520 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL, 



Aug. 17, 1899. 



PCBLISHT WEEKLY BY 



George W. York & Company, 



118 Michigan St., Chicago, III. 



ONE DOLLAR A YEAR. ^%^ SAMPLE COPY FREE. 



[Entered at the Post-Office at Chicago as Second-Class Mail Matter.] 



United Stales Bee-Keepers' Association. 



Organized to advance the pursuit of Apiculture ; to promote the interests 

 of bee-keepers ; to prtttect its members ; to prevent the adulteration of 

 honey ; and to prosecute the dishonest honev-commission men. 



Alembersblp Fee—^l.OO per Aantim, 



Executive Committee— Pres., E. Whitcomb; Vice-Pres., C. A. Hatch; 



Secretary-, Dr. A. B. Mason, Station B, Toledo, Ohio. 

 Board of Directors— E. R. Root; E. Whitcomb; E.T.Abbott; C. P. 



Dadant; W. Z. Hutchinson; Dr. C. C. Miller. 

 Gen'l Manager and Treasurer— Eugene Secor, Forest City, Iowa. 



JPiace and Date of ^ext HlGGtln^: 



In Franklin Institute, 



IS.Sonth 7th Street, between Market and Chestnut Sts., Philadelphia, Pa., 



September 5, 6 and 7, 1899. Every bee-keeper is invited. 



VOL. 39. AUGUST ir, 1899. 



NO. 



jji 



Note— The American Bee Journal adopts the Orthographv of the follow- 

 ing Rule, recommended by the joint action of the American Philolo^i- 

 ical Association and the Philological Society of England: — Chantre 

 '*d" or "ed" final to "t" when so pronounced, e.\cept when the "e" af- 

 fects a preceding sound. 



Why Take a Bee=Paper?— The editor of Bee-Chat 

 having- askt for reasons for taking- a bee-paper, one of his 

 correspondents replied : 



"1. Because it keeps me abreast of the times. 



"2. Because by enquiry in its columns I can g-et infor- 

 mation on any unusual difficulty that maj- arise in my 

 apiary. 



" 3. Because I can help to provide the editor not only 

 with the sine-ivs of war by my subscription, but also add to 

 his moral support by increasing his clientele." 



There is every reason why a bee-keeper should read a 

 good bee-paper, while there is likely no reason why he 

 should not. How any one can expect to be successful with 

 bees, and not read the best current bee-literature is beyond 

 our comprehension. 



Correspondents of Bee=Papers.— Referring to an edi- 

 torial in these pages as to the smaller number who write 

 for the bee-papers nowadays. Editor Root, of Gleanings in 

 Bee-Culture, says bee-papers are run for the benefit of sub- 

 scribers and not correspondents ; so the editor must get the 

 best he can, and, as many of the best bee-keepers either 

 have not the faculty or have not the inclination to write 

 what they know, the number of writers has become limited, 

 and it is the business of the editor to keep the few who do 

 write from running their followers into ruts. 



Per contra, a writer in the American Bee-Keeper asks 



that a page be set apart for amateurs, and the editor an- 

 nounces that a department will be started for amateurs as 

 soon as material enough comes to hand for it, all intended 

 for it being markt by the writer, " Amateur Department." 

 This vrill relieve the editor from the delicate task or sorting 

 out the amateurs from the others. 



While amateurs are fully represented in the American 

 Bee Journal, they are allowed to mix in freely with the rest 

 of the family. 



The Chapman Honey = Plant is still talkt of as a valu- 

 able new thing in some of the foreign bee-journals. Is 

 there anj' one in this country who continues to believe it 

 worth cultivating ? 



Bee= Keeping a Studious Occupation.--G. W. Demaree 

 says in his department in Barnum's Midland Farmer, that 

 facts show that there are more failures in bee-keeping than 

 in other domestic pursuits. He thinks the reason is that it 

 requires closer study and greater skill to handle bees profit- 

 ablj- than most bee-keepers are willing to afford. The most 

 successful bee-keepers are those who have a natural taste 

 for the study of insect life, with some inclination toward 

 botany. 



The Honey flarket Quotations have held up prettj- 



stifily thruout the past year, but at present they hardlj' 

 seem in proportion to the scarcity of honey that reports in- 

 dicate. Editor Root says in Gleanings in Bee-Culture : 



" From present indications the season over the country 

 generally will be even poorer than that of last year, and we 

 thought 1898 was about as poor as it could be. Comb hone3- 

 — at least a choice article — ought to be sold at a higher price 

 than it has sold for for several years past." 



But the commission men and dealers make quotations 

 that show no advance in price. Are they doing the right 

 thing by their clients ? 



Advertising the United States Bee-Keepers' Asso= 

 ciation. — Editor Holtermann, of the Canadian IJee Journal, 

 endorses what H. F. Moore has said in the American Bee 

 Journal about keeping the craft fully informed as to what 

 the United States Bee-Keepers' Association is doing ; but 

 he does not agree that it would be a good plan to have the 

 manager or secretary of the association send copy to one 

 bee-paper with the request that the others copy. Mr. Hol- 

 termann wisely suggests that the better plan would be to 

 send to all bee-papers at the time when most of them would 

 be ready for cop}'. A bee-paper would be more interested 

 to publish information sent to it direct, even if all others 

 were to have the same matter, than to copj- that matter 

 after it had been printed in some other paper. 



Success Thru Reading and Thinking.— Prof. D. H. 



Otis, of the Kansas State Agricultural College, gives some 

 excellent hints in the following paragraphs : 



Among the questions askt of creamery patrons by the 

 Kansas Experiment Station is, " What dairy or farm paper 

 do you read ?" Out of 77 patrons who answered this ques- 

 tion we found that S3 (or 6Q percent) took no farm or dairj- 

 paper. In looking up the details of the records it is inter- 

 esting to note that the highest yield was made by a man 

 who keeps special dairy cows and subscribes for a dairj' 

 paper. This patron realized S9.00 per cow per annum more 

 than the next best patron who reads no paper, and S36 per 

 cow more than the poorest patron. 



In collecting records from various parts of the State we 

 find where intelligence is applied to the dairy industrj- the 

 cow is yielding from $60 to $80 worth of dairy products per 

 annum'. Contrast this with $20 to $30 without intelligence 

 and no one need ask if education pajs. At the Kansas Ex- 

 periment Station we find that intelligence applied to feed- 

 ing calves will cause them to gain from 12 to 23 pounds per 



