THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



441 



taiiliness in getting bees to work in 

 boxes 



Had niv paper been on the " Honey- 

 Bee," I coiilii doubtless l\ave made it 

 more interesting tlianon keeping bees 

 for prolit ; but will say this much for 

 the bee or race of bees to be kept for 

 proht : tliat after having tried several 

 races, 1 am decidedly in favor of the 

 Italians, for the following reasons : 

 1. They possess longer tongues, and 

 can, consequently, gather from dow- 

 ers wliich are useless to tlie black bee. 

 •2. They are more active, and with the 

 same opportunities, will gather much 

 more honey. 8. They work earlier 

 and later, not otdy of the day, but of 

 the season. 4. They are far better to 

 protect their hives against robber 

 bees. Bees which attempt to rob 

 Italians ot tlieir stores, soon (ind that 

 tliey have " dared to beard the lion in 

 his'den." o. They are proof against 

 niotii millers, ti. The queens are far 

 more prolific, and breed up faster in 

 tlie spring. 7. The Italian bee is 

 more hardy, longer lived, and stronger 

 of wing tlian other breeds. S. And 

 lastly, they are more amiable. A 

 stock of pure Italians may be handled 

 without the least danger of stings. 



And now I will close by speaking of 

 their advantage to the farmer, other 

 than by supplying his table witli 

 honey, and filling his pocket with 

 money. All bees feed exclusively 

 upon saccharine juices or nectar of 

 flowers, called honey, and the food of 

 their young in the larval state, is the 

 pollen of flowers, called bee-bread, 



Tlie honey-bee was not only created 

 to gather the nectar from each open- 

 ing flower, and store it in shape for 

 food and medicine for mankind, but 

 at the same time there was a double 

 purpose intended. They were made 

 to perform a very important part in 

 the economy of nature — that of the 

 fertilization of flowers, which de- 

 pends upon the contact of the pollen 

 with the stigma; and, as if to secure 

 this object more perfectly, in their 

 search for honey and pollen, they pass 

 from flower to flower of the same 

 kind, and are never known to visit 

 two varieties of flowers on the same 

 trip, as many have supposed. It is 

 indeed wonderful liow so small an in- 

 sect can be made to do so great a 

 work, and governed by natural laws, 

 they become most populous at the 

 season of the year when most needed 

 in this work It is estimated that not 

 more than one-half of the blossoms 

 on our fruit trees woidd bear fruit, 

 were it not for this agency. Tlie bee, 

 eager for the nectar secreted in the 

 flower, plunges into the blossom, 

 covering himself with its pollen dust, 

 and thence to the next, scattering it 

 there, and so on. 



When we realize that in a strong 

 working colony there are 50,000 of 

 these workers, and that each one 

 makes hundreds of trips each day, we 

 can readily see how much may be ac- 

 complished in one day's time. And 

 it is indeed possible that the nectar 

 there secreted was for the sole object 

 of attracting the insects thither, that 

 they might accomplish this work. 



Farmers are becoming more ac- 

 quainted with these facts, and it is 



very noticeable tliat in sections where 

 many bees are kept, the fruit crop is 

 more abundant, and the clover yields 

 far more seed. Only a short time 

 since I saw an article on the transpor- 

 tation of bees to Australia, where the 

 clover has never been known to bear 

 seed. Some one suggested that bees 

 might be made to distribute the 

 pollen. 



The experiment was tried, and it is 

 reported that in the vicinity where 

 the bees were stationed, the clover, 

 the present season, lias bortie seed, 

 thus proving conclusively tliat their 

 work alone wrought the change. 



Kor the American Bee Journal. 



Reply to W. F. Clarke. 



.lAMES HEDDON. 



I shall have to ask my old friend, 

 Mr. Clarke, to excuse me for not tak- 

 ing a firmer "hold" of him in the 

 " Priority of Location " controversy. 

 If he win not again blame me for 

 "tailying" him, I will say that it is 

 very difficult for me, or any other api- 

 cultiiral writer, to keep a "good 

 square hold " of him when we cross 

 the swords of sharp sarcasm ; and as 

 far as the philosoidiy of the subject 

 at issue was concerned, truly I did 

 not discover much to get " hold " of. 



