Sept. 6. 1906 



American Ttec Journal 



were represented a total of 1,277 colonies for comb honey and 

 1,370 colonies for extracted, making a total of 2,647 colonies 

 of bees. This represents but a small portion of the bee-keep- 

 ing interests of northern California, but there is no doubt that 

 many of the other apiarists will come into the organization 

 now that it has been formed. A number, indeed, have ex- 

 pressed their intention of doing so. 



The general idea of those present was that organization 

 would prove of great benefit to the industry in this section of 

 the State, as it has in other places. It is proposed to collect 

 the product of the members in warehouses in several places 

 provided with good transportation facilities. The honey could 

 then be marketed on warehouse receipts, and better prices be 

 obtained for carload lots than when the bee keepers sell their 

 output individually and in small lots It is possible that later 

 on a manager may be chosen to take charge of the marketing 

 of the crop, the purchase of supplies and other business mat- 

 ters. The sentiment of the members is now, however, that it 

 is too soon to take such a step. This is a detail which will ar- 

 range itself when the organization is in full working order 

 and stronger than it is now. 



The nature of the proposed organization was very fully 

 discussed, the principal speakers being B. B Bogaboom, F. 

 Jay Lewis, Mr Stephenson and others. John M. Rankin, 

 United States Special Agent in Apiculture, Bureau of Ento- 

 mology, stationed at Chico, was present and made a very in- 

 teresting talk. He advised the bee-keepers by all means to 

 organize, and assisted very materially in perfecting the or- 

 ganization. 



It was decided that the local association should affiliate 

 with the National Bee-Keepers' Association. The dues were 

 fixed at $1 per year, half of which goes for membership in the 

 National Association. 



Electiorj of officers resulted in the choice of the following: 

 F.Jay Lewis, President ; B. B. Hogaboom, Vice-President; 

 Charles F. Lewis, Secretary and Treasurer. These, with Les- 

 ter B. Johnson and J. W. McDonald, wdl serve as directors. 

 They were instructed by the meeting to draw up a constitu- 

 tion and by-laws, to be presented at the next meeting. 



Honey Crop in Northern California. 



Conversation among those present developed the fact that 

 the honey crop of the northern part of the State prom- 

 ised to be a very good one. On account of the unusual dura- 

 tion of the rains and the coolness of the season up to very re- 

 cently, the crou will be about a month late, but prospects are 

 that it will be satisfactory as regards both quantity and qual- 

 ity. Charles F. Lewis, Secretary of the Association, states 

 that a failure of the honey crop of this section of the State 

 has never been known. It is sometimes necessary to feed the 

 bees during the early part of the season, as has been the case 

 in some instances this year, but the final outcome is nearly al- 

 ways about the same. 



Last year the honey output of Calirornia was a record- 

 breaker, being over 10,000,000 pounds The 1906 crop will be 

 very much shorter. In fact, grave fears are expressed as to 

 their being any crop in the southern part of the State. The 

 continued wet weather has put the bees baek about a mouth, 

 and they can not make this up in the south as they can in the 

 northern part of the State. Most of the honey in Ventura 

 and other southern counties is stored in the month of May or 

 not at all. This year there was very little in that month. At 

 present it is too early to estimate the probable output of the 

 State. Conditions have improved very greatly within the past 

 few weeks, and it is possible that earlier forecasts may prove 

 to be somewhat under the actual output. — California Fruit- 

 grower, of June 30, 1906 



NATIONAL AT CHICAGO 



Report of the 36th Annual Convention of the 



National Bee-Keepers' Association, held in 



Chicago, 111 , Dec. 19. 20 and 21, 1905 



tContiuued from pa^re 671.] 



