BEE-spoke-data/bees-v0 huggingface dataset:
are taken off the hive, to pile them up cross wise as shown in the accompanying illustration, in a dry room that can be kept as warm as possible. If the room is kept tight, and the sun slines through the window, th's will have a tendency to keep the honey dry, and to continue the process of ripening it. If allowed to stand this way for a month or two before shipping, the chances of its safe arrival at destination will be much improved.
(Comboney or honey in extracting-frames should not be ruled up in a honey room from which the bees can be excluded, one super squarely on top of another. No matter what the temperature of the room, honey shut up in this way from the air is in danger of sampling. If it does not do so outright it will have an acid taste\(-\)enough so that it will ruin its chances of bringing a good price.
We once had an experience of this kind with several thousand pounds of honey piled up solid, and a super cover placed on top, \(\lambda\) good portion of the honey sourced, and the flavor of the rest of it was very much impaired by reason of the acid taste.
If the honey piled with the supers crisscross, as shown in the illustration, and the temperature of the room be kept as nearly as possible to that of the living-room, there will be but very little danger of candying or souring, and, what is more, the quality of the honey itself will be richer and riper.
shall we use separators?
A few years ago there was considerable discussion among prominent bee-keepers as to whether separators could or could not be dispensed with profitably in the production of comb honey. Some stoutly maintained that they could, and others just as strenuously asserted that they could not. The former class urged that they could secure more honey without separators, and hence that they preferred to put up with the inconvenience of some few sections bulged out beyond the sides. While the latter class were ready to admit that _perhaps_ a little more honey could be secured by the non-use of separators, they asserted that they obtained so much merathole honey, and were put to so much inconvenience in trying to arrange the sections so as to have them built out evenly, that they never wanted to dispense with separators. It should be remarked right here, that, with the narrow beeway sections, 1%, 1%, or 1%, the separators are not so necessary as with the wide ones, such as 1% or 1%. Full sheets of foundation in either case greatly lessen the need of their use. How to dispense with separators entirely will be fully explained a little further on. But plain sections _should always be used with fences_ or separators. At the present time, however, by far the greater majority of the producers of comb honey advocate and use fences, separators, or sonething of that sort; and as our experience in former years was so unsatisfactory without separators, we are compelled to agree with the majority.
Wood or tin separators.
Objection has been made to the tin separators, because of their metallic coldness. It is urged that the smooth sides of the tin are not congenial to the bees, and that, furthermore, the expense of separators made of tin is greater than most bee-keepers can afford, in consideration of the low price of their product. Partly for these reasons, and partly for others, wood separators costing an almost insignificant sun have been made. They are sometimes cut out on a slicing-machine, and are really thin veneer wood, cut to the size of the separator. Those cut with a saw are much better because the grain is not broken in shaving. The thickness varies from 28 to the inch up to about 16. The preference seems to be in favor of the thicker ones.
## 7. When separators may be omitted.
It has been shown very conclusively that bees dislike a super divided off into a num
ber of small compartments as is the case in the old-style supers with solid separators Supers provided with _fence_ separators, because they allow of a much freer communication, are more acceptable to the bees, for they dislike being shut off from one another by any obstruction, although some doubt this. This raises the question, "Why not dispense with separators altogether?" We can. But before we do so we must dispense with the present wide section altogether, for it has been demonstrated over and over again that it is impracticable to produce _thick_ comb sections without separators if we desire to sell the honey away from home.
It may be asked why bee bee beepers have not adopted these narrow-width sections. The reasons are hard to give; but in a general way it is probably due to the fashion.
What size of section to use.
To answer this question intelligently for oneself, it will be well to consult the honey-market reports. As a general rule, sections holding an even pound of honey are preferred by consumers, and, of course, they bring a higher price. Notwithstanding this, few bee-keepers think that more honey can be secured in two-pound sections than in the smaller sizes. Most producers, however, are not so sure that it makes any difference to the bees; and while the fact remains that, in most markets, they sell for from one to two eents less per pound than the one-pound, it behooves every bee-keeper to think carefully before he decides on adopting two-pound sections. The size of section which seems to have the general preference is 42 inches square and 1% inches wide for the beeway style, and 4x4x4x1% for the plain section narrower sections.
Some markets demand a smaller package. Instead of going to the expense of making smaller sections, supply-dealers have been in the habit of making the regular 42 sections narrower--1%, 1%, 7 to the foot, 1%, 1%. The seven to the foot hold about three-quarters of a pound, while the 1% and 1% hold about half a pound.
There is a very great advantage in diminishing the _thickness_ of a section instead of the _size_, for this reason : They will fit most of the surplus arrangements in use, and can be shipped readily in ordinary shipping cases, with but little trouble. In Canada the narrow sections have the preference, and the tendency in this country is toward a narrower section of late.
