602 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



August, 1917 



I will tell just what I do to lessen the need 

 of sugar-feeding and to carry out the ad- 

 vice I have given. 



We have here several honeys which are 

 very pleasant to some persons, but repellent 

 to others. Some are of fine body and color, 

 but so pronounced in flavor that one quick- 

 ly tires of them. Several of these make up 

 no small part of some of our " surj^lus-pro- 

 ducing " fiows. Once all were taken and 

 put together, the aim being to get the largest 

 possible yield. Some years the honey sold 

 readily, " repeat orders " quickly exhaust- 

 ing the sujaply. Other years it was almost 

 impossible to give the honey away, owing 

 to the preponderance of poor honey in the 

 mixture. Afterward the various flows were 

 kept separate, so far as possible, and each 

 kind sold by itself; but this caused trouble, 

 for customers wanted the kind they had be- 

 fore, and you were out of it, ])erhaps, or 

 forgot what kind they had. Following this 

 was an attempt at blending, and it was a 

 long and troublesome job. Some honeys 

 would not do at all. Others were all right 

 if only a little of them were used; and it 

 was right at that point that I decided I 

 could far better afford to take a small per- 

 colony yield and leave the undesarable 

 honeys with the bees, rather than to take 

 everything and attempt to sell it and feed 

 sugar. 



The next thing in the evolution of my bee- 

 keeping methods was to learn thoroly the 

 honey sources about each apiary and work 

 for the surplus from the most desirable, 

 jnst as the " clover - district " men bend 

 every energy to get that crop. This was 

 not as simple as it sounds, for flows overlap, 

 and not infrequently some previously quiet 

 and well-behaved plant becomes obstreper- 

 ous and bursts into a sea of bloom and raises 

 havoc with our plans, or gives us an addi- 

 tional fiow of a desirable honey. But on 

 the whole the practice is working satisfac- 

 torily. The bees are manipulated for the 

 desirable honeys, and are allowed to keep 

 the undesired sorts. Sometimes the latter 

 are taken away in brood-sized combs, or are 

 extracted and returned later, either for 

 brood-rearing or for winter stores. It will 

 be noticed that I am speaking almost wholly 

 of extracted honey. This is not a good 

 comb-honey region, but I do secure comb 

 honey from one flow and occasionally from 

 a second. When I do get it, it sells for a 

 fancy price, so even a small per-colony yield 

 in pounds brings a good per-colony cash 

 return. Just keep the cash returns in your 

 mind's eye and think less of the pounds per 

 colony. 



Neither Mr. Crane (page 48, January) 

 nor any other beekeeper will adopt my 



plan, nor even think favorably of it, until 

 they change their ideals from quantity to 

 quality and do it so thoroly that they will 

 err on the side of leaving some possibly 

 good honey with the bees. 



You ask, "Does it pay?" That is the 

 yardstick by which we do most of our meas- 

 uring. Yes, it does pay. Suppose our 

 average has been 50 pounds per colony, and 

 we fed 10 pounds of sugar, and our honey 

 sold for some medium price or for as much 

 as the neighbors got. Now suppose we 

 drop the yield to 40 pounds, feed nothing, 

 and sell our honey for 20 per cent more than 

 the highest-priced honey on the market, and 

 have to keep putting out new yards to meet 

 the demand. That is me. Now who wins? 



Providence, R. I. 



[Perhaps we do not get your viewpoint; 

 but we see no reason why we should " back 

 water." It would be folly to sell these 

 dark honeys along with other good honey to 

 a distant market that does not know the 

 producer. These off grades can be sold 

 around home for less money ; and then if an 

 exj^lanation is made that they are pure there 

 is no harm done. Some people prefer these 

 dark, strong-flavored honeys to the light- 

 colored milder - flavored honeys. Around 

 home one can pick out these kinds of cus- 

 tomers. There are many people, foreign 

 bred, who actually prefer these dark honeys. 

 See bottom of page 135, second column, 

 February Gleanings. — Ed.] 



The First Man Set the Price Too Low 



There is not very much honey produced or 

 sold in this section. The price on comb 

 honey in the surrounding towns ranges any- 

 where from 15 to 30 cents. In my home 

 town the price is from 15 to 20 cents. We 

 could get more, but one producer started 

 early in the season to sell at 15 cents and 

 that kept the price down. 



Extracted sells at about 15 cents. There 

 is some chunk honey sold also that retails 

 from 121/2 to 18 cents. If the beekeepers 

 would only come together and establish a 

 price it would be much better for all. 



I started last year with 17 colonies. I 

 now have 43 and have made about 1000 

 pounds of surplus. The season is very 

 short here, lasting only from May 1st until 

 about the 20th of June, then we have a 

 small flow in the fall. The flow in the 

 spring is from tupelo and poplar, holly, and 

 ]iersimmon. They all blossom near together 

 and the bees store very rapidly. 



Waverly, Va. J. A. Bryant. 



