Seitember, 1917 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



almost daily. A few oonlracted at tliat 

 price, but, fortunately, not many. But as 

 prices advanced, producers continued to 

 contract, many agTeeing to 7^4 cents. Our 

 county organization set a price for its mem- 

 bers of 91/2 cents. At the time this looked 

 out of the question, but proved to be a very 

 low figure after all. At 10 cents many sold. 

 "When VZy^ cents was reached a buyer be- 

 came very indignant because I would not 

 contract; but I t(jld him 1 had no assurance 

 that I would not be offered 13 cents the 

 next day by another buyer; and as long as 



the buyers continued to bid up I would not 

 sell unless they wanted to take my crop 

 at 15 cents. This price was not quite 

 reached, but a small amount was a.s 

 high as I4I/2 cents. I am not blaming those 

 who contracted, if in their judgment they 

 were doing the right thing; and I fully 

 realize that the man who seems to be the 

 wise one, even in following the general mar- 

 ket, may be classed as the fool another sea- 

 son. The weakness of the beekeepers seems 

 to lie in their failure to maintain an ade- 

 quate marketing information bureau. 



THE twenty- 

 first annual 

 session o f 

 the Texas State 

 Beekeepers' Association, held on August 2 

 and 3, as an affiliated section of the Texas 

 Farmers' Congress, at College Station, was, 

 without doubt, the best meeting in the his- 

 tory of the organization. Considerable 

 surprise was expressed that such a wonder- 

 ful meeting could be held this year, the 

 hardest in twenty-five" years for beekeepers 

 over most of the state. Much credit for 

 such a successful meeting must be given to 

 Mr. E. G. LeStourgeon, president of the 

 association, for his untiring efforts to make 

 the sessions this year of value to every bee- 

 keeper in the state. 



Practically every beekeeping section of 

 the state was represented — the north, the 

 central, the east, the south, and the south- 

 west. Only the extreme western section was 

 without a representative. Fifty-seven bee- 

 keepers attended the session, and visitors 

 were present to hear many of the papers. 



The program, made out by T. P. Robin- 

 son, proved to be most interesting. Those 

 on the program who were not able to at- 

 tend the meeting sent their papers to be 

 read. Beekeeping for beginners and for 

 specialists was well discussed, altho there 

 was some diversity of opinion, due largely 

 to the differing views of what constitutes 

 a specialist. Most of those present felt 

 that those who desired to keep a few beas 

 for home purposes should not be discour- 

 aged in such efforts; but it was generally 

 agreed that but few are fitted to make bee- 

 keeping a specialty. There was some diver- 

 sity of opinion as to the best location of 

 apiaries, and really the section of the state 

 may alter any set rule. 



Bee diseases and their treatment were dis- 

 cussed fully. Again it was disclosed that 

 there can be many minor chang'es in a gen- 



IN TEXAS 



F. B. Paddock, State Entomologist 



eral plan, yet 

 with equal suc- 

 cess. There is 

 yet a need for a 

 more technical discussion of bee diseases, for 

 there is much misunderstanding as to how 

 these diseases work. The foul-brood-eradi- 

 cation work was reviewed, and plans for fu- 

 ture work were mentioned. At present the 

 eradication forces are called upon to conduct 

 educational work among the beekeepers. 

 Mention has already been made in these 

 columns of such work in two counties. The 

 results in one county were mentioned at this 

 meeting. When the eradication work was 

 started in the county last spring it was esti- 

 mated that there were ICOO box hives in the 

 county. Today 350 of those have been 

 transferred to modern hives, and the work 

 continues to increase each day. 



The papers and discussions brought out 

 concerted opinion that the beekeeper could 

 more profitably produce extracted than comb 

 honey. Many regretted that local demand 

 was for the comb honey, and all hoped it 

 would not be long until the consumer would 

 ask only for extracted honey. The problem 

 of granulation has been a big factor in 

 discouraging beekeepers from putting comb 

 honey on the market. 



Perhaps the most interesting topic of the 

 meeting was "Shipping Bees by the Pound." 

 This new phase of the industry has devel- 

 oped very rapidly in the state during the 

 past season. Many beekeepers launcJied 

 into the package business after it was evi- 

 dent that the honey-flow would be short in 

 their locality. Some of these beekeepers 

 had good success, while others lost consid- 

 erable money. Not all of the failure of this 

 business is due to the beekeeper, for the 

 best of them lost heavily after it got real 

 hot. A committee was apj^ointed to confer 

 with the express company with a view of 

 reducing the loss of so many packages in 



