SUMMER MEETING. 31 



of those who when growing a crop set dead-falls to catch the honey 

 bees when the fruit was ripe, thinking the bees were robbing them of 

 their crops. The bee is no robber; he is one of our best friends. If 

 jou ever expect to make a i&uccess at growing fruit, yon must depend 

 on the honey bee to do the fertilizing. You gentlemen have been talk- 

 ing of certain varieties of apples that fertilized themselves. One gen- 

 tleman spoke of the time when the whole earth was covered with 

 pollen from the fruit trees. Well, that happens some years, but still 

 they are compelled to contract this marriage ; this necessary ceremony 

 has to be performed, and God in his wisdom has brought in the little 

 honey bee to perform this ceremony, this necessary otfice. If you rule 

 the little honey bee out of your orchard you may as well expect failure. 

 The little experience I have had in the culture of the honey bee has 

 taught me that they generally pay for themselves. 



But I am not to speak on that subject. You gentlemen of this 

 Society, and all others engaged in similar business, should be the war- 

 mest friends of the little honey bee. I want you to be, and will urge 

 the subject. If you will place a few hives of bees in your orchard 

 right where they can get at the flowers when rainy weather comes and 

 the pollen is washed to the ground instead of being carried away. If 

 you have honey bees there you will have a place there on the trees 

 near the hives. I know this from experience. Close to my apiary is 

 situated an orchard. Last year that orchard was a failure, and the 

 next year it had a good crop of apples. If the apiary had been closer 

 to the orchard, I have reason to believe that the crop would have 

 been even larger. The truth of this is demonstrated in the cherry 

 crops of California. It excited the country at one time, and almost 

 everybody went into the business. But that was at a time when bee 

 culture had not been as largely indulged in as it is today. They had failure 

 after failure until some gentleman came along and told them, "You 

 need the little honey bee to perform the right or ceremony," and the 

 bees were introduced in the orchards, and now in the valleys of Cali- 

 fornia can be found the hives sitting as high as two or three yards back 

 all around the orchard for that purpose. We will get the little honey 

 bee, and as long as the price of honey is so low, that is the use we will 

 put it to. If Mr. Lamm will put some honey bees out in his orchard 

 he can see what they will do toward assisting him to have a success- 

 ful orchard — in other words, he will have apples. 



I do not say that the honey bee is not a very important element in 

 fertilizing fruit trees, but I hardly think they will avoid failure in years 

 of excessive storms. The very fact of the storms that wash the pollen 

 Away will keep the bees in their hives. It is in good weather that the 



