Tmm MMERICISIN: be© JOURKSlLr. 



249 



had to work certain colonies for that 

 particular object to obtain what cells 

 I needed. The number of bees left in 

 the old hives had no effect, so far as I 

 could see, on the ([uality of the queens, 

 at least so far as those were concerned 

 that were in sealed cells when the 

 swarm was east. I tested returning 

 none, returning a part, and returning 

 all of the old swarm. The Alley 

 method, with some changes of details, 

 had so many advantages that I very 

 closely watched the quality of the 

 queens, and while my record, as 

 already said, had been kept only four 

 or five years, and covered some 150 

 queens only, that had been reared l)y 

 that method, and therefore not full 

 enough to be at all conclusive, yet 

 they strongly pointed to the conclu- 

 sion that such queens were fully equal 

 in every respect to natural queens. 

 One thing was certainly proven, 

 namely, that to obtain good queens by 

 any method required intelligent, care- 

 ful working of the method — no slip- 

 shod work or attention would succeed. 

 While the larger part of Mr. Doo- 

 little's article — all of that relating to 

 ])oorlj--reared queens — cannot be too 

 often repeated by such writers as he is, 

 yet it has no bearing whatever on the 

 question under discussion, as stated in 

 the caption of his article, and the good 

 effects of the article must inevitably 

 be lessened by its being interwoven 

 with what manj' others, as well as mj-- 

 .--elf, believe to be an overstated idea 

 of the superiority of properly-reared 

 natural queens, over carefully-rea\;ed 

 artificial ones. 



Mr. Doolitittle makes so few mis- 

 takes that it is almost a pleasure when 

 one does get a chance to have a good- 

 natured discussion with him on some 

 difference of opinion. 



And now, Mr. Editor, I want you to 

 take into consideration what I have 

 .said about an overstatement lessening 

 the force of any argument, and apply 

 it to the fight you have been making 

 for several years past on the " untested 

 queen trallic." Fight the " poor (jneen 

 traffic " all you can, but always keep 

 in mind the fact that ten dollars worth 

 of the riglitly-reared, young, untested 

 queens are worth more to such honc}'- 

 producers as I am, than is the same 

 money's value of older tested queens. 



The thing for all of us to tight is, 

 the abuses of the traffic, and so far as 

 my knowledge goes, those have Ijeen 

 fully as great in the high-priced traffic 

 as in the lower price<l. 

 Havana, Cuba. 



[Our remarks following the article 



of Mr. Doolittle, on page 136, were 



these : 



Bro. Doolittle is right. We have repeat- 

 edly protested against the clieap qiieen 

 tratHc. What we ueed is better tjueens, not 



lower prices. One good queen is worth a 

 dozen poor and correspoiidmKlyc'ieap ones. 

 This " lieap-by-eheap" business is tlie hane 

 of modern apiculture, and should be 

 "frowned down" by all who desire Us 

 prosperity. 



It will be seen that we did not use 

 the words "untested queen traffic." 

 We want qunlity, not quantity ; and 

 our ideas in this respect are fully in- 

 dorsed by both Messrs. Doolittle and 

 Poppleton. For the past six years we 

 have been fighting the ''poor queen 

 traffic," and shall continue to do so, 

 because the interests of the pursuit 

 demand it. In the first article we 

 wrote on the subject in February, 1882, 

 we used this argument against the 

 purchasing of inferior queens for 

 breeding purposes : " Who but a luna- 

 tic would think of buying a cheap Dur- 

 ham bull, fidl-blooded horse, or pig, 

 for the purpose of breeding the best 

 stock ?" What we should be particu- 

 lar about is the quality, not the price. 

 —Ed.] 



STATISTICS. 



SiigffCMlions asi to Oatlicriiig 

 Stuti»tii-» or Bee-Keepiiig. 



Written for the A nt < rictin Bet Juuj-Tuil 

 BY B. T. DAVENPORT. 



In regard to gathering statistics, I 

 would say that I agree with several 

 others who have expressed an opinion 

 in regard to it, that it cannot be done 

 through the assessors, for the reasons 

 already given ; but it can be done 

 through the bee-keepers themselves, 

 those of them who are interested 

 enough in the pursuit to go to a little 

 trouble in getting the required infor- 

 mation. 



The " assessor's i)lan " would work 

 all right where bees are not taxed, as 

 in this town, and might perhaps work 

 as well as any other method where 

 they are taxed. I think that a list of 

 those producing h<iney to sell (the 

 smaller ones can be omitted) can be 

 obtained through the several town 

 assessors ; but then, how can we best 

 get the statistics after having their 

 names, is another problem. 



If the town assessors could be 

 furnished with a certain number of 

 addressed postal cards, with the proper 

 headings all on, to be tilled out at such 

 a time and mailed, and let them hand 

 each apiarist one, it seems to me like 

 — well, I wont say it is the best, nor a 

 good plan, but offer it as one way that 

 has presented itself to me. I shall 

 be willing to do what little I can to- 



ward centralizing and making effective 

 this huge undertaking. 



I send 11.00 for the defense fund, 

 and though I am quite heavily in debt, 

 I should be willing to pay several 

 times this amount, rather than to see 

 Mr. Clark beaten, and obliged to either 

 make a great .saeritice by moving his 

 property out of " Sodom," or give up 

 as legitimate and upright a calling as 

 a person can engage in. 



It is warmer to-day, and rainy. The 

 snow is 18 inches deep yet. Bees are 

 wintering well, I think. 



Auroraville, Wis., March 26, 1888. 



MARKETING HONEY. 



The Coiniiiiiiision Merchant and 

 the Honey-Trade. 



Bead at the Ohio SUite Convention 

 BY CHAS. F. MUTH. 



It is the object of bee-keepers' meet- 

 ings to stimulate a friendly relation 

 among bee-keepers and the friends of 

 bee-keeping ; to gather knowledge in 

 the art of bee-keeping by a friendly 

 exchange of ideas, and to advise as to 

 the manner of disposing of our product 

 to the best advantage. 



Although millions of pounds of 

 honey are produced annually, and in 

 every part of tlie world, and thousands 

 of people are interested in the pursuit, 

 and hundreds of bee-papers and agri- 

 cultural periodicals are spreading 

 knowledge and enlightenment on the 

 subject in every land and in every lan- 

 guage, yet the public are still poorly 

 posted as to tlie many beneficent quali- 

 ties of honey. Honey is comparatively 

 little known yet, even to the great 

 majority of our nearest neighbors. 



A great deal of this unfortunate 

 ignorance is due to our selfishness. 

 Not only do our Canadian brethren 

 represent their own linden honey as 

 far superior to our American bass- 

 wood, but our American brethren also 

 will mislead the consumer when his 

 own interest conflicts with that of a 

 rival bee-keeper. 



Our great anxiety to change the 

 name of "machine-extracted^' honey, 

 for fear that consumers should trans- 

 late a very projjer name into an ab- 

 surdity, such as " machine-made," or 

 as "manufactured" honey, shows a 

 weak spot indeed. Our own knowl- 

 edge that the honey is pure, and was 

 extracted from the comb by a machine, 

 needs onl}' our positive assertion to be 

 a(-cepted by a sensible community. 

 We may succeed slowly, but we shall 

 succeed best, with a straight and fear- 

 less story. Let us, therefore, always 

 call our honey by the proper name, 

 and never be afraid to show it, granu- 

 lated or liquid. Expose the adultera- 



