188a 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTUllE. 



23 



in your own mind what the result would be 

 it' he were to run in debt for 200 colonies. 

 He would let them starve, swarm out and go 

 to the woods, get the hives full and hang 

 out in idleness, and possibly, too, because he 

 had some other work on hand that would 

 hardly bring him 50 cents a day, when with 

 the bees he might realize several dollars a 

 day. railing in this, he vrould swap them 

 olf for some useless truck. What 1 mean is, 

 that such would likely be the result with one 

 who was not equal to' the responsibilities of 

 such an apiary. It Avonld be like giving 

 him a steamboat or train of cars to run. 

 But if he should build up 200 colonies, little 

 by little, without going into debt, the case 

 would be far different. Friend Grimm would 

 perhaps handle 1000 colonies safely. I might 

 possibly 200 ; in fact, that is just what I am 

 trying to do now. My friends, how many do 

 you suppose God can safely intrust to your 

 careV If I am not mistaken, he is testing 

 vour trustworthiness in that respect just 

 how. He that is faithful in few things shall 

 be made ruler over manv things. 



ly scttllDg lu communities. Every kind of fi-uit, 

 vegetable, or grain, that will grow anywhere on the 

 face of the glol)0, will grow here to perfection. The 

 most beautiful homes that can be imagined; roses 

 in bloom the entire year; lemons from the blossom 

 to the ripe fruit, in all stages of growth, at any sea- 

 son of the year. 



There, Mr. Editor, if you will be kind enough to 

 publish the above, it will save me a wonderful sight 

 of repetition, and answer a great many questions. 



Santa Ana, Cal., Nov. 13, 1881. E. Gallup. 



QITESTIONS ABOUT CALIIOKMA 



ANSWERED IJY E. OALIAT. 



fUERE is but about two cents per pound differ- 

 ence between the poorest quality of extracted 

 — ■ honey and the very best, in the San Francisco 

 market; and as we can raise the poorest quality 

 every season, and on an average the best quality 

 only every other season, I have come to the conclu- 

 sion that there is more money made from the poor- 

 est quality. I learn that the Chinese purchase con- i 

 siderable quantities and ship to China, and two cents i 

 in price is an item with them, and not quality. j 



At Downej- City is a good place to locate an apiars' ( 

 for lowland honey, as the land is moist, with water | 

 from 5 to 25 feet from the surface, it is too moist j 

 for grapes for prolit. Splendid fields of alfalfa, which 

 the bees work on when in bloom, are here. The 

 products are corn, hogs, cattle, barley, English wal- 

 nuts to perfection, apples, pears, peaches, etc., and 

 mostly without irrigation. This alfalfa gives us 

 about ten full ci'ops in theyear in this climate. I 

 haA-e located my bee ranche on a stock range where 

 thei'o is no fruit — only chickens, hogs, horses, cat- 

 tle, and sheep, with several hundreds, perhaps thou- 

 sands, of acres of swamp on one side, that is green, 

 and produces llowers the entire year; close to the 

 ocean, and no fear of miasma or unheathfulness. 



The willows commence to blossom in December, 

 and continue until about the flrst of iMarch. It is 8 

 miles from Santa Ana, and 10 from the fruit ranche. 

 Santa Ana, Tustin, and Orange, are situated about 

 equal distances apart, in the form of a triangle (2^^ 

 to 3 miles), and I am situated about centrally from 

 the three ])laees. That is the lirst ranche. There 

 are nine churches within three miles; I'ailroad, 

 schools, and as good and enterprising, kind, neigh- 

 borly a class of citizens as there is anywhere in the 

 known world. Wo are Hi miles from the Santa Clara 

 coal-mine, where coal is $5.00 per ton, and 10 miles 

 from the steamboat landing (Newport harbor;) so we 

 have the advantage of railroad and ocean for freight. 

 Goods of most kinds are a trille higher than east; 

 land from $20.00 to $1000 per acre; people from the 

 Eastern States coming in by the carload, and usual- 



B££S «N A KAMPAGE. 



jjIIE following was sent by the writer, 

 clipped from the Ilesscnger, Eussell- 

 vilie, Ky. The " piece " explains it- 

 self. 



I wrote the following f(ir Glcaninos in Bcc Culture, 

 Medina, Ohio. That, as you know, is a land of Puri- 

 tans and Quakers. Fearing that its publication 

 there might compromise mo as a man of veracity 

 with that interesting class of people, I thought it 

 best to start it from nearer home, where we have a 

 plenty of people of my own ilk. If you tbink it 

 worthy of a place in your paper, please publish it, 

 with this explanation as a caption. 



Since I have been a reader of Gleaninas, you have, 

 under the above heading, given two accounts — one 

 from Mrs. J. Hilton, and the other from Merrybanks— 

 the first doubtless true, as it is written by a lady; 

 but the other is apochryphal, name and aU. From 

 these readings, as Mai-k Twain's Scmdwich story- 

 teller, would say, your correspondents or readers 

 know nothing at all about what a real and genuine 

 rampage of bees means, and, consequently, have no 

 true conception of such a situation. 1 shall here 

 leave this noted story-teller, and adopt the words of 

 the immortal liurns:— 



But this that I am gaun to tell. 

 Which " once upon a time ' ' befell, 



Is just as true as the tleil's In 



Or Dublin City. 



A well-to-do farmer lived in Logan County — no 

 matter in what part nor when — who had a son who 

 had for a long time been in bad health. The Allo- 

 pathies had failed to cure him, and he had been in- 

 duced to try the botanic, or Thompsonianjjc/SKciSiOJi. 



So, one moriiing early he began the practice tiy 

 taking a large dose of lobelia, which, it was said, op- 

 erated finely more than once. He did not throw up 

 his boots, but he never could tell just how sick he 

 was. In the midst of an extreme paroxysm he heard 

 a great noise, for which he could not account; and 

 forgetting his sickness, and going to the door, he 

 saw in the garden four horses, hitched to as many 

 plows, running and kicking at a fearful rate. The 

 drivers and others were trying to stop the horses, 

 but in vain. The sick man seeing the imminent 

 danger from the pointed steel of the plows, where 

 men and horses were mixed up in such a hurley- 

 burley, ordered all to leave the horses to themselves. 

 Bees tilled the air as if a large swarm was on the 

 wing, and they made war against every living thing 

 that made its appearance. The negro plowman had 

 got out;early tojplow a vegetable garden before going 

 to the held. When called to their breakfast, they 

 left their horses to graze on the blue grass of the 

 walks, with a little black boy to mind them. Some 

 days before this the bees had swarmed and settled 

 on a lilac in the garden, where they had been hived, 

 and the hive had not been removed. The boy said, 

 •' The bay mare rooted the hive over with her nose," 

 and here the melee began. It seemed that the other 

 bees, and there were several hives, regarded it as a 

 free tight, and pitched into it with a will; and one 

 would have supposed, from the confusion, that, be- 

 sides the horses, every turkey, chicken, dog, puppy, 

 cat, kitten, pig, and person, black and white, near 

 the premises, had received one or more stings, ex- 

 cept such as kept closed doors. 



Von will say that this was much of a rampage in 

 the bee line, and so it was; but 1 am not done yet. 

 Three of the horses were hitched by only one trace 

 each to his plow, and soon got loose, jumped the 

 fence, and took to the woods. Not so with the mare 

 that turned over the hive. She was hitched by both 

 traces, and made two or three rounds iu the garden, 