Mr. E. T. Abbott then addressed the convention as fol- 

 lows : 



POULTRY-KEEPING FOR THE BEE-KEEPER 



I want to say that I haven't any paper, neither do I 

 intend to give you the kind of poultry talk that you hear 

 every day. When Mr. Hutchinson asked me to take some 



part in the progam down in Texas, I suggested that he put 

 me on for this talk instead of some bee-keeping talk that I 

 had been talking all these years. This poultry talk of mine 

 is not along the usual lines, and I do not know but what 

 it would be just as well if I didn't give it all. I will talk 

 just a little while along the lines I usually talk, and if you 

 don't like that kind of thing we can easily enough change 

 off. I remember Mr. Root heard me on this poultry talk 

 once down in Missouri. He came in and sat down in front 

 of me and dropped his head down, and put his hand over 

 his eyes and looked fearfully discouraged, and I didn't 

 know but what he was going to cry. Some time after- 

 wards he straightened up. He said afterwards that it wasn't 

 the kind of talk he was expecting, just as though I could 

 teach A. I. Root anything about bees. 



Poultry is a broad subject; it is much broader than you 

 can discuss in one evening. There were two or three 

 old hens up in Wisconsin, that got under a pair of stairs and 

 began to scratch and scratch around the leaves and dirt, 

 and after a while they scratched up some several thousand 

 dollars, and the money was found and it got into the papers. 

 I do not know whether or not you read it, but it was in 

 every newspaper, almost, in the United States. Now, hens 

 have been scratching up money all these years, which amounts 

 in Missouri, I think, to something like forty millions every 

 year ; in other States they have been scratching up equal 

 amounts, and nothing has been said about it. We have 

 been looking all these years for something we could do in 

 connection with bee-keeping. I will tell you what I do. 

 I milk a Jersey cow and keep some fine poultry, and have 

 for years, and I have been advocating that inbreeding for 

 io or 15 years. When I first began to advocate it, like 

 Mr. Holtermann, they said I was upside down, and I was 

 talking nonsense, but I went on until I had some of the 

 finest golden Wyandottes I ever had in my life, the most 

 perfectly marked. The boys thought they were such a good 

 mark for marksmanship that they killed them off. 



The first secret of success is to know how, and in order 

 to know how you have to study the hen. She is a peculiar 

 creature. She has had but little study. The reason has 

 been that men inherited a theory that in order to make poul- 

 try a success they must turn it over to the women, and as the 

 women didn't know much they wouldn't expect them to ac- 

 complish much ; it was a kind of a small, one-horse business 

 and the woman was a kind of a small, one-horse affair, 

 and it could all be turned over to her and it would be one- 

 horse all the way through. The man didn't have much in- 

 terest in it only when he wanted a little money to buy his 

 tobacco, or to get something when he went to town, and 

 then he went to the old woman's purse and got enough to 

 buy a plug of tobacco or a drink. That is about all he 

 knew. 



Mr. York — That was in Missouri, wasn't it? [Laugh- 

 ter.] 



Mr. Abbott — No, sir; all over. 



The great secret of success in keeping poultry is to 

 make the poultry comfortable. I want to give you some good 

 rules that will work out in practice. Now in order to make 

 a hen comfortable, the conditions and surroundings must be 

 such as are adapted to hens. Some people think a hen 

 has no feeling; they think it isn't an animal; it is a kind of 

 automatic machine to grind out eggs and to eat for Sunday 

 dinners; but there is a vast deal more to a hen. If you 

 expect to get eggs — and that is all hens are worth — that is 

 what there is in a hen, is eggs — if you can't get eggs out of 

 the hen you can't get anything out. In order to get eggs 

 out of the hens you must put eggs in. You can't get any- 

 thing out of a hen you don't put into her. You put it in 

 in the form of feed, and take it out in the form 

 of eggs. And the food must be first, enough to nour- 

 ish the lien's vital energy, and to build it up; and then 

 there must be sufficient superabundance of food to make 

 eggs, and eggs should always be in a hen, so that you have 

 a circle. You feed a hen eggs in food, and the hen gives 

 you other hens in eggs, and the circle keeps going around 

 and around, but you must supply fuel to run the machine. 

 There has to be eggs put into the hens and then you will 

 get eggs out of the hens. 



Somebody in "Gleanings" said: "Gleanings" always has 

 things in it that are so, and things very wise, and sometimes, 

 a small illustration. There was an old man, who, in his 

 condemnation of his poultry business, said he had hatched 



