ILLINOIS STATE BEE-KEEPERS' ASSOCIATION 



65 



there was considerable said about the 

 then poor and discouraging honey sea- 

 sons, many bee-keepers even wonder- 

 ing if the good honey crops of the early 

 '80s would ever be repeated." But it 

 was not so very long until the good 

 old seasons came again, and with in- 

 creased amounts of honey, so that the 

 crops of 1903, 1906 and 1908 were even 

 more abundant than those of the for- 

 mer bounteous years. 



While, of course, there will be little 

 or no difficulty experienced in dispos- 

 ing of the honey crop this year, very 

 likely another large crop will soon be 

 here, and the question of marketing it 

 will be up for consideration again. In 

 the meantime, it may be well to look 

 at some of the present most successful 

 methods of disposing of honey. 



Perhaps the bulk of the honey crop 

 each, year is sent to the large city 

 markets — sold wholesale. This is, of 

 course, the easiest way to sell, but not 

 always the most profitable to the pro- 

 ducer. And yet, for the most extensive 

 producers it is the best way, for such 

 can not hope to work up a demand at 

 home sufficiently large to take all the 

 honey produced in their immeaiate 

 locality. 



But all who ship or sell wholesale 

 should be exceedingly careful with 

 whom they deal. There are commis- 

 sion men who handle all kinds of prod- 

 uce, and such do not know best how 

 V to dispose of honey. They seem to 



think that any old price will do for 

 honey, so long as they get their com- 

 mission on the sales they make. And 

 thus, often the market is ruined almost 

 before much honey has begun to be 

 shipped. 



In nearly every large city there are 

 now commission men, or dealers, who 

 make a specialty of honey. They have 

 developed a line of customers to whom 

 they can sell honey right along, year 

 after year. Such dealers can usually 

 realize much better prices for the pro- 

 ducer than can the ones who know lit- 

 tle about honey. 



Every bee- paper publisher knows 

 f pretty well who are the reliable and 



best wholesale honey- dealers, and if 

 every bee-keeper reads the bee-papers 

 (as, of course, every up-to-date bee- 

 keeper does), he will have little trouble 

 : . 1: about learning where it is best to ship 



. his honey. 

 ;- Next is the retailing of honey — ^that 



Is, selling it near home, or to consum- 



ers residing within a short radius of 

 the producer. Many bee-keepers, after 

 years of patient effort, have developed 

 a good local demand. If more would 

 do this, I think all T\"Ould soon find 

 that better prices, both wholesale and 

 retail, would result. Less honey would 

 be sent to the already overloaded city 

 market, and thus, by reason of less 

 quantity, a higher price would be real- 

 ized; and by cultivating the home 

 market, it w^ould be found that soon 

 raore honey would be required to sup- 

 ply it, or else what honey there is to 

 be disposed of there would bring, a 

 better price. The fact is, there are 

 thousands upon thpusands of people 

 in the country and in small cities that 

 do not see any honey from one year's 

 pnd 1o the other. And this ought not 

 so to be. It surely doesn't pay to neg- 

 lect the home market and overstock 

 the large cities with honey. 



And this brings me to a considera- 

 tion of honey as a staple article. You 

 ask, "Will honey ever be used as com- 

 monly or as extensively as sugar? May- 

 be not. But the fact remains that it 

 ought to be used ever so much more 

 generally than it is today. And it is 

 "up to" the bee-keepers themselves to 

 see that honey has its rightful place 

 among the articles of daily consump- 

 tion. I say daily consumption, and 

 I mean it. I declare that honey should 

 aKv'ays be on every table, just as mucn 

 as butter or any kind of sauce or fruit. 

 And surely at the present price of ex- 

 tracted honey, why should it not be 

 eaten daily? Oh, yes, I know that 

 some people say they don't care for 

 honey! But I have found that there 

 are but very few people who would not 

 eat honey pretty regularly if thej"- had 

 a chance. 



Right here I want to touch upon the 

 f Jim of honey to be placed before the 

 people, if we ever expect it to be used 

 extensively or by practically every- 

 body. 



Of late, my attention has been called 

 to chunk or bulk comb honey, which 

 has been in recent years such a suc- 

 cess in certain parts of the South, es- 

 pecially in Texas. Do you know, I be- 

 lieve our Southern brethren have hit 

 upon a good thing, in more ways than 

 one? In the first place, they can pro- 

 duce more honey by their present 

 methods than they could if produced in 

 sections, or even in extracted form. 

 And then, they get a higher price for 