Four-beeway sections.
A few years ago these were talked of considerably; and it was stated at the time that the bees would enter them more readily : that they would be filled better, and have a better appearance for market. Very little attention was paid to them in this country, although they have been used continuouslyor slightly smaller, but of the same proportion. (See IIIves.)
Some of the reasons that have been urged in favor of the tall section are as follows :
1. Weight for weight, and for the same thickness of comb, a tall section presents a bigger appearance than the average square one. In the 4x5 tall plain section, for example, 12, we have about the same actual weight as the 4x4x4x14 plain ; and yet, as will be seen by the engravings the former looks to be the larger. As a result the tall box brings in some markets anywhere from one to two cents more per pound, but in other markets it brings no more. If this were the only reason why the tall box is preferred, we should say nothing about it here ; but there are other reasons for this preference.
2. By long association we have come to like the proportion of objects all about us that are taller than broad. Doors and windows of their present oblong shape are much more pleasing than they would be if they were square. Nearly all packages of merchandise, such as of drugs and groceries, are oblong in shape -- that is, taller than broad. To cater further to this taste, brought about by long association with the common objects round about us, the tall section was introduced ; and outside of its relative appearance of bigness as compared with the square box, very many consider the tall one much more pleasing.
3. Mr. R. C. Aikin, one of the closest observers in all, heedom, lays it down as a rule that "_in comb-building the downward progress exceeds the sidweise in the proportion of about three to two._. If, then, comb construction goes on in this way, a section as wide as deep will be finished down the center before it is at the outer edges,". A tall section, then, more nearly conforms to the natural instinets of the bees.
4. A greater number of tall sections holding approximately a pound can be accommodated on a given hive surface.
5. A tall section will stand, shipping better, because the perpendicular edges of contact of the comb itself are greater than in a square box.
## 6.2. **Olassed sections.**
Glassed sections are simply sections of comb honey with squares of glass fitted in between the projecting sides of the section. The glass is held either by glue, tin points, or paper pasted over the top and bottom of the section, and lapping over on to the glass a little way. When the section is sold to the retailer, the glass is included in the price of the honey. Of course, the producer can afford to sell glass at from 12 to 15 cts, per 10,; but customers have sometimes objected, and justly, too. In spite of all this, glass sections have quite a rage at times in the New York and other eastern markets, and occasionally there is some sale for them in the West. In England such a section with a fancy border is sold quite extensively.
pasteboard catons for one - pound sections of comb honey.
Mr. J. E. Crane, of Middlebury, Vt., formerly put nearly all of his honey into cartons. These were put into unglassed shipping-cases, the latter neatly stencilel with an old-fashioned straw hive, and lettered.
the danzenhaker section-carton.
This is somewhat cheaper than the others, and answers the purpose very nicely. They are shipped, folded, and all one has to do is to crowd on two opposite corners, when the package assumes a rectangular form as shown. This carton is specially adapted to use with a plain section, as will be seen from the illustration.
A new carton has been recently introduced to the trade that has a, fancy engraved design on the front panel, and the whole is
## 3 Comb Honey.
printed in two colors. The spaces on the top and two sides and bottom contain appropriate printed matter. On the back there is a recital of the contents of the package, and a denid of the off-repeated canard that comb honey is manufactured. On the two sides is an explanation concerning honey and its flavors, and honey as a food. On the top is done, the higher will be the price secured. If one is careless in grading there will be inferior sections mixed in with sections of a higher grade; and if the commission man or buyer discovers this he is likely to "knock down the price " of the whole cneseful to the price of the inferior sections. It is very important to have every section in a case of the same grade.
Obviously not much will be accomplished if there be a dozen different systems or rules of grading. So far they have been reduced to two--one set for the Eastern bee-keepers and another for the Western. There is no reason why we could not have all adopted one and the same set of rules. It is unfortunate that a uniform grading is not universal over the country. The Eastern grading reads as follows:
grading rules.
Fancy.--All sections well filled, combs straight, firmly attached to all four sides, the combs unsolled by "terist-stin or otherwise; all the cells sealed except an occasional one, the outside surface of the wood well scraped of propoils.
A No. 1.--All sections well filled except the row of each next to the wood; combs straight: one-legath part of comb surface soiled, or the entire surface slightly soiled; the outside surface of the wood well scraped of propoils.
No. 1.--All sections well filled except the row of cells next to the wood; combs comparatively even; one-legath part of comb surface soiled, or the entire surface slightly soiled.
No. 2.--Three-fourths of the total surface must be filled and sealed.
No. 3.--Must weight at least half as much as a full-weight section.
In addition to this the honey must be classified according to color, using the terms white, amber, and dark; that is, there will be "Fancy White,"\({}^{*}\)-No. 1 Dark," etc.
