GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



were informed that entire harmony pre- 

 vailed; that all were agreed that, in view 

 of the long and splendid history of the old 

 National of nearly 50 years, it should not 

 be disbanded, bui that it should reorganize 

 along lines that would eliminate discord, 

 and then put the organization back where 

 it was in former days when its membership 

 ran up into the thousands, and when its 

 meetings were largety attended. The new 

 officers, we understand, will announce their 

 policies later on. 



In another issue we shall endeavor to give 

 a synopsis of the discussions, or at least as 

 much of them as we heard. 



Beekeeping Statistics in Indiana 



Deputy State Bee Inspector B. F. Kin- 

 dig, of Indiana, has prepared an article for 

 the Farmer's Guide, published at Hunting- 

 ton, Ind., under date of Jan. 15, setting 

 forth some interesting statistics gathered 

 from the office of the State Entomologist. 

 The first paragraph of the article contains 

 so much of interest that we are glad to 

 place it before our readers : 



Statistics regarding beekeeping are sur- 

 prisingly incomplete. The most accurate 

 figures that are available in the state are in 

 the office of the State Entomologist. Those 

 records show fairly accurate data of more 

 than 8200 beekeepers. There are more than 

 that number of beekeepers; but how many 

 more, and how many colonies of bees they 

 represent, can hardly be estimated, inas- 

 much as the government census-takers do 

 not consider bees kept in cities and towns. 

 From the records of the State Entomolo- 

 gist's office the average number of colonies 

 per beekeeper is 13.2. This seems to repre- 

 sent a higher average than there really ex- 

 ists, because the smaller beekeepers do not 

 respond readily to statistical inquiries. F)-om 

 figures available there are in the neighbor- 

 hood of 140,000 colonies kept within the 

 state. Figuring the average yearly yield per 

 colony at 15 pounds of honey makes a total 

 yearly production of 2,100,000 pounds. This 

 figure may be unfair to the beekeepers, as 

 many of the large beekeepers make a yearly 

 average production of over 40 pounds per 

 colony. Again, thousands of colonies in the 

 state do not return to their owners an aver- 

 age of one pound per colony. Obviously the 

 great difference is accounted for by the dif- 

 ference in the way the bees are kept. 



Don't Forget to Enclose a Stamp 



As we have noted before in these col- 

 umns, there are many good beekeepers who 

 will not write for publication on account 



of the amount of correspondence entailed. 

 Occasionally we hear mutteiings of wrath 

 from some contributor who has been del- 

 uged with letters concerning a certain arti- 

 cle; and his usual complaint is, aside from 

 the time and energy required in, answering 

 the letters, that very few take even the 

 trouble to send the postage for the reply 

 which they expect. Surely those who expect 

 the favor of an answer to a question ought 

 to be courteous enough to enclose postage. 

 It is a businesslike tiling to do, and failure 

 to observe this business ru^.e is well nigh 

 inexcusable. 



While we are about it we may as well put 

 in a personal plea of our own. We receive 

 from fifteen to twenty inquiries a day re- 

 garding some phase of beekeeping, which 

 we try to answer to the best of our ability. 

 Of course, it is possible to use but a very 

 small percentage of these in Gleanings, 

 and even those which are answered in 

 Gleanings we usually answer also by let- 

 ter, since in many instances if the question- 

 er had to wait until he saw his answer in 

 Gleanings he would get over wanting to 

 know about it. We should greatly appre- 

 ciate it if our friends who write us these 

 letters calling for answers to questions of a 

 personal nature that would not be of much 

 benefit to any one else would remember to 

 enclose a stamp. 



Yes, a stamp is a small thing; but a lot 

 of them together look pretty good. We 

 shall not refuse to answer a question simply 

 because the questioner forgot to send a 

 stamp, but we can answer it more cheerful- 

 ly if we see that pink stamp with the ques- 

 tion. 



Information Wanted 



We have room for a few more good live 

 articles on the question of out-apiaries, for 

 our special number for May 1. As we have 

 stated before, we pay rather more for ma- 

 terial used in these special numbers, for we 

 are anxious to get the best obtainable. It 

 is not quantity but quality that we want. 



The great majority of out-apiaries are 

 run for extracted honey. Who is running 

 one or more out-apiaries for comb honey? 

 We want information concerning the pre- 

 vention of swarming in out-apiaries. 



So far we believe that Allan Latham 

 holds the imaginary cup for operating bees 

 on the let-alone system. Out-apiaries re- 

 quire a different management altogether in 

 order to reduce the cost of the labor and of 

 the transportation. In the March 1st issue 

 there were several discussions on extracting 

 at out-apiaries and at central extracting- 