As sharp and pointed as Mr. Clarke 

 takes hold of me, he is not faultless 

 in his logic, nor correct in his asser- 

 tions. Because I am, the present sea- 

 son, increasing the stock of my field, 

 is not "an admission that I have un- 

 derrated it ill the past," or that the 

 field is in any way improved. I am 

 doing this to put to test the results 

 and standard of overstocking in this 

 locality. Regarding the elegant and 

 classical caption of Mr. Clarke's arti- 

 cle, I have only to .say tliat Mr. Clarke 

 has mis-applied it. I need no " bur 

 row." I will try to prove my claims. 

 I feel that time and experience will 

 assist me. 



I do not say that no one can form a 

 correct conclusion regarding any point 

 in apiculture who is only an apicul- 

 tural dabbler, but I do say this, that 

 being only a dabbler is the mantle 

 that practical producers throw' over 

 the heads of those who almost always 

 get the impractical theory side of such 

 subjects. 



I think Mr. Clarke is mistaken, and 

 I imagine that more than nine-tenths 

 of the honey-producers of this coun- 

 try think that he is mistaken. He 

 can convince me that he will not " al- 

 ways be in error on this subject," 

 when either he or I see our mistake. 



Mr. Clarke's comparison in his last 

 paragraph i.s entirely unfair. Why 

 could he not compare my position in 

 the science of apiculture with a simi- 

 lar position of some one in another 

 science V Why could he not have 

 said, if ]SIr. Heddon says that editing 

 a daily newspaper is not labor ; is 

 ouly just child's jilay ; that dull, prosy 

 items take as well as sharp and spicy 

 ones, he is mistaken, and nothing will 

 set him right, but to depend upon 

 holding sucn a position for the bread 

 and butter of his family. "In the 



realm of the unknown (and that in- 

 tellectual giant, Herbert Spencer, 

 says, 'possibly the unknowable'), 

 ALL have an equal right to guess." 



No doubt the "Priority of Loca- 

 tion " subject lias gone its normal 

 length. Mr. Pond is reduced to one 

 stale law-point. Mr. Kendall aji- 

 preciates anew the old law of logic, 

 viz: Never back up a strong point 

 with a weaker one, for an opponent 

 will cunningly attack the weaker one, 

 entirely ignoring the one he cannot 

 answer. 



IJowagiac, Mich. 



Pacitlc Kuril] Presi. 



Marketing Extracted Honey. 



■VVSI. MUTH-RASMUSSEN. 



A paper published in Los Angeles, 

 JV"ei(!.s and Recreation, contains an arti- 

 cle complaining of the unjust and ex- 

 orbitant tare exacted from honey-pro- 

 ducers. Not only the weight of the 

 cases, but also that of the cans, in- 

 cluding the weight of what honey 

 adlieres to the inside of the can after 

 it is emptied, is deducted from the 

 gross weight. The same cans are 

 frequently returned to the bee-keeper, 

 who has to pay for them over again, 

 besides cleaning them and paying the 

 return freight charges. While I have 

 suffered from this extortion myself, 

 and admit that there is just cause for 

 complaint, I cannot help feeling that 

 the bee-keepers themselves are in a 

 great measure to blame for this state 

 of affairs. Finding that new cans, 

 made to order in the tin-shops, were 

 too expensive, they adopted second- 

 hand coal-oil cans, which, after being 

 properly cleaned, might do well 

 enough for manufacturers and other 

 large consumers of honey, but were 

 unsuitable for the retail trade. Aside 

 from the more or less founded objec- 

 tion to the previous use of these cans, 

 very few customers will buy such a 

 quantity of honey at one time. This 

 same objection, being once fixed in 

 the public mind, will be slow to dis- 

 appear, even if entirely new cans 

 snould be used for the purpose, par- 

 ticularly if the new cans retain the 

 same size and shape as the old coal- 

 oil cans. The consequence is, that a 

 new trade has sprang up, whose busi- 

 ness it is to place the honey before 

 the public in smaller and more at- 

 tractive packages, without which 

 tliere would hardly be any sale for 

 honey at all. 



Producers of comb honey have long 

 ago taken the matter into their own 

 liands, and thereby remedied the evil 

 of too much tare. None of them 

 would now tiiink of placing whole 

 caps of honey, built irregularly 

 through the frames, on the market. 

 The popular one and two-pound sec- 

 tions are sold with the honey ; the 

 sections are so light that iiobody ob- 

 jects to paying for them, while the 

 producer gets Iiis money back and 

 really loses nothing by buying the 

 sections. If all producers of extracted 

 honey would insist on being allowed 

 the actual cost of the cans, including 

 purchase price, freight charges and 



