1907 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



1309 



The child, which lay in its mother's arms, was nine 

 months old, and gave one the feeling that it had but 

 to close its little eyes for death to assert itself. The 

 infant was suffering from diarrhea, which had re- 

 fused to yield to all remedies tried; the poor little 

 creature was emaciated to an extreme degree, with 

 black rings under the eyes, and the lower stomach 

 fearfully large. The poor sufferer had no appetite 

 whatever, but was, in its place, plagued with almost 

 incessant vomiting and diarrhea. He ordered her 

 to feed the infant on honey and water, nothing else 

 absolutely, for eight days, and if the child were still 

 living at the end of that time, to give goat's milk 

 and water in the proportion of one to two parts re- 

 spectively. "I dismissed the case from my mind, 

 since I did not hope for any thing better than death 

 as a release," says the doctor. "What was my as- 

 tonishment when, at the end of three months, I was 

 shown a healthy-looking well-nourished baby, with an 

 excellent appetite and regular habits, and its stomach 

 reduced to normal proportions, may be easily guess- 

 ed. Here was my little wretched creature nothing 

 less than metamorphosed by means of the honey." 



SEASON REPORTS. 



As mentioned in our last issue, these local 

 reports should not be taken to represent 

 general conditions throughout the whole of 

 the States mentioned. 



Very good crop, Dryden. Va. 

 One-fourth crop. Deer Plain, 111. 

 No white crop; small fall crop, Meredosia, 111. 

 No crop— necessary to feed. Pollock, La. 

 No Crop. Soldiers' Grove, Wis. 

 Very small crop ; colonies O. K. for winter. Fre- 

 mont. O. 

 Heavy fall crop parts of Southern Ohio. 

 Double last year's crop, Grommet, Col. 

 Good fall flow Underwood. Ind. 

 Good fall How, Indianapolis, Ind. 

 Good fall flow, Parkersburg, W. Va. 

 Extra good crop. Petersburg, Tenn. 

 Poor season. Bell's Landing, Pa. 

 Fair crop, Mertztown Pa. 

 Good crop, Stanton, N. J. 

 One-fourth crop. El Toro, Cal. 

 Extraordinary fall flow, Bard, Ark. 



THE NEW PARCELS POST; WHAT THE GOV- 

 ERNMENT WISHES TO DO. 



The Postmastei'-General has, through the 

 daily press, recently taken the public into 

 his confidence with regard to the new par- 

 cels-post system which he will recommend to 

 the consideration of Congress when it assem- 

 bles. His idea is to have a parcels post at 

 the rate of 12 cents per lb. over the whole 

 country; then there will be a parcels post 

 limited to rural routes, and another to cities, 

 at a much lower rate — probably a cent a 

 pound. 



By way of criticism, the rate of 12 cts. per 

 pound looks rather high, and it seems clear 

 the service would succeed much better if the 

 rate were lower. The present rate of 8 cts. 

 per pound for books, etc., seems high enough, 

 and it does not seem as if ordinary packages 

 would cost any more to transport than booKS. 

 Some of the European governments carry 

 packages at 24 cts. for 11 pounds, and actu- 

 ally make money at it. Probably Postmas- 

 ter-General Meyer's plan is best because the 

 "vested interests" have succeeded in excit- 

 ing quite a lot of people to oppose a parcels 

 post, and his plan is likely to meet with the 

 least opposition of any yet proposed. 



The local feature will please most bee- 

 keepers, particularly those who have a local 

 trade in honey. In a few years, if we faint 

 not, it may be possible for a bee-keeper to 



sell his honey by talking over the telephone, 

 and having the same delivered to his cus- 

 tomers by parcels post. Most bee-keepers 

 have customers who can not be reached by 

 the present-day methods; whereas by means 

 of the parcels post they could be reached 

 quite nicely, even when the weather is bad. 



Some folks are quite virulent in their op- 

 position, and seem to think the farmer is ex- 

 pecting too much when he asks the govern- 

 ment to do what every other civilized gov- 

 ernment does for its people. w. k. m. 



the honey market. 



During the past two weeks we have re- 

 ceived further conllicting reports regarding 

 the movement of the crop. Michigan, to 

 which dealers usually look for very fine 

 stocks of fancy clover honey, still offers but 

 very little so far as we can learn — almost 

 none going out of the State. Wisconsin and 

 Minnesota are making very few offerings for 

 markets in this vicinity and further east. 

 As occasionally happens, there is some move- 

 ment of honey westward. In average sea- 

 sons the tendency of the crop is to move east; 

 but in exceptional years we see Vermont 

 clover honey going to Chicago, Iowa honey 

 to Omaha and the West, and we learn of 

 some movements in this direction this year. 



In the eastern portion of the clover belt, 

 particularly New York, there appears to be 

 a larger amount of No. 1 white and amber 

 grades than earlier reports indicated; but 

 from information at hand we can not modi- 

 fy our report regarding Michigan, Ohio, In- 

 diana, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Minnesota. 



California honey is still ruling very high. 

 Bee-keepers have made disposition of entire 

 crops of white-sage extracted at six cents at 

 their yards in some instances. In the alfal- 

 fa districts of Utah, Nevada, and Colorado, 

 offerings of extracted are still firm, and 

 prices well sustained. 



There seems to be, however, a much larger 

 offering of alfalfa comb honey than for sev- 

 eral years; and when this latter reaches the 

 eastern market in quantities it is likely to 

 influence the price of eastern white honey to 

 some extent. As we pointed out in our last, 

 we believe it is unwise for eastern bee-keep- 

 ers to hold crops of No. 1 and No. 2 white 

 and amber grades beyond this time, for, in 

 the light of our past experience, the maxi- 

 mum price is reached by October 1st, and by 

 November 15th the height of the season is 

 past. Those who have a strictly fancy and 

 extra fancy clover comb honey can usually 

 find a market for it almost any time at re- 

 munerative prices, .and yet nothing is gain- 

 ed, in our opinion, by holding even this aft- 

 er the above date. 



the proper soil for white and red 

 clovers; sweet clover; white, yel- 

 low, and sour clover. 

 Those of our readers who have been non- 

 plussed by the failure of white clover, both 

 as a forage and honey plant, will be inter- 

 ested in the discussion now going on in the 



