Feb . 1 4, 1907 



\2') 



American l^ee Journal t 



has fallen into the hands of the spec- 

 ialist, and bee-keeping territory has been 

 divided and subdivided, and placed by 

 legislative enactment under the special- 

 ists' control. 



There was an old English worthy 

 (was his name Sir Phillip Sidney?) who 

 went in search of Utopia. I have not 

 heard that he ever found it. 



Leon, Iowa. 



Let the connnUcc point out to the the latter, and a lower rate on the honey 



rate people the 'liflference between the packed in carriers; and the expense will 



risk in handlint; lioncy put up in car- fall where it belongs— o;j those who are 



riers and that slii|iped in supers. Make too ignorant or too stupid to learn. 



;i rocommendation for a higher rate on River Falls, Wis. 



Lower Freight Rates on 

 Honey 



BV W. H. PUTNAM. 



To my mind the most important sub- 

 ject that has recently come up for dis- 

 cussion among bee-keepers is Ihat of 

 better freight-rates on honey. 



Mr. Lred W. Muth sprung it on the 

 San Antonio convention, and a com- 

 mittee consisting of Mr. France, Mr. 

 Muth and Mr. Holekamp, was appointed 

 to go before the various classification 

 committees of the railway rate board, 

 to present the matter. I have had some 

 experience in seeing the rate men, and 

 it is a well-defined habit of railway 

 people to charge all the traffic will bear. 

 It will be necessary for that committee 

 to emphasize the fact that the bee-keep- 

 ers cannot afford to pay the rates now 

 in effect ; that the present rates are keep- 

 ing men out of the business. It might 

 also be well to point out the fact that 

 honey can be, and is being, shipped in 

 large quantities from Honolulu to the 

 central L'nited States for less money 

 than honey can be shipped from various 

 places in the United States; that Cuban 

 and Jamaican honey is filling the place 

 which the domestic honey should fill. 



I have several times been before rate 

 men, and invariably the first question 

 they ask is, "Where is your competi- 

 tion?" The bee-keepers have a good 

 chance now to send this matter home. 



Rates on supplies are sadly out of 

 line, also. There are many instances 

 where the freight is greater for a short- 

 er haul than for a longer haul. For 

 instance, Reno, Nev., located on this 

 side of the great range of the Rocky 

 Mountains, pays $1.15 per 100 pounds in 

 car-loads ; while the same road will pull 

 the freight over the same ground and 

 up over the mauntains 800 miles farther 

 (to San Diego) for 85 cents per 100 

 pounds. 



Again the rate to southeastern States 

 —Georgia, etc. — is greater than to Cuba 

 or Jamaica. 



There is a certain amount of educa- 

 tional work to be done in two directions. 

 It seems to me that we should first edu- 

 cate the bee-keepers to pack their honey 

 in carriers (I mean comb honey). It 

 is the poorly packed honey that goes to 

 pieces, and leaks and daubs the cars, 

 and spoils other goods, that gives the 

 whole honey the bad reputation. 



I know that many bee-keepers do not 

 read the bee-papers and that it will be 

 impossible to reach them through that 

 means ; but touch a man's pocketbook 

 and his heart is yours, every time. This 

 committee has the best chance in the 

 world to educate the bee-keepers through 

 the pocketbook. 



rX. 



louthern \ 



Conducted by Louis H. Scholl, New Braunsfels, Tex. 



First Bee-Keeping- in the South 



Grandfather and I have been keeping 

 bees in the South for 91 years ; counting 

 the period that my great-grandfather, 

 kept bees it would be over a century, 

 and perhaps the first days of bee-keep- 

 ing in the South. Arriving here from 

 across the waters, and prospecting a few 

 weeks, he wrote back that he was satis- 

 fied, and thought that he could raise 

 potatoes, corn, and tobacco, and from 

 the amout of blooms he saw, he thought 

 he could "raise" honey, too, but could 

 not find any bees, and when he sent for 

 his wife to come over to him, he wrote 

 her to bring along one colony of bees. 

 But she did not succeed in getting here 

 with them, but when her parents paid 

 them a visit a few years afterward, they 

 succeeded in getting over with a small 

 colony and he established the first apiary 

 in the South on the Savannah River, 

 between Savannah and Augusta, Ga. 



The hives were made of hollow trees, 

 which, by the way, is a quite prevalent 

 method in some localities here yet. The 

 bottoms of the "gums" were beveled off 

 with an axe so that the bottom edge 

 was nearly sharp ; the gum would not 

 decay so soon at the bottom in that 

 way, and would give better access to 

 the insects which were supposed to go 

 in mostly around the bottom. The in- 

 side of the gum was cleaned out well, 

 and made as smooth as could be, with 

 an axe. When the bees were hived in 

 these gums, they were set on a block 

 (a short cut of a solid tree sawed oflf 

 10 or 12 inches long), and another of 

 the same dimensions was laid on top for 

 a cover, for lumber was not yet sawed 

 here. 



Many are the stories handed down, 

 of the Indians and this apiary, for they 

 seemed not to have any knowledge of 

 bees. On one occasion, my great-grand- 

 father left his wife in his cabin, which 

 was a small log-house with the earth 

 as a floor and furnished with 2 one- 

 legged beds and _' cooking utensils, a 

 frying pan, and ;i skillet. He had not 

 been gone long d' iwn the river in his 

 dug-out for the boat-landing, when an 

 Indian all at once appeared in the cabin 

 for no other purpose than to steal. 

 Looking up at the frying pan as it hung 

 on the wall, aivl nodding his head a 



few times, he took it down. About this 

 time the dog came to the door and the 

 Indian made friends with him and tied 

 him. Going out the door, he saw the 

 ax, and nodding at that a few times, he 

 picked it up and started off with dog, 

 frying pan, and ax, but stopped at the 

 bee-hive. Nodding his head a few times 

 again, he undertook to satisfy his curios- 

 ity by prying the top off, and, of course, 

 the bees responded actively. Passing 

 his hands over his face a few times as 

 if he were washing it, he clutched his 

 hands in his long dark hair, gave a few 

 loud whoops, and disappeared as he 

 had appeared, but leaving his stolen 

 goods. 



Many times the bees in this apiary 

 died out, but by this time there were 

 some bees in the forest, and they kept 

 drawing from it for "starts," and soon 

 others had "starts," and so on. There 

 was no market for honey, but if there 

 was any left after all the settlers around 

 had had what they wanted, it was car- 

 ried to boat-landings and exchanged for 

 such things as they needed. 



Grandfather fell heir to the apiary 

 at his father's death, and he kept it up 

 for years, receiving good returns, and 

 was perhaps the first shipper of honey to 

 many of the large towns. 



He said there was one great draw- 

 back to the progress of the bee-industry 

 in his best days as a pursuit, and that 

 was, the combs were not movable, so 

 as to give access to the needs of the 

 bees ; and, when lumber was being 

 sawed, he decided to overcome this if 

 possible. He bought some lumber, made 

 some hives, and tried to make the frames 

 from good splitting timber, but was not 

 successful. After many efforts for 

 several years, he gave up and went back 

 to bo.x-hives, but always had a large, 

 well-cared for apiary of this style of 

 gums. 



Cordele. Ga. J. J. Wilder. 



How different early bee-keeping must 

 have been from that of today ! Who 

 could imagine the life of a bee-keeper 

 with the "red man" all around his apiary 

 and his home, and the old-style "log- 

 gums" for hives? We are glad times 

 have changed, and a narrative like the 

 one here presented, only makes the read- 

 ers of the present time feel more grate- 

 ful for the bee-keeper's life we are en- 

 abled to live now. 



