Vol. XTI. 



SEPT. 1, 1888. 



Xo. 17. 



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SUGAR FEEDING. 



SHALL WE USE 



SUGAR FOR WINTERING, OR 

 HONEY? 



fHE question as to feeding: sugar for winter 

 stores is one that has been considerably 

 discussed, not always, as it seems to me, in 

 the most dispassionate manner. On the one 

 hand, some have apparently taken the 

 ground that, whoever should feed a pound of sugar 

 to his bees was doing a great wrong to the whole 

 fraternity, by arousing a suspicion of adulteration 

 in the minds of the public, and throwing just so 

 much more honey unnecessarily upon the market, 

 thus aiding the sugar-trade at the expense of the 

 honey-trade. On the other hand, some have seem- 

 ed to think, " Just so long as I can get more for a 

 pound of honey than a pound of sugar syrup costs 

 me, it is the right thing for me to feed sugar, no 

 matter what others may think." Probably there is 

 some right and some wrong on both sides. Much 

 depends upon the standpoint from which we view 

 things, always keeping in mind the words of Paul, 

 " Look not every man on his own things, but every 

 man also on the things of others." 



The man who is so situated that his bees have 

 abundant healthy stores of their own gathering, 

 and who can not get nearly as much for this honey 

 if he extracted it as it would cost him to replace it 

 with sugar stores, would not be so foolish as to feed 

 sugar; and it is natural that, in view of the low 

 price he is getting, and the plethoric state of the 

 market, he should think no one should feed sugar. 

 He reasons that, if it is wise and right for one to do 



so, it is right for all; and that if all do so, the result 

 will be something like this: Tf the average yield of 

 a colony is 75 lbs., and 3.5 lbs. more is extracted to be 

 replaced by sugar syrup, thus throwing 100 lbs. on 

 the market, instead of 75 for every colony, only 

 three-fourths of the price will be obtained, and he 

 will lose one-fourth of his earnings, with no corres- 

 ponding gain by any one. Without stopping to 

 show that there is some erroneous reasoning in this, 

 I will give a view from another standpoint and give 

 an actual case in my own experience as an illustra- 

 tion. 



The summer of 1887 was so disastrous that I re- 

 ceived practically no surplus, and was left with 

 empty combs for winter. The question was. Shall I 

 buy honey or sugar? Under the circumstances I 

 bought sugar. T bought and fed barrels, or 2800 

 pounds, paying therefor $190. Allowing that 3 lbs. 

 of water to 10 lbs. of sugar makes a syrup equiva- 

 lent to good ripe honey, my 2800 lbs. of sugar was, 

 for feeding purposes, equal to 3640 lbs. of honey. I 

 do not think I could have bought honey such as I 

 would have been willing to use, for less than 8 cents 

 per lb., free of freight. That would have made the 

 cost of the honey $201, or $101 more than the sugar. 

 1 think almost any one would have decided just as I 

 did. 



But I think 1 hear some one say, "How about 

 'looking on the things of others'"? It Is by no 

 means always easy to decide just how far the things 

 of others are to be considered; but I feel clear that, 

 for the sake of a little gain to myself, I should not 

 entail a great loss upon bee-keepers in general. In 

 this case, however, I feel that a different decision, 



