1907. 



THE AMERICAN BEE-KEEPER. 



109 



say no to that need, but with the ac- 

 knowledgment of the right to feed 

 comes 'the denial of the right to feed 

 in a way. which will cause suspicion. 



To avoid suspicion we can feed 

 honey; but for some of us to feed 

 honey would mean a cutting down of 

 the income from the bees to the extent 

 of putting us out of the business. 

 Moreover there is always the lurking 

 danger of foul brood in feeding strange 

 honey to our bees. Then comes the 

 question, Is it possible to feed sugar 

 in a way that will avoid all suspicion? 

 It has been suggested that we color 

 the sugar syrup. This will protect the 

 white-honey man (I came near saying 

 the white honey-man) but still leaves 

 the dark amber and buckwheat honeys 

 under the ban of suspicion. Alexander 

 feeds sugar by the barrel, and reaps 

 buckwheat honey by the barrels. Dear 

 old Langstroth said that he liked 

 buckwheat honey diluted with white 

 sugar syrup. Is this the reason that 

 the Alexander buckwheat honey is so 

 popular? 



No, coloring the syrup will not over- 

 come the difficulty entirely. Yet it 

 would go far toward placing our de- 

 licious white honeys above the sus- 

 picion which now rests upon them. 

 The truth is that many people, old 

 people especially, who are prone to ex- 

 press themselves decidedly, have firm- 

 ly fixed in their minds the honey whicn 

 comes from the box-hive, a honey 

 often dark, generally a blend, seldom 

 white. They look askance upon a 

 section of snowy comb, comb contain- 

 ing honey of a delicacy of flavor al- 

 most unknown in "taken-up honey." 



The whole subject is fraught with 

 difficulty, but we can surely use more 

 oare, and we can surely parade sugar 

 feeding less. I cannot for one, ap- 

 prove of the parading of stimulative 

 feeding when such feeding is done with 

 sugar. I think that such advertising 

 is unnecessary, and I believe more- 



over, that this variety of sugar-feeding 

 is scarcely legitimate. Again, I must 

 disapprove of wholesale feeding just 

 before, during, or just following the 

 honey-flow. It may be easier to do 

 work about the apiary during a dearth 

 of honey, extracting for instance, by 

 feeding sugar syrup wholesale. But 

 such process is not necessary; it should 

 be condemned. 



Why should the last mentioned plan 

 be condemned, and why should sugar- 

 feeding for stimulation of brood-rear- 

 ing be condemned? For this reason: 

 Though it is right in our eyes, it never 

 can be in the eyes of the world, our 

 customers. Not a few people believe 

 that bees make honey, even in winter. 

 To see a man feeding syrup and taking 

 off honey simultaneously would cause 

 many an observer to draw the natural 

 conclusion that the bees were making 

 honey out of the syrup, and he would 

 so report. The apiarist might argue 

 till night-fall, the motion of the eye- 

 brows of the observer would decide 

 the debate. The same would be true 

 of wholesale feeding for stimulative 

 purposes; hence I say, let all who feed 

 to make apiarian work easier, or who 

 feed to get their colonies ready for 

 the harvest, feed with diluted honey 

 else not feed at all. 



The only legitimate use of sugar in 

 a honey-producing apiary is to get the 

 bees through the winter or through a 

 time of dearth till the flowers come 

 again. Even this sort of feeding sel- 

 dom comes to the bee-keeper except 

 as he brings it about by his system of 

 management. It does sometimes come 

 legitimately, but the visit can be made 

 a rare one. 



As to feeding to produce bees, or in 

 queen-rearing, that is another thing. 

 I think it perfectly legitimate for a 

 dealer in bees to turn sugar or any 

 other sweet into bees, but let that deal- 

 er in bees avoid trying to harvest a 

 honey-crop in the same apiary where 



