Mar. 21, 1907 



American ^ee Journal 



the goods, when he will do his best to 

 aid you in increasing the demand. 



In regard to the large exhibition, you 

 have alwaj-s had a very creditable show 

 of honey and wax. With the advent 

 of a new and better building at the In- 

 dustrial Exhibition, Toronto, this year 

 it would be wise for bee-keepers' every- 

 where to put forth extra efforts to 

 make this the best show that has ever 

 been put on display there. There has 

 been considerable criticism in the com- 

 mittees of these exhibitions as to the 

 action of the bee-keepers of the Pro- 

 ▼ince. They claim that you have be- 

 littled the industry by your action in 

 the past. It behooves you now to show 

 them that you have an industry worthy 

 of a first place in the agricultural pro- 

 gress of the Province. 



At your last meeting there was some 

 discussion in regard to the formation 

 of local_ honey-shipping associations, and 

 the majority were of the opinion that 

 some legislation should be sought after, 

 so that incorporation could take place 

 at very little expense. The fruit- 

 growers have been availing themselves 

 of a shipping act passed some years 

 ago, but this act is to be repealed this 

 session, and one new act to cover all 

 joint stock companies is to be issued. 

 Just how this will affect these organi- 

 zations I do not at present know. 

 However, it is not absolutely necessary 

 that incorporation should take place, as 

 a great deal can be done under a simple 

 set of rules and regulations signed by 

 those who form the association. While 

 you probably cannot work on the same 

 scale as the fruit-shipping associations, 

 still I believe that under careful man- 

 agement much further expansion can be 

 given to the industry by working along 

 these co-operative lines. You will have 

 to work slowly at first, not attempting 

 too much. A great deal depends on the 

 first association organized. If these are 

 successful there will be no trouble in 

 forming them afterwards in any sec- 

 tion of the Province. 



The Press and Honey. 



Probably one of the best sources 

 through which you can inform the pub- 

 lic as to the value of the industry is 

 through the local press. Nearly every 

 household throughout the country takes 

 one or more daily or weekly papers, and 

 in the case of the farming classes, at 

 least one of the great national weeklies 

 and one of the agricultural papers. It 

 is very rarely indeed that you will find 

 in the newspapers any articles on the 

 care of bees or the value of the product 

 for food. Of those that do occasionally 

 appear, the substance is sometimes en- 

 tirely erroneous. The ignorance of the 

 public in this respect is deplorable. For 

 instance, many people imagine that cry- 

 stallized honey must necessarily be im- 

 pure. Many people when buying comb 

 honey in lots will put it in a damp cel- 

 lar, thinking that the proper place to 

 preserve it. Again, very few realize that 

 a small section of honey will go as far 

 as the ordinary quart jar of preserved 

 fruit. Now, what are you doing as bee- 

 keepers to displace such ignorance? 



In this connection it would be wise 



for you to make use of your home paper 

 as much as possible, sending in local 

 items from time to time about your 

 crops, your meetings, general items as 

 to use of honey both as a medicine and 

 as food ; proper ways of keeping it 

 after it is purchased, etc. The editors 

 of these papers are generally only too 

 glad to use this matter in preference to 

 the silly jokes with which so many of 

 them are padded. Let the people of 

 your vicinity know that you have good 

 honey and lots of it for sale. Put in 

 an advertisement occasionally and ask 

 for a reading along with it. The more 

 we can enlighten the public on this 

 side of the industry the better it will 

 be for our pocketbooks. 



There has been considerable discus- 

 sion in your meetings as to whether you 

 should endeavor to enlighten the public 

 too much as to the other side of the in- 

 dustry, namely, the keeping of bees 

 themselves. It is hardly necessary to 

 say anything about the profits, but the 

 distribution of all kinds of literature 

 which will help improve the products of 

 the smaller apiaries of the Province will 

 tend in the long run to assist those of 

 you who are doing business on a larger 

 scale. 



While at a meeting recently I was 

 told by a prominent gentleman in To- 

 ronto that he had purchased last week 

 in Toronto a small sample of honey 

 with the idea of buying larger quan- 

 tities if the sample proved to be of the 

 best quality. He was very much dis- 

 appointed to find, however, that the 

 honey was tainted with the wax and 

 bee bread. Now this should not be if 

 you have done your duty in enlighten- 

 ing those who are keeping bees as to 

 the absurdity of extracting their honey 

 in this crude fashion. This is where 

 the value of your bee journal comes in. 

