88 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Feb. 6, 1902. 



A. M.ITTAZ IN HIS Al'IAKV. 



rolled on one end of the table to make room for the full one, 

 and then exchanged for it on the barrow. 



The extractor, a four-frame Cowan, stands in the mid- 

 dle of the house, on one side, and the straining one-half barrel 

 tub in one front corner, and the cans at the other end and 

 alongside of the house. 



I am careful to drive to the nearest and most convenient 

 and level place to the hives. This is kept in mind when plac- 

 ing the hives, and whenever possible I stop on ground having 

 an incline away from the apiary so as to be able to run the 

 house away by hand. When this is impossible we use a rope 

 too feet long, and also sheet covers on the horses. We have 

 to use the rope only occasionally. 



The house and furniture with looo to 1200 pounds of 

 Iioney make a good load on ordinary good roads. 



We are promptly ready for work on arriving. I usually 

 ride alone in the house, my help (usually three), coming and 

 returning in a top buggy. My daughter and two neighbor 

 girls prove first-class help, both to do the work expeditiously 

 and in fixing tlie house both at starting and finishing. 



We extracted last summer about 18,000 pounds in all, 

 including about 1000 pounds of comb honey, from some 200 col- 

 onies, spring count; but 6a colonies had been transferred in the 

 spring. 



I have quite an extensive retail trade, to the stores in 

 pint Mason jars, and to private customers in pails and in 

 hulk. This will use six or seven thousand pounds. This trade 

 increases every year. 



LONG-TONGUED BEES. 



I have just read with interest Prof. C. P. Gillette's article 

 on long-tongued bees. I desire to emphasize his remark, that 

 besides long-tongue there is to consider the individual 

 energy, gumplwn, or get there, of the bees. Let me illustrate: 

 I have two horses, one is smaller than the other, some older, 

 somewhat stiff, and 15 years old. That horse is very greedy 

 whenever he happens to be cast about for finding something to 

 eat. When hitched up double or single, and reined up, he 

 turns his head on one side, braces his legs in some odd' way, 

 and reaches the shortest grass, if only there is any at all. 

 Let him loose in a yard, tight must be the barn and crib 

 indeed if he cannot get something to eat. His neck, or nose, 

 or teeth, are no longer, rather shorter, than most horses, but 

 I believe that if he were put with gg others in a barren, starved 

 place, in all likelihood he would outlive all the others. 



Also, I have some 18 cattle; last fall, when the pasture 

 began to fail, two of them after having fed the grass under- 

 neath the lower wire, finally pushed their way entirely tlirough 

 the fence into a clover field. I then put the whole herd into 

 it. Well, the next day the same two energetic cows again 

 pushed their way into a corn-field adjoining, and kept finding 

 plenty of feed. Now is it not so with bees? Will not a bee 

 or a colony of bees with tongues two or three, even four 

 one-hundredths less long tongue, but having ten one-hun- 

 dredths more energy or greediness and know-how-to-get-there, 

 surpass merely long-tongued bees? 



I do not deprecate breeding for long tongues, for this, 

 coupled with the other .(and it can certainly be) cannot help 

 proving extra good gatherers. 



By the way, I have had working for me a carpenter, a tall 

 fellow, probably six feet and 2 inches, or more. Many times 

 I have seen him reach up to drive a nail high above his head, 

 ind apparently above the length of his arm. I would think 

 le is too short by i, 2, 3, or 4 inches, but every time he would 

 stretch arms, body or legs, or all together, and reach to his 

 nail. He is the only carpenter I ever saw do that. I often 

 thought that he could always stretch or reach another inch 

 higher. All this comes from some characteristics of both the 

 body and brain, or instinct when in animals or insects. 



La Salle Co., III. 



The Truth About Honey— Encouraging Words. 



EV C. P. DAD.'^NT. 



It sometimes seems rather discouraging to see so many 

 false stories pass current about the nature of honey and the ■ 

 iilulteration of it, and yet when we look back upon the con- 

 litions which the apiarist has had to meet in this country, 

 .md upon what he is meeting in the Old World, there are many 

 things that give us encouragement. 



When the honey-extractor was first invented by a Euro- 

 pean apiarist, Hruschka, there was no practical way to sepa- 

 rate honey from the comb. Good honey could be secured 

 only by straining the nicest combs, taking good care not to 

 mix the old combs with the new, or to get combs in which any 

 pollen was stored. The average "strained" honey was taken 

 out by heating, and was cloudy, dark, and mixed with all 

 sorts of objectionable things, of which the least disagreeable 

 was the pollen. So those who knew honey in the liquid state, 

 knew only this ugly mixture, and I can recall dozens of in- 

 stances, in the early '70's. when the consumer would flatly 

 say: "No, sir; that isn't honey. I know honey when I see 

 it. That's sugar syrup that you are trying to palm on us for 

 honey." Then would come a description of honey as the 

 man had seen it : "No, you can't put any of your stuff on 

 me ; my dad used to keep bees when I was a boy, and such 

 nice buckwheat honey he used to get; but it was not like that, 

 it was darker. That is altogether too light-colored for honey. 

 None of your sugar for me." 



. But the worst man to "ruli in" the slander was an old fel- 

 low who thought he could not eat honey : "No, sir : I can't 

 eat honey ; pure honey makes me sick ; but I can eat Dadant's 

 honey; it is just right for me; it don't make me sick. I don't 

 know what they make it out of, but probably ggqd sugar." 



And so it went for years, and the argument and asser- 

 tion had to he taken over and over, that the honey was "honey" 

 and nothing else, and that if it was nice, that was a quality 

 and not a fault. For years it was out of the question to get 

 the papers to quote "extracted honey" at all, and they insisted 

 on the word "strained." 



Some of my readers will probably say that it is very much 

 tliat way yet. in many places. That is true, yet the average 

 commission man and the average grocer are quite likely to 

 be informed on the question of honey, and you do not have 

 to begin at the beginning and inform even the educated man 

 — the man of good sense — and every day you meet people 

 who already know the actual facts, and help you to argue your 

 case. 



Again, even, if our chemists have done us some harm by 

 repeating stories — for fun or out of ignorance, which is hardly 

 excusable in learned men — we now have chemists who really 

 take hold of the true interests of the pursuit, and their work 

 goes a long way towards helping both ourselves and the con- 

 sumers. Mr. Eaton, the chemist in charge of honey tests at 

 Chicago, has undoubtedly done work which will bear fruits. 

 The National Bee-Keepers' Association, on the strength of his 

 tests, has begun a work of reform which is showing prac- 

 tical results among the adulterators. For years — yes, for 30 

 years — we have seen a fraud perpetrated upon the public by 

 dishonest dealers who passed glucose for pure honey, helped 

 in this work by the consumers themselves, who, out of their 

 ignorance, were distrustful of the pure article and disliked 

 granulated honey. Lately, I must say that I have examined a 

 number of samples of such of the stuff as used to be sold openly 

 as honey, and in every case I have found it to be labeled 

 "Imitation HONEY," with the disreputable word in small let- 

 ters of course; but with such labeling there is no need of any 

 one being deceived in what they buy, and I believe that the 

 success achieved is to be credited to the work of Air. Eaton. 

 There has been enough done to frighten the adulterators in 

 many cases. It is without doubt that there must be a great 

 deal of adulteration yet, but it is getting timid. It feels that 



