1919 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



339 



A good, case costs a little more, but carries its 

 contents safely to destination and its general 

 use would bring a lower freight rate. 



tainer that the weight of the tin 

 varies more. The beekeeper should 

 insist that his 60- pound cans be suf- 

 ficiently heavy to carry the honey he 

 is to put in them. A tin of the basis 

 of at least 107 pounds should be used. 

 Barrels, if properly made and prop- 

 erly packed, would make the very 

 best containers for honey. It is 

 probably, however, in barrels that the 

 greatest loss occurs. This arises from 

 the fact that the beekeeper do^s not 

 buy the right quality of barrel. It 

 must be remembered that honey, in- 

 stead of soaking up the staves by 

 giving out moisture, rather absorbs it. 

 The utmost care, therefore, must be 

 used in selecting a barrel which will 

 not dry out after it is filled with 

 honey and thus cause leakage. 



It may not be amiss to mention 

 here that it is a great mistake for 

 any beekeeper to soak his barrels so 

 they will be tight and hold honey. 

 The unavoidable result of this is that 

 honey in time absorbs the moisture 

 from the barrel and the leakage is 

 worse than ever. Staves should be 

 tightened thoroughly by driving down 

 the hoops and making the barrel ab- 

 solutely honey-tight when dry. 



Barrels made of soft wood and with 

 six hoops or less are very much in- 

 clined to show leakage when honeyis 

 placed in them. In fact, we would rec- 

 ommend only a hard-wood barrel 

 with at least eight hoops. The ordi- 

 nary commercial alcohol barrel is the 

 best package for honey. It is well 

 made and will carry its load with 

 very little loss. 



In fact, in our many years of using 

 such barrels, we do not remember of 

 having a single loss. 



Shipping Packages 



The barrel requires no further 

 packing for shipment if it is well se- 

 lected and carefully tightened. 



With glass packages, the container 

 is usually furnished by the glass 

 manufacturer and conforms to the 

 standard set by the railroad. There 

 is bound to be a great deal of loss in 

 shipments in glass containers, and 



the freight rate must necessarily be 

 high to offset this. 



Glass packages are not usually 

 shipped very long distances by local 

 freight. The small producer buys 

 glass packages and sells his honey in 

 this shape to the local stores and the 

 nearby towns. The large producer 

 guards against losses by either ship- 

 ping in carloti, to distributing points 

 or by carefully packing before send- 

 ing out. 



It is in tin packages, probably, that 

 there is the greatest amount of vari- 

 ation in the style of box used. Some 

 of the boxes are so flimsy they will 

 hardly stand hauling to the depot, 

 but the shippers expect them to be 

 carried safely by the railroad com- 

 pany the length of several States to 

 destination. The friction-top pack- 

 ages should be in boxes with seven- 

 eighths heads and three-eighths lum- 

 ber for sides, top and bottom. The 

 heads should have hand-holds so they 

 can be easily transported. Besides 

 this, such boxes should be made of 

 good, strong lumber which is not apt 

 to split and thus damage the box 

 through rough handling. Then, too, 

 the amount of honey should not be 

 so great in each box that the weight 

 of the contents will render the box 

 inefficient. Not more than six 10- 

 pound cans, twelve 5-pound or twen- 

 ty-four 2^2-pound should be placed in 

 one package. The lids of the buckets 

 should be driven down tight and the 

 lid of the box should fit against the 

 lids of the buckets so as to prevent 

 them from working loose. Another 

 thing which is very often neglected 

 is care in nailing the boxes together. 

 Very often nails are driven inside and 

 pierce the cans, so leakage occurs 

 from the start. . If coated nails are 

 used there will be less danger of their 

 pulling out and accidentally being 

 again driven so as to pierce the tin 

 instead of the lumber. 



If small shipments are to be made 

 by express, of two or three cans, it is 

 usually best, besides other safeguards, 



to have a handle to the box, to secure 

 safe arrival. 



The two-sixty-pound case has the 

 greatest strain upon it, since it con- 

 tains 120 pounds of honey. It would 

 be well to have these cases made 

 with one-inch heads and one-half- 

 inch sides, bottom and top, with a 

 wood partition in the center of at 

 least half-inch lumber. This makes a 

 very heavy case, but more expensive 

 than the beekeeper desires. It is, 

 however, imperative, if shipment is to 

 reach destination in good shape, to 

 have the heads made of seven-eighths 

 lumber and the sides, bottom and top 

 of at least three-eighths. This lum- 

 ber should be straight grain and not 

 shaky, and nailed with cement-coated 

 nails, so that it will not pull apart in 

 transit. A small additional expense 

 on the part of the beekeeper in se- 

 lecting his packages would go a long 

 way towards securing safe delivery. 

 It is negligence in the choice of the 

 packages which has caused the 

 freight advance. As stated previous- 

 ly, the companies have to figure upon 

 losses paid and must necesarily raise 

 the rate so that there be some re- 

 muneration in handling this class of 

 freight, or else refuse the business 

 entirely. 



We would like to see a definite 

 standard set for all styles of pack- 

 ages and containers. With this, we 

 believe that the losses could be min- 

 imized and freight rates reduced. 

 These Classification and Rate Com- 

 mittees are, of course, working for 

 the best interest of the railroads, but 

 are willing to listen to the arguments 

 of the shippers. 



Then, too, there is no distinction 

 made between the ordinary domestic 

 case and the export case. The export 

 case has twice the handling at least, 

 since it must reach the seaport, be 

 transported on board ship, unloaded 

 on the other side, and again hauled 

 by railroad to destination. Export 

 cases should be made considerably 

 heavier than domestic cases, and this 



h six hoops at left is unsafe for shipping honey. 

 with eight hoops at right will carry safely. 



The hard wood barrel 



