

ILLINOIS STATE BEE-KEEPERS' ASSOCIATION 



59 



chased has "sugared" and that it has 

 been adulterated. I have to explain 

 that all honey will granulate, and if 

 It doesn't granulate it is more a sign 

 that it is adulterated than if it does. 

 Granulation is a sign of purity more 

 than if it were not. I have alfalfa 

 honey in brick form to show how pure 

 honey crystallizes. 



Mr. Moore: This has been the prin- 

 cipal trouble in my business. Con- 

 sumers are the people who find the 

 fault. Mr. Taylor is a wholesaler. I 

 try to stick to the truth whether it 

 pleases them or not. Very few people 

 in Chicago know anything about it. 

 They expect honey to be liquid, the 

 same as when it runs out of the combs. 

 The best thing I had to say was this: 

 Go to your drug store and find out that 

 it is pure. Refer the customers to 

 the druggists. - 



Swarming Indications. 



"What are some reasonably certain 

 ordinary indications of swarming?" 



Dr. Miller: None. 



Mr. Wilcox: Bees in the air! 



Mr. Miller: That is no sign. Bees 

 are likely to be in the air anyway. I 

 don't believe that there is any outside 

 sign upon which you can depend, as to 

 whether the colony is likely to swarm. 



Mr. Whitney: I was watching one of 

 my colonies a few years ago. I saw an 

 unusual commotion on the part of the 

 bees. I started for a queen-cage. I 

 believed they would swarm in about 20 

 minutes. I had just time to catch the 

 queen. I believe there is an outside 

 appearance. 



Dr. Miller: There is a sign that 

 within 24 or 48 hours a swarm will 

 issue. A prime swarm will not give 

 any sign. But an afterswarm will give 

 a sign. You can hear the young queen 

 piping. Then you will know that a 

 swarm is likely to issue within 24 

 hours. Only one queen will pipe. Three 

 or 4 may quahk but only one will pipe. 

 The queen that is free will make a 

 shorter noise than the others. 



Mr. Whitney: Another outside evi- 

 dence occurs to me. I had a frame out 

 one time looking it over. There was 

 a young queen on it, making that pip- 

 ing noise. She poked her head into a 

 cell and made that noise. I was quite 

 certain that a swarm would issue the 

 next day, and I found it so. 



Dr. Miller: The free queen has a 

 higher pitch than the others that we 

 say are "quahking." Those who are 



quahking commence with a shorter 

 tone. The first one is a long, high 

 note, and then a little shorter, and a 

 little shorter. They will be answered 

 by the others with a lower pitch and 

 the different tones that they make will 

 be equal in length. That's the way they 

 used to do it. Maybe they don't do it 

 now. 



Honey Market in Illinois. 



"Will Dr. Eaton give a few words 

 about the present condition of the hon- 

 ey market in Illinois?" 



Dr. Eaton: I must confess that I 

 am not quite so well posted on the 

 honey market in this city now as I 

 was 2 years ago. However, in my 

 work as an analytical chemist, I some- 

 times inspect the grocery stores of the 

 State, and my own work in that line 

 leads me to take quite an interest in 

 seeing what is on the market. And 

 naturally I get, now and then, samples 

 of honey for analysis. I always take 

 a great interest in the meetings of this 

 Association, and also the iheetings of 

 the bee-keepers wherever I may hap- 

 pen to be, my first interest having 

 been with the Minnesota State Bee- 

 Keepers' Association, and w'hether I am 

 in official work or not, I like to drop 

 in at these meetings. I always find 

 something of interest to me as a chem- 

 ist. I might say that this Association 

 is largely responsible for the Illinois 

 State Pure Food Law. Had it not 

 been for this Association and the State 

 Association, I don't believe there would 

 be an Illinois Pure Pood Law. Those 

 two associations made possible the 

 State Pure Food Law. 



When this Association first took hold 

 of the work before the State had a pure 

 food law, they gathered a number of 

 samples — 40 or 50, I believe — and I did 

 the analytical work. We' found about 

 33% per cent of those samples adulter- 

 ated. They w^ere all sold for pure 

 honey. That same proportion of adul- 

 teration kept up for 2 years after that. 

 The law was not very vigorouslj- en- 

 forced at first. The penalty was not 

 enforced at once. Therefore, the adul- 

 teration did not decrease immediately. 

 But the last few years the adulteration 

 began to grow less. Only one sample 

 of adulterated honey was found the 

 last year of my connection with the 

 Pure Food Commission. We practic- 

 ally drove • adulterated honey off the 

 market. Nov/ there is quite a good 

 deal of mixtures of honey on the mark- 



