996 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Dec. 1 



the rig-ht thing; at least, if it's right for 

 the grocer to sell by the piece why shouldn't 

 he buy by the piece? [Because there is no 

 reason for selling by the piece. When he 

 buj's in bulk he can just as well buy by 

 weight, and perhaps better; because if he 

 bought his sections by the piece in the case 

 he would have no means of knowing wheth- 

 er he is getting a uniform quantity, because 

 most of the honey is covered from view. 

 The consumer, when he buys his box of 

 honey, sees the whole thing, inside and 

 out. But in Colorado, honey is actually 

 sold by the case. If you wish to buy at 

 wholesale you ask what the price is, and 

 you find it is so much per case. I could 

 see no objection to that, providing we knew 

 we were dealing with honest people, and 

 there was a certain system of grading th t 

 was understood between the buyer and 

 seller, as is the case in Colorado. — Ed] 



Speaking of errors, the editor says to 

 me, p. 952, "But, say; once in a while we 

 catch a slip in j'our copy, and fix it." 

 Yes, that's just it; those Gleanings fellows 

 have the whip-hand of me. There's that 

 man Stenog. I have to depend on him to 

 furnish semicolons and things to sprinkle 

 into my copy wherever they belong, and on 

 that account I don't dare to abuse him only 

 about so much for fear that, if I stir him up 

 too much, he'll print some of my stuff just 

 as I send it in; and I don't dare to bear 

 down too hard on that young upstart of an 

 editor for fear when I write something that 

 says just the opposite of what I mean he'll 

 let it go in just as writ en, and not stop to 

 " fix it." [Yes, in this batch of Straws, 

 doctor, you have made another slip. Out of 

 pure revenge I am going to let it stand just 

 as it is, for revenge is sweet. I refer to 

 that Straw in this issue where you are tell- 

 ing about letting A. I. R. push the wheel- 

 barrow with you in it. At first I thought 

 you meant it as a joke; but the preceding 

 sentence is a disclaimer. If you had not 

 put in the phrase, " wheeling one another," 

 we should have thought it was the old case 

 of the trapper and the Indian — "Here, 

 Pete, you may have the hen and /will take 

 the turkey; or / will take the turkey and 

 you may have the hen. — Kd.] 



Mr. P^DITOR, I note what you say about 

 the Chicago market, p. 952. After giving 

 full consideration to the pretty talk there, I 

 have just one question for you. According 

 to the quotations on page 907. for a )2-sec- 

 tion case weighing 31 pounds I can get 

 $1.54-, and for a 12-section case weighing 12 

 pounds I can get $1.44. Now the question 

 is this: If I can get $1.54 for one case, and 

 will have to take 10 cents less for another 

 case just as good, for no other reason than 

 that it has a pound more honey in it, don't 

 you think there are at least some signs of 

 incipient decay? [" Scintilla " is a term 

 used in legal parlance to designate the mi- 

 nutest of minute fragment of interest. Now, 

 while I will admit there might be a scintil- 

 la of rottenness in Chicago, in the case you 



have mentioned, yet the rottenness of all de- 

 pends on whether there is a deliberate in- 

 tent to defraud. Trade conditions call for 

 lighter packages, and from the producer's 

 standpoint it is a difficult matter to get a 

 4'4^X4X to average a full pound unless it is 

 \\\ or 2 inches thick. A thick comb is not 

 as well ripened nor as quickly built. The 

 tendency is toward a thinner comb, not be- 

 cause it cheats the consumer, but because 

 it is more satisfactory to the bee-keeper. Is 

 it not true that a thinner comb will have 

 fewer uncapped cells? After all. the ques- 

 tion hinges on whether the sections are sold 

 by the weight or by the piece. If I sell you 

 a piece of ground for $100, and there is no 

 talk between us as to the amount of land in 

 the piece, and no intention on my part to 

 make you think there is a full acre when 

 there is not, there is not even a scintilla of 

 " rottenness." — Ed.] 



Much time was taken up at Los Angeles 

 discussing the use of the honey-knife, and 

 whether hot or cold water should be used. 

 T. F. Bingham tells in American Bee Jour- 

 7ial how he uses the Bingham knife. He 

 uses the X-inch bevel next the honey, and 

 has a wooden pail or shallow pan tilled 

 with ordinarily cool water, into which he 

 drops the knife whenever time permits. He 

 advises never to use hot water, as the edge 

 of the knife will be made thick with wax, 

 and will not cut. [When in California I 

 helped Mr. Mendleson uncap and extract 

 both. He gave me, as I thoui;ht at the time, 

 convincing proof that a honey-knife taken 

 out of water a little more than lukewarm 

 would shave the cappings cleaner and eas- 

 ier than when the knives were left all stuck 

 up with thick honey. On the other hand, 

 our Mr. Phillips, who has extracted many 

 thousand pounds of honey in Jamaica, says 

 he does not want any warm knife, if the 

 edge is made with a file so as to be slightly 

 rough so that the knife can be worked like a 

 saw. I recall that in California the honey 

 we were extracting was very, very thick. 

 Warming the knife would thin the honey 

 just enough so the blade would slide easily 

 over the face of the comb. From the stand- 

 point of the Californian, Mr. Bingham is 

 both right and wrong. The probabilities 

 are that the extracted- honey man will have 

 to be governed by conditions. — Ed.] 



A FRIEND whose modesty forbids mention 

 of his name writes that he has succeeded 

 in keeping extracted honey without granu- 

 lating, merely by heating it. My first 

 thought was, "Yes, that's old; heat it to 

 about 160 degrees and seal it." But a sec- 

 ond reading shows no mention of sealing, 

 and he saj's he ran cappings through the 

 solar, and the honey showed no signs of gran- 

 ulation after six months; buthe doesn'tknow 

 the exact degree of heat necessary. I suspect 

 it's the length rather than the intensity 

 of the heat that's important. Comb honey 

 kept in a hot garret next the roof through- 

 out the summer will not granulate for a 

 year or more, as I reported years ago. 



