OCTOBER 1, 1916 



923 



but I am not in favor of putting comb hon- 

 ey in glass cans with extracted honey. The 

 size of package will depend uj^ou the trade 

 and the class of customers in general. 

 "Strained" honey should not be advertised, 

 and, as far as possible, the grocers should 

 be discouraged from handling it as "strain- 

 ed." Have them call it "extracted," noth- 

 ing else. Glass can be used for samples, al- 

 so in local stores and for j^ublic exhibition 

 and sale; but glass cannot be successfully 

 used in parcel-post shipments. 



I believe in advertising. I think it is a 

 good plan to use little stickers on all sta- 

 tionery, and, if possible, to use booklets as 



an aid to publicity. We have been using 

 them for the past eight years. Honey ought 

 to be advertised as a strictly clean sanitary 

 article, suitable to use in any household. 

 People must understand it that way. 



We have no difficulty in selling all the 

 honey we can handle, but it is necessary to 

 have good fully ripened honey, not a lot of 

 green unsealed stuff mixed with milky 

 brood, such as has been produced in some 

 southern California beeyards lately. Right 

 here is the great argument in favor of 

 queen-excluders to keep queens out of the 

 supers. 



Glendale, Cal. 



SOME THEORIES ON THE COLOR VARIATION IN HONEY 



BY W. I. LIVELY 



There has beea much discussion as to 

 whether the same plant always produces the 

 same article of honey in color and flavor. I 

 have been waiting to see if some one would 

 spring a theory in accord with my own pet 

 ideas on the subject. Mr. M. H. TAveed, 

 p. 988, Dec. 1, has come very near doing it. 



Here in the Salt River Valley, in Ari- 

 zona, alfalfa is our staple honey-plant. In 

 fact, during a large part of the season it is 

 the only source available. Arizona beekeep- 

 ers do not spend any time discussing wheth- 

 er alfalfa always yields the same grade of 

 honey in color and flavor. They know to 

 their sorrow that it does not. It varies in 

 different seasons, and it even varies at times 

 during the same season. Now Mr. Tweed 

 comes forward with the theory that tliis 

 variation is caused by the difference in 

 climate and temperature, and I suspect he 

 is partly right at least; at any rate this is 

 the only theory that sounds reasonable to 

 me; and, moreover, it coincides with my 

 own observations and experience. 



Owing to a vast increase in irrigation and 

 cultivation, our climate has changed gTeatly 

 in the last few years. Summer tempera- 

 tures are not so high, and there is a marked 

 increase in atmospheric humidity. In cor- 

 respondence with this change the alfalfa 

 honey has materially lightened in color. Of 

 late we have produced the whitest honey 

 ever known in this section — so white and 

 well flavored that it is comparing favorably 

 with the northern alfalfa, and running close 

 in competition with white clover. Where it 

 used to range from a dark amber to a light 

 amber, it now runs from light amber to 

 extremely light, almost water-white. 



The increased irrigation has not only 

 affected the temperature and humidity, but 

 also the amount of moisture in the soil. 



This causes a ranker growth of the alfafa- 

 plant, and I believe that this has something 

 to do with the gi-ade of the honey. I think 

 a honey gathered from the plant when it is 

 short of moisture, dwarfed in size, and 

 blooming rather prematurely, has a ten- 

 dency to be thicker and darker. Last year 

 I extracted four different times during the 

 season, and no two lots of honey were 

 exactly the same in color. The darkest was 

 in the hottest, driest part of the season 

 when the plants were making their least 

 vigorous growth. The best color was ob- 

 tained in June and early July when the 

 alfalfa was at its best, and the irrigation 

 was heavy. 



Now I also suspect that the color of 

 honey is regulated somewhat by the volume 

 and rapidity of the flow. When the blos- 

 soms are secreting rapidly and heavily, and 

 nectar is just " rolling in," as we say, I 

 suspect it is lighter in color than when it is 

 coming more slowly. 



I confess that this is all mere theory 

 gleaned from my experience. The worst of 

 it is, that every once in a while something 

 will happen that seems to upset all the 

 carefully worked-out theories; and condi- 

 tions that ought to produce certain results 

 will seem to obtain the opposite; but con- 

 ditions and results as I have given them 

 here seem from my experience to be the 

 general rule of causes and effects, and pos- 

 sibly the occasional variations are the 

 exceptions to the rule. At any rate, I am 

 convinced beyond a doubt that here, at least, 

 there is a variation in the color of alfalfa 

 honey; and I think that some or all of the 

 condiiiniis T liave mentioned, or perhaps, 

 more strictly speaking, certain combinations 

 of these conditions, produce the variation. 



Glendale, Ariz. 