These are based on a set of rules originally adopted by the National Bee-keepers' Association in convention at Washington, D. C., in December, 1892. It will be seen that the question of color and source is taken care of very nicely in the last paragraph, so that we can have a No. 1 or fancy amber or a fancy buckwheat, the same as a fancy clover stock.
In the mean time the Colorado Bee-keepers' Association, the most influential organization west of the Mississippi, adopted the following set of rules:
_No. 1 White.--_sections to be well filled and even's capped except the outside row, next to the wood; honey white or slightly anter, comb and compphire, and not projecting beyond the wood; wood to be well cleaned; cases of separtored honey to average 21 pounds net per case of 24 sections, no section in this grade to weight less than 189 sources. Cases of half-separated honey to average not less than 22 pounds net per case of 24 sections.
The honey shown on previous page would be what is called "extra fancy white," according to the Eastern grading, for it is white honey put up in plain sections, and, as the illustration shows, it is evenly and nicely the faces of such sections are examined carefully it will be found that the stain or discoloration goes _clear through_. These disconorations are due to the fact that the bees take up pieces of old black wax, propolisis, or any thing that will answer as a substitute or filler for pure wax. We have seen the cappings of some sections of this sort filled with bits of old rope, lint from newspapers, small hard chunks of propolisis, fine slivers of wood -- any thing and every thing that is right handy. Sections of this class often look like those of the first class, hence the frequent confusion.
In the third class are those with soiled cappings, due to the pollen dust or possibly a thin layer of propolisis stain.
The fourth and last class takes in all those that arecalled " greasy" or "water-saked," having emphings that lie on the honey. The covering to each cell is more or less transparent, or water-saked - the transparent part being half-moon shaped, or in the form of a ring enieirelng a white nucleus center that is not greasy or transparent.
If the reader will look over the unsold odds and ends of the grocer's he will be able to find samples of all these classes, and the fall of the year is a good time to find them, as they are the last to sell.
A knowledge of how to make dark or soiled sections No. 1 white, thus putting them at the top of the market, may be worth hundreds of dollars to some bee-keepers : and while it is probably not possible to make water - soaked and certain kinds of travel - stained sections white, there is a probability that a very large class of the soiled boxes can be rendered No. 1.
## 10.2 Deaching comb honey
Mr. Byron Walker, a honey-merchant of Chicago, had quite accidentally placed some yellow or pollen-stained sections in his showwindow, where they were subjected to the direct rays of sunlight. A short time after, he noticed that the faces of these sections that were next to the light were bleached white, while those on the reverse side retained the old color. Instantly grasping at the suggestion he placed other sections of the same kind in the same window, and was gratified to learn that these were likewise bleached as were the first; but so far as I know, Mr. Walker was successful in bleaching pollen - stained or yellow - faced combly. The real travel-stained and water-s soaked ones he considered beyond redemption. The time required to bleach the yellow sections was anywhere from two to three days, depending on weather and sunlight.
Mr. A. E. White, of Pala, California, apparently goes one step further; for in connection with sunlight he uses sulphur, which is known to be a powerful bleaching agent. His method is described as follows :
" We first fumigate with sulphur, then place the combs where the sun will shine on them, and that is the whole process.
" I build a frame on the south side of my honey-house, and cover the same with cotton cloth. A door opens from the honey-house into this room. I place shelves on the side and ends of this room, the bottom shelf being a wide board to be used as a table. I place the combs on these shelves so that the sunlight will strike them. Dark combs will require several hours. This plan will whiten dark combs here in California. If you furi-gate a few combs, then place them on a window-still where the sun will shine on them, you will be convinced.
" In placing the sections on shelves in the morning, I find the following plan good : On the shelves at the east and west end of the room I place sections end to end lengthwise of the shelves, two rows on each shelf, one row on the outer and the other on the inner edge. The morning sun strikes one side, and the afternoon sun the other side.
It is penny wise and pound foolish to try to make one's own cases. They will cost as much as or more than the factory-made articles,and will have an awkward and clamsy look. One prominent commission-man to tell me that these home-made affairs, in his market at least, " knocked the price of the honey down a cent or two " a pound.
The standard size of shipping-case is a 2-lb. single-tier, shown in the middle of the cut given. Then there is the 48-lb., the same thing, only double-tier, having two glass with a strip of wood between. The 48-lb. cases formerly had one large glass; but besides the fact that these were much more expensive, the honey actually shows off b.-tier when there is a strip of wood covering up the tops and bottoms of the sectors, leaving only the best portion of the honey to show. Another very popular case is the 12-lb. single tier shown on the top of the pile.
Some bee-keepers and some markets prefer the three-row 12-lb, and the double-tier three-row 24-lb. But these are objectionable in that they will not tier--that is, not pile up on the floor as well as the flatter cases.
