190 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Mak. 15. 



my honey as first class, and have had no fault 

 found with it. I have nevor selected out any 

 to sell that could pass in friend Green's highest 

 grade, and 1 don't think a fourth of it could 

 pass muster, if a tenth could. I suspect a good 

 many others would have the same feeling of 

 rebellion that I experienced against a system of 

 grading that would lower the grade of my 

 honey so that L who had prided myself on rais- 

 ing almost entirely honey of the highest grade, 

 should be obliged hereafter to confess that only 

 a small part of my crop could come up to tlie 

 mark. 



On thinking a good deal about it, however, I 

 must say that my prejudices are beginning to 

 melt away. It's a good deal as one looks at it. 

 If you allow me to say that I raise mostly honey 

 of the first grade, aiid out of that select a part 

 of the verv choicest to sell at a little higher 

 price, then it doesn't look so bad tome. .Inst 

 this very thing is allowed by the way friend 

 Green puts it. His highest grade is simply a 

 selection out of the highest Albany grade, and 

 is not so very different from the Chicago basis, 

 only the latter has the unfortunate feature of 

 so naming it that the great bulk of honey must 

 be second grade or worse. 



The Review says, very justly, that the Al- 

 bany system is too wordy. "Rules for grading 

 ought to be very concise, yet very carefully 

 worded." I suspect it will be a very difficult 

 thing to so word a set of lules that there will be 

 no danger of misnnderstaniling, and that no 

 two persons can take a ditlerent meaning from 

 them. But any approach toward this will be 

 an improvement over the present condition of 

 affairs. Looking at the market quotations as 

 given in the Honey Column of Gleanings for 

 Jan. 1.5, I find the first classification separates 

 honey into "white'' and "dark;" the second, 

 "best comb;" then in succession we have 

 "fancy white"' and "dark;" "comb honey;" 

 "white" and "dark;" "fancy white" and 

 "other grades;" "comb;" "white" and "dark." 

 It will be seen that the main grading is into 

 " white" and "dark." Now, suppose I look at 

 a quotation and see that I can get 16 cts. for 

 white comb. Just on the face of it I can get 16 

 cts. for any thing that can properly be called 

 white honey; but if I ship I may find an actual 

 range of 3 or 4 cents according to quality; and 

 as matters now stand it would be a v(>ry hard 

 thing to agree in writing just how much my 

 honey would bring, without a great deal of cor- 

 respondence. I mention these things to show 

 how important it is to have something very 

 definite, and to show, further, that at present 

 we have no system, and very much need one. 



The A grade of the Albany system requires 

 that "one face of each section shall be perfect 

 in appearance." I like that idea of "one side;" 

 for when the section com(>s to its final use— on 

 the table— only one side can be seen; and if the 

 honey on the under side tastes all right it makes 

 very little difference how it looks. There may 

 be some difficulty as to exact agreement in all 

 cases as to what is meant by " ^^ei'/ect appear- 

 ance;" but I hardly see how the wording could 

 be bettered. As to the other side of the section 

 being "perfect in color and sealing, or nearly 

 so," it does seem to me that "nearly .so" is un- 

 necessarily vague. It might sound like hair- 

 splitting to name the greatest number of un- 

 sealed cells that should be allowed; but I 

 suspect that, if you were to take five men at 

 random, and ask them how many cells might 

 be unsealed to make a face "nearly" sealed, 

 you would get about five different answers. . . 

 . . . I just stopped long enough to try the 

 experiment on three persons (all that I could 

 easily get at), asking each one separately, with 

 the result that one said a section "nearly seal- 



ed " miglit have "seven cells unsealed;" anoth- 

 er said "seven or eight." and the third said 

 "eight or ten." I must say that I am surprised 

 that they are so nearly together: but I have 

 some doubt whether there would be so close 

 an agreement if they had never worked together 

 at sorting honey. But even in this case, the 

 range from "seven" to "ten" is enough to 

 make trouble. Would it not be better to be 

 definite and give the exact maximum number of 

 unsealed cells to be allowed ? As to coloi'. per- 

 haps there is nothing better than "nearly .so." 



The second Albany grade is to have "but lit- 

 tle unsealed honey." How much more does 

 that allow unsealed than the first, which is 

 "nearly " sealed. 



The third Albany grade contains white mixed 

 with inferior, including buckwheat and fall 

 flowers. Does that mean that buckwheat and 

 fall flowers unmixed ai'e included in the thiixl 

 grade, or that buckwheat and fall flowers are 

 included in the inferior honeys that may be 

 mixed with white? It would hardly seem to 

 mean that these two kinds unmixed belong in 

 this grade, for. immediately afterward, buck- 

 wheat is put in a separate class by itself. On 

 the other hand, if these two kinds be allowed 

 in the third grade only when mixed with white, 

 then fall flowers, pure and simple, have no 

 place in any grade. There's trouble somewhere. 



Possibly there may be some of the readers of 

 Gleanings as ignorant as myself; so, Mr. Ed- 

 itor, will you please tell me what is meant by 

 "boxes known as 'pieces' "? and why put a 

 "private" mark on them? 



Let me now give just a little further glance 

 at friend Green's system. I like the man so 

 well that I should expect something good from 

 him; but no faults should be passed by un- 

 challenged. I have already noticed the fact 

 that the first three gi'ades all make the same 

 demand as to quality, and that throws every 

 thing not of good flavor into the " M " grade. 

 Possibly this is all right; but there is such a 

 disagreement in tast<'S as to what is "good fla- 

 vor"' that it may not be wise to bring them in 

 unnecessarily. Moreover, as the public taste 

 now stands you may formulate all the rules you 

 please, and the whitest honey will bring the 

 highest price without being tasted. Still fur- 

 ther, is not every white honey good enough in 

 flavor to snit the general consumer? 



The genei'al spirit of his "A" grade is much 

 the same as the Albany, and is quite satisfac- 

 tory. But would you allow a single cell of pol- 

 len to throw a section into the "C" grade, if it 

 were perfect in every other respect? By the 

 way. Albany says not a word about pollen. 



In the "C grade, "sections must be nearly 

 filled, with few or no unsealed cells." In that, 

 the words "nearly" and "few" are indefinite. 

 Couldn't a little arithmetic come in tliere? 

 Again, at the close of the "M" grade "well 

 sealed " is indefinite. 



In the extra select, if I understand it rightly, 

 a single unsealed cell, in the line of cells touch- 

 ing the wood, rules a section out. Isn't that a 

 little too exacting? If a section wcie i)i'rfect 

 in all other respects, and a little projiolls care- 

 fully scraped off the wood left a slight discolor- 

 ation, would you throw it out of the "extra 

 select"? 



I hope it will not be understood that I have 

 any intention of treating with disrespect the 

 efforts already made toward establishing a 

 standard. Far from it. I am very gi-ateful for 

 what has been done, and am free to admit that 

 1 am not able to get up a scheme of grading 

 satisfactory to myself. You may then ask, if I 

 can not tell what ought to be done, what use 

 there is in my talking about it. Let me illus- 

 trate. Emma has been doing some very nice 



