1900 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



843 



cost me a cent a pound at least ; also, this hon- 

 ey shows that the producer does not know the 

 value of his production, or he would have put 

 it up in marketable shape ; therefore, if I buy 

 it, it will be at a less figure than I otherwise 

 would pay.' So he offers three or four cents 

 less than he would expect to pay for the same 

 quality of honey nicely crated and offered for 

 sale by a person knowing what such honey 

 was worth in the different markets." 



" Upon what do you base such thoughts as 

 these? " 



" While passing through the city of Syra- 

 cuse some years ago I stepped into several 

 places where I saw honey, and inquired the 

 price they paid for it. The grocer informed 

 me, pointing to a lot of perhaps 200 pounds 

 not crated, that he "paid 8 cents a pound for 

 that ; and then, tnrning to a lot which was no 

 better, but nicely put up in handsome crates, 

 he said, ' That lot cost me 12 cents a pound ; ' 

 and upon questioning him I found he was re- 

 tailing both lots at 16 cents a pound." 



" Did you find any other places like this? " 



" Yes ; and this was about the difference in 

 price which I found generally, although in 

 one or two places it v^as not more than two 

 cents." 



" Well, at that rate I should think it would 

 pay me better to crate mine." 



" Yes, it pays largely to crate our product ; 

 and if I had but 25 pounds of honey to take 

 to market, I would crate it by all means, not 

 only because it would pay me, but also because 

 it would help to establish a more uniform price 

 for honey throughout the country." 



" I conclude that I know very little about 

 this matter of marketing honey, so will ven- 

 ture to ask what I had better do with my hon- 

 ey after I have it nicely crated." 



"In answering this question I would say 

 that much depends upon the amount of honey 

 we have and upon our surroundings. If we 

 have few bees, and produce only a small quan- 

 tity, it will probably be better to sell it in our 

 own city, or the small towns about us, but not 

 till we know what it is worth to us if we send 

 it to some of the large cities." 



" How can we tell what it is worth to us in 

 the larger cities? " 



"To do this we should take some paper 

 which will give correct market reports on hon- 

 ey of the different grades. Having this we 

 should next figure the expense of freight and 

 commission out, taking the grade ours would 

 come under as the basis for this, when we shall 

 have what our honey is worth delivered at our 

 nearest railroad station ; and, by figuring out 

 the cost of hauling, what it is worth at our 

 door." 



"Give me an example of how you would 

 figure." 



"Very well. For an example, the freight 

 rate from Skaneateles to New York city is 45 

 cents per 100 pounds. As this is gross weight, 

 we deduct the weight of the crate, by which 

 we find that it costs us about 50 cents for every 

 100 pounds of honey, or half a cent a pound. 

 Then we have to pay 25 cents per 100 for haul- 

 ing and loading on car, which makes one- 

 fourth of a cent more. Upon looking up quo- 



tations we find that good honey, such as we 

 have, sells at from 14 to 16 cents in that city. 

 Suppose we call it 15 cents. As most commis- 

 sion men charge ten per cent commission for 

 selling, we have 1)^ cents more for commis- 

 sion, or 2'4^ cents as all of the expense of getting 

 our hone} from our door to New York and hav- 

 ing it sold. Thus you will see that, if we can 

 not get 123^;' cents for our honey at our door, 

 we had better send it to New York. And you 

 can figure the same way for Auburn or any 

 other place." 



"That seems plain, and I begin to see now 

 how I can know just what my product is worth 

 to me without being entirely governed by 

 what my grocer offers." 



"That is right; and if every one having 

 honey to sell would adopt the^ same line of 

 reasoning, crate it nicely, and then hold on 

 to his product till he could get what it was 

 really worth, we should soon find our smaller 

 towns and cities paying a uniform price, and 

 the country taking a long stride toward mak- 

 ing honey as staple an article of merchandise 

 as it can ever become." 



" I am really glad I came over to see you, 

 for I now see where I can be more independ- 

 ent than I have formerly been, having the 

 matter of fixing prices quite largely in my 

 own hands. But I must be going if I reach 

 home before it gets dark. Good day." 



" Good afternoon." 



HYBRID STOCK REVERTING TO BLACK ; BREED- 

 ING FOR THE YELLOW. 



Last spring I had a colony of black bees. 

 They swarmed, and in the natural order of 

 things the new queen became fertilized and 

 commenced laying. Her progeny proved to 

 be a mixture," about two-thirds being pure 

 blacks and one-third pure Italians ; that is, 

 they clearly showed the three yellow bands. 

 If this colony should swarm again next spring, 

 and should the queen which will eventually 

 reign be produced from an egg such as brought 

 forth the three-banded bees, will this queen be 

 to all appearances an Italian? Should she 

 mate with a pure Italian drone, will her prog- 

 eny be pure Italians? To make my meaning 

 more clear, I desire to know whether, if mat- 

 ters should turn out as stated above, my colo- 

 ny would change from pure blacks to pure 

 Italian?, in two generations, without any out- 

 side assistance. J. F. HennesSY. 



Ballston Spa, N. Y., Oct. 5 



[Hybrid bees have a tendency, if any thing, 

 to revert to the original black rather than to 

 the Italian stock. Why this is so I can not 

 say. The bees from the second queen reared 

 under the conditions named above, while they 

 might be better Italians (that is, more of them 

 three-banded), yet the queen might be just as 

 much a hybrid as if she had been reared from 



