4fi8 



GLEANINGS IN BE E CULTURE 



August, 1920 



^ FROM THE FIELD OF EXPERIENCE 



BEEKEEPERS' CONVENTIONS 



A Discussion of Some of the Faults of the Present- 

 day Sort of Meetings 



As this, comparatively speaking, is the 

 off season for beekeepers' conventions, what 

 I am about to state need not be considered 

 personal, and it is not intended at all to be 

 so. 



When I was a young man (now a great, 

 great many years ago) we had beekeepers' 

 conventions. The present-day conventions, 

 in my estimation, are a mere shadow of what 

 we had then. Has the glory departed? Will 

 it come back? 



I can remember great international con- 

 ventions, notably, one at Detroit, Mich., at 

 which were to be found, if I remember cor- 

 rectly, L. L. Langstroth, Dr. C. C. Miller, 

 Dr. Mason, A. I. Eoot, Thos. G. Newman, C. 

 P. Dadant, D. A. Jones, W. F. Clarke, S. T. 

 Pettit, and no doubt, many others equally 

 as worthy of mention among beekeepers. 



Then arrangement was made for the news- 

 jiapers to mention the industry, and that De- 

 troit convention received a notice unique 

 and wonderful. One of the leading papers 

 ill. Detroit stated in its columns that the 

 members of the international association in 

 conventio)! were a very fine body of men; 

 that they did not go to the theatre; that the 

 bartender at the hotel at which they made 

 headquarters stated that not one of them 

 had been served with a drink; and that the 

 boy at the cigar stand stated that he had 

 S:)ld only one of them a cigar and that was 

 a ' ' five-center. ' ' 



Could they say it now? I know we are 

 creatures of habit — our environment in- 

 fluences us tremendously. I have often said 

 we surely never sprang from monkeys, but 

 we have degenerated to them. We follow 

 custom, fashion, and "theirs not to reason 

 why, theirs but to do and die." During 

 the last five j ears people appear to thinK 

 they should be allowed to smoke anywhere, 

 and there :\r-i still many people who suffer 

 when they breathe tobacco-smoke-laden at- 

 mosphere; and the grossest of all offenses 

 is to smoke in places where people are eat- 

 ing. I speak of this kindly, and want lo 

 say: "Young man, you will never have any 

 reason to regret it, if your lips never touch 

 tobacco. ' ' 



What I started out to write, about is the 

 length of convention notices. When we w>ne 

 officers we used to have a full program .nn- 

 nouneed months before the convention was 

 held. If there is nothing likely to »e at- 

 tractive, let people know it; if there 

 is something worth while, then give 

 them a chance to attend. I had a 

 wave of (1 trust) righteous indignation 

 sweep over me a year or more ago when 

 a notice was received of an impor- 

 tant convention about a week before it 



was held. I sat down and with a red-hot pen 

 wrote a little item for Gleanings, saying 

 that those who had charge of getting out 

 programs and arranging the time for bee- 

 keepers ' conventions appeared to be under 

 the impression that a beekeeper was a kind 

 of person who sat on a chair by the fire with 

 his clothing on day and night, overcoat on a 

 chair by his side, ready to jump up from his 

 seat, grab his overcoat and make for the 

 station the moment he got word to come; 

 and, if he did not make a mistake, or lisiss 

 a train, he would 4ikely get to the meeting 

 in time. 



Why this way of doing things? Oh! Theie 

 will be a thousand excuses; but, after all, 

 there is none. Thousands of times I have 

 said to people who are behind: " l.k a vhing 

 as early as you can and then, if this, that, 

 or the other happen, you will still l>e in 

 time." Is it not true? 



Then when secretaries write to people, 

 let the response be quick. I answer nearly 

 all my correspondence immediately; but, 

 alas, there is little reciprocity ia thi-s re- 

 spect. I have often felt deeply wounded by 

 having no answer to kindly letters. 



In this day there are many speakers sent 

 at expense to help conventions. Why not 

 have secretaries co-operate more, so thnt 

 these can make a continuous jowniey and 

 save time and money? 



There is probably no fault to !ie found 

 with programs. At a national convention at 

 Detroit, I think the last held there, at my 

 suggestion to the secretary, W. Z. Hutchin- 

 son, the program included a debate and I 

 was later told that this part of the progr;ini 

 v.'fis considered a pleasurable, exciting and 

 instructive feature. The subject of such a 

 debate should be one upon which there are 

 strong and distinct diffeiences, and there 

 should be impartial judges, or the decision 

 might even be left to the individual. 



Brantford, Ont. R. F. Holterin:uni. 



::i0^c»: 



FREQUENCY OF SUPERSEDURE 



Dr. Miller Thinks His Bees Do Not Fail Once in 

 a Hundred Times to Supersede 



In July Gleanings, page 407, A. Butsch 

 says: "The statement has been made that 

 when bees are left to their own devices every 

 ((ueen is superseded before she dies. Now 

 ill my experience I have not found this true 



I find that the bees will allow the 



((ueeii to go on laying until her fertility is 

 ]»ractically exhausted when she will lay both 

 drone and worker eggs in worker-cells. At 

 this stage the bees, if they have any sense 

 at all, surely ought to start queen-cells. In 

 a few exceptional cases they do, but they 

 generally allow the queen to go on until she 

 lays nothing but dioue eggs.'' 



I plea«l guilty to having injidc the state- 



