor consistent. On page 309 

 3'ou acknowledg-e that the short crop of 

 the present season was a blessing. 

 Nature having- stepped in and redu ed 

 the supplj' of hone}', prices will be 

 sustained, etc. 



Witii all of which we agree, and I 

 wrote you a long- time ago and said, 

 that nothing- could cure the adverse 

 conditions but the law of Nature, re- 

 ducing the crop of bee-keepers or the 

 crop of honey. 



On page 311 you argue and plead 

 writh bee-keepers to increase their pro- 

 ducing capacity. 



Suppose that all should follow your 

 advice, which you, of course, would 

 wish to have them do, what would be 

 the result ? 



General lo^s through low prices, and 

 a dead market to all engaged in the 

 business of honey production for profit. 

 A g-reat many would become disgusted 

 and quit, losing- all they had invested. 

 This would certainly occur before con- 

 d'tions would again become normal. 



Yours Truly, 



Harry L^throp. 



Yes, there is something- part'cularly 

 attractive and delicious about the cut 

 edg-es of comb honey — the liquid, drip- 

 ping- sweetness. One of the lady ex- 

 hibitors over at Toronto told me that 

 the supreme moment always came when 

 the section of honey had been cut, and 

 was separated and the dripping pieces 

 laid out before the crowd. Some one 

 was alwa3's certain to fish up a five 

 cent piece at that point of the proceed- 

 ings. 



Now then, friend Lathrop, I must 

 agree with you that it would have a 

 yery depressing effect upon the honey 

 market IF (don't lose the point con- 

 tained in this little word) every bee- 

 keeper in this land should "keep more 

 bees," should double, or quadruple his 

 honey crop. But this thing will never 

 happen. All of the bee journals in ex- 

 istence may urge their subscribers to 

 keep more bees, and onlj' a certain 

 portion of them will heed the advice. 

 I will admit that not every man is so 

 situated as to keep bees in large num- 

 bees, but I do feel, and feel it strongly, 

 that many bee-keepers ought to keep 

 more bees — or else less. I feel that a 

 man ought to go into bee-keeping as he 

 would into any other business — as a 

 business. I would like to see, scattered 

 over all of this land, where the condi- 

 tions are suitable, men who are mak- 

 ing a business of bee-keeping— special- 

 ists with several apiaries each. It is 

 possible that honey would be sold at a 

 lower price, but the men who produce 

 it would be more prosperous than the 

 average bee-keeper of the present. 

 The large number of bees kept, and the 

 short-cut, wholesale methods employed, 

 would lower the cjs of production. 

 There might be more honey produced 

 than at present, but, if it were produced 

 by fewer men, they might be more 

 prosperous than the average bee-keeper 

 who now mixes bee-keeping with some 

 other pursuit. 



If we increase the crop of honey by 

 having a small percentage of the ex- 

 isting bee-keepers "keep more bees," 

 the increase in the aggregate will not 

 be sufficient to greatly lower the price, 

 and the men who thus double or tribble 

 their crops will be immense gainers; if 

 we increase the crop bj' a universally 

 bountiful yield, the increase is so much 

 greater that it influences the price. 

 Even then, the man who produces a big 

 crop, at a low cost, will come out 

 ahead of the ordinary bee-keeper. 

 Then there is another point, and it 

 must not be overlooked, when a man 