On account of the comb honey being broken in shipment, it used to be the practice, and is yet to a great extent, to put a paper stray in the bottom of the case, and at regular intervals w.ocen cleats from \(\$\) to \(\$\) while, and \(\$\) thick, as shown in the cut opposite.
## 12 and 24 round cases.
The object of this is to keep the sections up high and dry, at the same time to leave room for the honey to drip, without sticking the sections to the paper tray, or, when the paper tray is not used, the bottom of the shipping-case. In that case the honey runs through, leaks on to the other shipping-cases, and, as a consequence, smears all the cases below it.
In 1908 and '0 the little strips of wood to hold the sections out of the honey drip were displaced to some extent at least by what is known as cellular or cushion paper. This is cut into sheets of the right size, and placed in the bottom of the paper tray. The corrugations of the paper serve a double purpose: First, they cushion the honey placed on them; and, second, the honey drip, if any, runs down between the grooves. The cushions of the paper,to a great extent, eliminute much of the breakage that takes place when honey is shipped in a solid wooden case on unyielding supports like wooden cats. To provide for ready examination the case has a sliding cover--a little improvement very much appreciated by ret-tilers and commission on n.g. generally.
During 1999 Mr. J. E. Crane, of Middlebury, Vt., devised a straw-board cellular shipping-case in which no wood at all is used. The corrugations of the material not only stiffen the package, but serve as an excellent emulsion for the tops, sides, and ends, as well as the bottoms of the sections. By referring to the series of illustrations shown herewith, it will be seen that the case is made of several thicknesses of this cellular strawboard.
. Apparently one would get the impression that a shipping-case or container for comb condition--that is to say, with less breakage and leakage--than takes place with the ordinary wooden cases. The reason of this is apparent from the fact that the wooden cases are stiff and unyielding, while the cellular strawboard containers not only cushion the whole case of sections but _each individual section_ itself.
There are different ways in which these strawboard cases may be made up. The next set of illustrations shows a slightly different style. While these cost somewhat in two cases, one in each hand, by running the fingers under the cord. For unloading and shipping (they will be much handier than the wooden containers.
Where wooden cases are used we advise using carriers. These are nothing more or less than large erates capable of holding from ten to a dozen cases of honey. Before they are put into the carrier, five or six inches of straw are strewn on the bottom of the crate, and the cases
importance of using the carriers shown, page 129. However, when one ships a whole earland of comb honey it is not necessary to use a carrier, provided the producer does his own loading. In that case he will strew several inches of straw or hay on the bottom of the car, and then pile up his cases in rows. Between some of the rows it is advisable to join in struw to afford an additional enshion to prevent the honey from being broken down when the car bumps.
In loading honey, always place the combs so that they will be parallel with the rail; and when on a wagon, parallel with the axletree.
_Mikreting comb honey._
There is nothing that can make a tree-keeper feel better than clean cash for his surplus honey at the end of the season,--_detem Grunn, page so, [_ToL._, --_Gleansis in Bee Culture._
Every thing, nowadays, depends on having goods neat, clean, and in an attractive shape, to have
then "go off"
reudily; even
our hoes have to be gilt-edged, for
we noticed some
one at a certain
hardware store,
and it seemed
that those that
were gilt, or
bronzed, perhaps, were selling far in advance of the
value of the
plain steel ones.
We've been told
of gilt-edged
butter that sold for fabulous prices, but we
how to make honey sell in the local
hardly think it will be advisable to have our
honey put up in that way, although we do
wish it to look as well as any of the other
products of the farm.
In order to get a fair price for your honey, you should watch the markets. To obtain
this information, you should take one or more bee-journals. Through the medium
of these you will learn whether the honey
crop is going to be small or large. This you
can not tell definitely from your own locality.
If you have secured a good crop of honey, and you learn that the crop throughout
the country is small, you must not be in
haste to dispose of yours to the first buyer.
is ripe--that is, good and thick--your taster
will want some.
thing that is
very impoortant. You want
something to
draw a crowd.
Prepare a nucleus in a glass
hive, and put
it up near the
window where
the crowd can see the bees. Sometimes the crowd will be so great as to block the street to see the queen or "'king bee;" but you will be the gainer, because _your_ honey is inside.
There should be on hand for a day or two an expert to explain about the honey, how it is produced, how good it is, etc., and to show that it is the most wholesome sweet in the world for children. He should then reinforce his arguments by handing out honeyleaflets that contain cooking-recipes, and that tell why the doctors recommend honey in preference to cane sugars, or why some invalids can eat honey when they can not eat other forms of sweet. Perhaps you yourself will be the best man to do the "' talking;" and therefore you had better stay with your grocer for a day or two, or at least be on hand when he is likely to have a run of customers. Charge the grocer nothing for your services, telling him that you will take your pay out of the increased sales.