776 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL, 



Dec. 



1899. 



PUELISHT WEEKLY BY 



George W. York & Company, 



H8 Michigan St., Chicago, III. 



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



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



United States Bee-Keepers' Association. 



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

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

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



Aleznbership Fee — $1.00 per AanvLm, 



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. 



VOL. 39. DECEMBER /, 1899. NO. 49. 



Note— The American I!fe Journal adopts the Orthofjraphy of the follow- 

 ing Rule, recommended by the joint action of the American Philolog- 

 ical Association and the Philological Society of England: — Change 

 "d" or "ed" final to "t" when so pronounced, except when the "e" af- 

 fects a preceding sound. 



Improved Spelling seems to suit Dr. Mason. In his 

 department, " Good Thing's from Other Journals," in the 

 Bee-Keepers' Review, he says he is pleased to see the steady 

 but sure advance it is making, and g-lad to note that some 

 of the bee-papers are not behind. The " t " for " ed " in 

 the American Bee Journal lookt odd to him for a time, but 

 now he thoroly enjoys it, and hints that he is expecting- the 

 Review to help on the needed reform. 



Inky Drops from the Smoker, their cause and cure, 

 have been for j'ears troublesome problems for many bee- 

 keepers, and it is not to be regretted that Dr. Miller's at- 

 tempt to give a cure in this journal was not a brilliant suc- 

 cess, for it has had the effect of bringing the attention of a 

 number to the question, and now we have satisfactory light 

 as to these dark spots. F. I,. Thompson says a freshly 

 cleaned smoker drops worse ; Critic Taylor says dry fuel is 

 the remedy. 



Now comes R. B. Chipman, in the Bee-Keepers' Review, 

 and says: "The moisture produced by damp fuel is a 

 trivial matter compared with the amount of steam produced 

 by combustion." While all will admit that the steam from 

 combustion is considerable, they will hardly admit that it 

 is of more consequence than the item of which Mr. Taylor 

 speaks— the moisture that may be expelled by drying. Even 

 supposing that the excess of moisure in damp fuel may not 

 be as great as the steam of combustion, the fact remains 

 that // is excess, and that it may be removed, while the 

 steam of combustion is a constant quantity, alike present 

 in damp or dry fuel. It is the excess that (like the last 



straw that breaks the camel's back), comes in to do most of 

 the inky-drop business. 



But Mr. Chipman agrees with what Dr. Miller said in 

 this journal for Oct. 26, that the dropping is caused by the 

 moisture condensing on the cold nozzle, and says, keep the 

 smoker hot ; while Editor Hutchinson agrees with Dr. 

 Miller, that one part of the remedy is to keep a coating of 

 soot on the nozzle so as to make it a non-conductor. Put- 

 ting together all that has been said, if j'ou don't want dirty 

 drops on your nice, white sections, the waj' to prevent it is 

 to have fuel that is thoroly drj', don't clean out the nozzle, 

 but keep the lower part clean, especially the holes in the 

 fire-pan, so as to keep up a brisk heat. 



Barrels vs. Tin Cans for extracted honey seems to be 

 one of the questions upon which there is undue positiveness 

 on both sides. Editor Hutchinson had a long interview 

 with the elder France at his home, and Mr. France felt in- 

 dignant at the bitter objection to barrels. Having the bar- 

 rels thoroly dried in advance, they have no trouble with 

 leaking. Pointing to the door of the honey-house, Mr. 

 France said : 



" Don't you see that the floor is just the right hight, so 

 that when a wagon is backt up there the floor and the bot- 

 tom of the wagon are on a level ? All 5'ou have to do is 

 simply to roll the barrel into the wagon. Tin cans you 

 can't roll nor shove ; j'ou have got to pick them up and 

 carry them. When you get to the railroad station, all you 

 have to do is to back the wagon up to the platform and roll 

 out the barrel." 



Most of the extracted honey in Wisconsin is put up in 

 barrels. Some bakers and other large manufacturers pre- 

 fer not to pay for more expensive packages. Mr. Hutchin- 

 son says : 



"There is no doubt whatever that the men who buy 

 honey from every class of producers, and then re-sell it to a 

 varied class of customers, such men as Mr. George W. York, 

 or the Roots of Medina, find the tin can a more desirable 

 package. They have had a lot of experience, and ought to 

 know what suits them, but they must not forget that ' there 

 are others.' " 



Moral : — Use the kind of package preferred by those to 

 whom you ship, but don't use barrels unless you know that 

 you can use them without leaking. 



Shipping Comb Honey to Harket. — A short time ago 

 a large honey-dealer on South Water street (this city) askt 

 us to call and see a small shipment of comb honey that had 

 been sent in by a bee-keeper in this State. 



Before shipping the honey the producer wrote the dealer 

 that it was all white clover and basswood honey, supposedly 

 of best grade of white comb honey, and the price agreed 

 upon was 13 cents a pound at the railroad station of the 

 shipper. 



The honey came in, and to say that the hone)--dealer 

 was surprised, when he saw it, is to say it very calmly. It 

 was all colors, all kinds of filling of sections, besides being 

 " spotted, ring-streakt and speckled" — some of it sort of 

 kaleidoscopic when held up to the light. Some of it could 

 hardly pass as a good grade of amber honey. 



The dealer wrote the producer, telling him that the 

 honey was not as represented, that he would hold it subject 

 to his order, or allow him 10 cents a pound for it — fully as 

 m.uch as we should think it worth — in fact, we wouldn't 

 want to buy it at that price. Of course, the shipper thought 

 that it was merely another case of the dealer trying to 

 swindle him out of his honey, when the honey was not at all 

 what it was expected to be. 



We cannot understand why any bee-keeper should at- 

 tempt to " work off " honey on a large dealer that knows 

 many times as much about what various grades of honey 



