(Entered as aeeond-elaas matter July 30, 1907, at the Post-Offlce at Chicago, III., under Act of March 3, 1879.) 

 Published Monthly at 75 cents a Year, by George W. York & Co., It8 West Jackson Boulevard. 



GBORGE W. YORK, Editor 



CHICAGO, ILL,, FEBRUARY, 1909 



VoL XLIX— No, 2 



!dii€orial ^ofes 

 and Comments 



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Uncle Sam's Sweet Tooth 



It takes a million dollars a day to 

 satisfy it with sugar, to say nothing 

 about honey. That's according to the 

 latest Government report, which is for 

 the year 1907. A honey-leaflet that has 

 had a considerable circulation says that 

 the average annual consumption of sugar 

 for every man, woman, and child in the 

 United States is about 60 pounds. That 

 was true when the leaflet was written ; 

 but the consumption has greatly in- 

 creased, and for 1907 it was 82.6 pounds ! 

 At that rate the average individual eats 

 half his own weight of sugar in a year. 

 Of the more than 7,000,000,000 pounds 

 consumed, 21.3 percent Was of home pro- 

 duction, 17.7 percent from our insular 

 possessions, and 61 percent from foreign 

 countries. Of the home product, 64 per- 

 cent was from beets and 36 percent from 

 cane. From all this the bee-keeper may 

 at least glean the crumb of comfort that 

 Uncle Sam's taste for sweet is not dying 

 out. 



Does Age Deteriorate Honey? 



Mr. Frank Rauchfuss showed some comb 

 honey at the bee-convention, which was three 

 years old. It had candied and liquefied several 

 times, and the comb was but slightly cracked. 

 The honey was liquid, but it had lost all of 

 its original honey-fiavor, and was thick like 

 taffy. Mr. Rauchfuss said that it could no 

 longer be considered as honey. All the water, 

 apparently, had left the honey, and nothing 

 but a sticky syrup was left. — Wesley Foster, 

 in Gleanings. 



Editor Root adds this footnote : 



Honey would evaporate more in a Colorado 

 climate than in the East, generally. The pre- 

 sumption is that a 12-year-oId Colorado honey 

 would be very different from an Eastern 12- 

 year-old honey. 



Evidently the question of the keeping 

 of comb honey is one upon which we 



need more light. It is a matter of im- 

 portance to know whether, at a time 

 when prices are very low one can keep 

 comb honey over for a higher price. If 

 so, under what conditions? Does kind 

 of honey, climate, or something else 

 make a difiference? Comb honey 12 

 years old has been reported. Can any 

 one tell us the quality of the honey 

 itself? It is generally agreed that honey 

 is improved by leaving it a long time 

 with the bees. If leaving it with the 

 bees a few weeks improves it, would it 

 not be better, or at least as good, if it 

 were left with them two or three times 

 as long, or five times as long, provided 

 conditions remain the same ? If so, can 

 we not imitate the conditions under 

 which honey is kept by the bees sufR- 

 ciently well to keep it over at least till 

 the next season? 



These questions can not be answered 

 so well by reasoning as by actual ex- 

 periences. There are very likely a num- 

 ber who have Kept comb honey over, say 

 to June of the next year. Will they 

 kindly report the result, especially as to 

 the quality of the honey, whether favor- 

 able or unfavorable? 



Should Bees be Allowed to Build 

 Comb? 



Mr. Aikin's word carries weight, and 

 this is an important matter. It is, how- 

 ever, against the general belief, and the 

 word of even so good authority as Mr. 

 Aikin will not pass current without scru- 

 tiny in such a case. If it is true, then 

 is it not a mistake, when running for 

 extracted honey, to furnish entirely 

 drawn combs, giving the bees no oppor- 

 tunity to build? 



Mr. Aikin explains that when bees are 



not allowed to build comb the great 

 quantities of wax that they secrete are 

 used in other ways. He say, in Glean- 

 ings: 



"When scraping sections I save the scrap- 

 ings, which appear to be almost entirely pro- 

 polis; but when melted they yield considerable 

 wax. Then I have many times seen nice 

 white wax used to fill cracks about comb- 

 honey supers; and when there are full sets of 

 combs already built to hold every drop of 

 honey to be stored, I have found workers 

 loaded with wax-scales, cracks stopped with 

 wax, burr-combs put here and there without 

 stint, and, when not needed, bits of wax 

 built against the quilts over the top-bars, some- 

 times amounting to a quarter or even half a 

 pound — all this apparently is done just to get 

 rid of the surplus wax by using it where pro- 

 polis would ordinarily be used. 



But that "quarter or even half a 

 pound" seems a small quantity compared 

 with the several pounds that must be 

 produced by a colony that has all its 

 comb to build. This is not by way of 

 saying that Mr. Aikin is wrong, only 

 that in a matter of so much importance, 

 he must do quite a bit of "showing" to 

 convince those who hold the general 

 view. 



Our friends who produce both chunk 

 and extracted honey in the same apiary 

 might help to solve this problem. To 

 one colony, or to a number of them, let 

 drawn combs be furnished, so that no 

 comb need be built ; to an equal number 

 let no comb whatever be given ; at the 

 end of the season melt the chunk honey 

 and compare the wax secured from each. 



AMiite Clover Prospects 



In white-clover regions there is always 

 interest on the part of the bee-keepers 

 as to what white clover will do in the 

 season next to come. That interest 

 seems more than usual tliis year, and the 

 different views expressed show that we 

 have not the most exact knowledge on 

 the subject so as to tell in advance just 

 what we may expect. There are differ- 

 ent views as to the effect on future har- 

 vests, of drouth in summer, drouth in 

 fall, winter freezing in wet or dry soil, 

 and in the Bee-Keepers' Review, is a 

 discussion as to the age of white-clover 

 plants, by Harry Lathrop. Editor 

 Hutchinson endorses the view that Mr. 

 Lathrop thus sums up : 



"White-clover plants one year old may bloom, 

 but are of no value for a honey crop. White 



