1886 



GLEANIJNGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



808 



usually conies as the result of violating- the plain 

 laws of health. It is Nature's protest against ill 

 treatment, and Nature is the g'reatcst phj-sician on 

 earth, and seldom loses a patient if given a fair 

 chance. T. B. Tehhy. 



Hudson, Ohio. 



HOW MUCH MONEY CAN I MAKE 

 FKOM THIS YEAR'S CROP? 



THE riU)FIT IN BEE-KEEPING AS COMPARED 

 WITH OTHEll OCCUPATIONS. 



fOU ask me, on page 733, how much money I 

 made after my tribulations. Really, I do 

 not know, for I have not made it yet. I got, 

 iu round numbers, 3000 lbs. of comb honey 

 and 1.500 lbs. extracted, with enough to 

 winter on. If 1 could have kept swarming within 

 any bounds I should have had 1000 lbs. more. Ot 

 those 4500 lbs. I have about 4400 lbs. yet. 1 can 

 scarcely sell a bit of it at any fair price. Last year 

 I put my honey in stores in the villages around, 

 at such a rate as to net me 1.5 cts. per lb., and it 

 sold pretty well. This year I have put the price 

 down about 2 cts. per lb., and there it is. Why? 

 Simply because all who want it can get it from 8 

 to 11 cents. I have made efforts to sell some in 

 Springfield, but have found the market completely 

 stocked. I could have sold some at 10 cts., but 

 —I would not— not yet awhile! I must have $400 

 out of my crop if I can get it, and not till I find 

 I can not will I take any less. For t-he capital and 

 work invested, that is not a high figure. As I do 

 not expect to average over 8^^ cts., if that, for my 

 extracted, I must have more than 10 cts. for comb 

 honey. Every farmer with a few bees had some 

 surplus honey this year, and they have been run- 

 ning into market and lumping it off to get rid of it. 

 They have it in pound sections too. In respect to 

 the shape in which honey is put up, modern bee- 

 keeping has made a wonderful stride in the last 

 three years. 



SOMETHING ABOUT OVERPRODUCTION. 



I am convinced, however, that there is no use in 

 trying to keep up the price of honey very much or 

 very long. We must simply bend our energies to 

 lessen the cost of production. It is folly to talk 

 about quitting the business. If wo do, what shall 

 we go into? Shall we take up farming? For sever- 

 al years the wheat has turned out poorly in this 

 region. This year there was a fair crop, but it is 

 a fact that farmei-s are scarcely any better off, 

 because of low prices. Last winter the live-stock 

 markets were perpetually glutted, and prices dis- 

 astrous. During the last two seasons we have 

 had magnificent yields of dairy and poultry prod- 

 ucts, with consequent overstocked markets, and 

 prices that at times scarcely gave back the cost 

 of production. Shall we try mercantile business? 

 One evening last summer a stove and tinware 

 dealer told me, as an example of the business he 

 was doing, that he had that day taken in 60 cts., 

 while his expenses were $5.00 per day. He was 

 in the business only because another man had 

 failed, and he was on his bond for about $0030. 

 He bought the stock to save himself. 



A grocer in the same city, Springfield, of 20 years' 

 standing, told me that the grocery business had 

 ceased to be profitable, largely because there were 

 too many in it. During that 20 years, Springfield 

 bas been more and more absorbing- the busiijcsg of 



the smaller towns around it. Yet there are too 

 many groceries for that business. Always and 

 everywhere we hear the same cry of overproduc- 

 tion or overstocking-. I feel that 1 have quite a 

 burden in the stock of honey on hand, with no 

 demand for it; but I do not appear to be much 

 worse off than most of the others. 

 There does appear to be 



ONE PROFITABLE BUSINESS. 



In my conversation with this same grocer I made 

 observations similar to the above, when the 

 gentleman admitted that no business seemed 

 thriving- except the saloons. Thei-e is a point for 

 us all. This traffic in vicious indulgence lives and 

 grows at the expense of the more legitimate and 

 beneficial pursuits. How many pounds of "honey, 

 and how many bushels of wheat or potatoes, might 

 be readily sold that are now glutting the markets, 

 were it not for the millions wasted thus! And, 

 by the way, that same stove-dealer, in our conver- 

 sation, remarked that business lots on his side 

 of the street were worth only half as much as 

 those on the opposite side, because " the saloons 

 along here " make them so undesirable for busi- 

 ness purposes. Amazing fact! Who ever heard 

 of any other profitable business but would en- 

 hance, not depress, the value of real estate in con- 

 tact with it. Bee-keepers, in common with men 

 in other occupations, can none too diligently 

 inquire how best to get rid of this parasite that 

 lives and feeds upon the very life of the business 

 world. Friend Root, you may regard this as a 

 digression, but I do not. I have, however, long 

 been wishing for a chance to drive a wedge in 

 here. 



QUEER IMPRESSIONS. 



I, too, get mistaken impressions concerning con- 

 tributors to bee-journals. I was never more sur- 

 prised than I was to learn that Mr. Heddon is a 

 "little nervous fellow," instead of a burly, solid 

 250-pounder. A. I. Root, I have always taken to be 

 a short, but thick-set, broad-shouldered, broad- 

 chinned, short-necked man, a little inclined to 

 corpulency as he grew older, with more of the 

 sanguine than the nervous in his make-up. Am I 

 right? Geo. F. Robbins. 



Mechanicsburg, III., Sept. 24, 1886. 



Many thanks, friend Eobbins. In yonr 

 remarks upon overstocking you touch indi- 

 rectly upon the same point brought out by 

 Dr. C. C. Miller— see page 811. You say, 

 last year you sold your honey for 15 cents 

 without much trouble. This year the farm- 

 ers about you, perhaps incited by your suc- 

 cess, have taken up the bee-business. Two 

 results have followed : Your locality has be- 

 come overstocked, and the price of honey re- 

 duced. If you were first in the field, is the 

 honey in the locality over which your bees fly 

 yours, or the property of every' one else? — 

 Our country is large, and there is an abund- 

 ance of room for us all.— I believe it is a 

 fact, that the returns from the honey-busi- 

 ness average as well as those of other legiti- 

 mate trades or professions, and I see no rea- 

 son why we should Ijecome dincouraged, even 

 if our liees do not pay well some years.— It is 

 true, there is one profitable business, and 

 that it is damaging to every other legitimate 

 business : but we hope this state of affairs 

 won't exist many years longer, in our fair 



luud. — your impression of A- I- Root is 