 I cannot impress too strongly upon you 

 the value of having a strong, active 

 paper as your representative in the 

 Province. I understand that there are 

 over 8,000 men who are more or less 

 engaged in the business of keeping bees 

 who do not subscribe for any bee jour- 

 nal. This is not as it should be. and 

 you should make every effort to effect a 

 change. Already the members of the 

 Provincial association get the Canadian 

 Bee Journal as a premium, and I think 

 that it would be wise for every local as- 

 sociation to extend the same privilege 

 to their members. You bee-keepers 

 must be up-to-date. Your meetings are 

 held probably only once or twice a year, 

 and in the time between, the only way 

 that you can hold together is through 

 your bee-keepers' journal. 



Many of you have improved methods 

 of handling your bees during certain 

 operations of the year, and it would be 

 wise for you to extend the benefits of 

 this knowledge to your fellows. There 

 is no better way than through the Bee 

 Journal. Do it at once, so that they 

 may try it before the season is over. 



Patronize first of all your own home 

 journal. This treats largely of local con- 

 ditions, and is therefore specially appli- 

 cable to bee-keeping in Ontario. We 

 are, as yet, a young country and we have 

 to stand together to support each other. 

 Be loyal, therefore, to the Bee Journal, 



subscribe for it, and then if you so wish, 

 to some of the American or British jour- 

 nals. If you have anrthing to advertise, 

 you should help the Bee Journal in this 

 way, as advertisements are the life of 

 any publication of this kind. Show your 

 neighbors the paper, especially if you 

 come across any article which you think 

 is of value to yourself; let them have 

 your paper to read and then suggest to 

 them to subscribe for it. 



If your neighbor is in difficulty about 

 any operations of the year, you should 

 refer him to special publications that 

 will help him out. Pass on your Annual 

 Report to him if necessary and send for 

 another. The department will always 

 be glad to assist you in this way. 



The Department of Agriculture. 



Two years ago the Honorable the 

 Minister of Agriculture visited the an- 

 nual meeting of your Provincial asso- 

 ciation and suggested that the Depart- 

 ment of Agriculture would be glad to 

 co-operate with you more closely than 

 in the past. At that time the inspec- 

 tion work for foul brood was put in 

 the care of the department. Last j'ear 

 some further changes were suggested 

 and after being thoroughly discussed by 

 the Bee-keepers' Association, were 

 adopted. This refers to the appointment 

 of additional inspectors to overtake the 

 increase in the work during later years. 

 Now we wish to impress upon you that 

 without the organized co-operation of 

 every bee-keeper we will not be able to 

 do very much to assist you. It is our 

 aim to learn as much about the indus- 

 try as possible. We are now at work 

 preparing a list of bee-keepers of the 

 Province by counties, together with 

 the number of the colonies belonging 

 to each. This will allow of our cor- 

 responding directly with every man in- 

 terested in the Province. We will be 

 able to distribute any literature which 

 may be published from time to time to 

 a great many people who at present are 

 not touched by your local or Provincial 

 association. We hope in this way to 

 get them so interested that they will 

 become members of some of these as- 

 sociations. We will be ablfe also in this 

 way to impart information in regard to 

 foul brood and perhaps to receive infor- 

 mation re infestations of this disease at 

 an earlier date than we would otherwise 

 have received it in the past. We trust 

 also that we will be able to keep a record 

 of the inspection work which will prob- 

 ably facilitate in the suppression of this 

 terrible disease. 



The census reports for 1901 show that 

 there are in Ontario 116,403 colonies; 

 in 1891, ten years previous, the number 

 was 146,341. One would naturally in- 

 quire the reason for such a decrease. 

 Had this taken place in any of the other 

 agricultural industries in the Province 

 we would have begun at once to inquire 

 the reason why and to have endeavored 

 to repair the loss. With the informa- 

 tion which we are now endeavoring to 

 procure, it would have been easy enough 

 to have discovered the reasons for the 

 large decrease. By a conference at the 

 time of the annual meeting, by the help 

 of local conventions, by the distribution 

 of literature and perhaps by the sending 



