October. I :)oS 



American Hqq Journal 



'jtj . - ■ .^)i' ' 



ribufed 

 Mrficlc^s 



111 



A Visit to Luther Burbank 



Honey-Bees and the Red (Clover. 



Santa Barbara, Calif., Sept. ig, 1908. 



For a number of years bee-keepers 

 have tried to produce a race of bees 

 which could secure the honey of the red 

 clover at all titnes when this plant is 

 in bloom, but thus far success is only 

 partial. When we think that we have 

 secured Italian bees which proved good 

 red-clover workers, a season comes 

 when none of them are any better able 

 than the common black bee to harvest 

 anything from the long corolla of this 

 plant. 



Does this mean that we will never 

 succeed in producing long-tongued bees? 

 Ko ; but We are too sanguine. We ex- 

 pect to secure in half a dozen genera- 

 tions an improvement that will very 

 probably follow years and years of con- 

 stant selection. 



There is another way to reach the 

 goal of honey-production from red clo- 

 ver. It is the securing of a plant which 

 W'ill have shorter corolla than the or- 

 dinary red clover, while yet retaining 

 all the other characteristics of this plant 

 — its red blossom, its heavy stem, and 

 powerful strength — qualities that are 

 missing in both the white and the alsike 

 clovers. Allow me to digress a moment 

 in order to tell you how I came to dis- 

 cuss this subject with one of the best 

 authorities in the world on plant do- 

 mestication and variation. 



I am just now, in company with my 

 wife, taking a protracted vacation as 

 you have noticed by the heading of tliis 

 letter, dated from Santa Barbara. Our 

 children are all grown and able to look 

 after our interests, so we decided to 

 make a long trip to the Pacific Coast. 

 We left home on August i, going north 

 by way of Winnipeg, and westward on 

 llie Canadian Pacific through the Rock- 

 ies and the Selkirks, and in the past 

 two months we have not seen a bee- 

 paper, either American or European, 

 and have almost forgotten that there 

 are bee-keepers in the land, althmigh 

 every now and then the little honey 

 iiee, quietly working on the flowers, re- 

 minds us of the boinr and our long 

 life pursuit. 



While in the neighborhood of San 

 b'ransisco, we had the pleasure of a 

 visit to the famous Luther Burbank, the 

 "Wizard of the West." It happened 

 ni this wise: 



My wife belongs to a floral society 

 111 our town, and she had often read of 

 I'.urbank's wonderful achievements. She 

 desired to see him, but we felt that it 

 was out of the question to ca'l on him 

 unless we could be sure of a welcome. 

 • ' ^'>U the liberty to wrile him a letter, 



and received a very cordial reply in a 

 xcry short time, inviting us to call on 

 him at the time of our passage, and 

 stating that he was once a bee-keeper 

 himself, in New England, some 38 years 

 ago. 



Well, to luake a long story short, we 

 called at Santa Rosa, his home, were 

 very nicely received by Mr. Burbank 

 himself, and were shown by him through 

 his experimental grounds. It would be 

 out of place to recite here all that we 

 saw, for this is a bee-paper and not ;i 

 horticultural publication. But I can not 

 refrain from saying that Burbank's 

 greatest hobby is the cactus. We saw- 

 giant thornless cacti, loaded with pears 

 of large size, and also absolutely thorn- 

 less. Mr. Burbank, to show how abso- 

 lutely smooth his plants were, would rub 

 the leaves against his face. Pointing to 

 his home, a very fine mansion, he said, 

 "That house was built out of the pro- 

 ceeds of the sale of 5 leaves of the 

 Giant Thornless Cactus, sold by me to 

 the Australian Government for $1,000 

 each." 



Among other wonders, such as the 

 thornless blackberry, the corn without 

 ears, grown with the intention of sup- 

 plying a giant fodder and hay plant, 

 we saw a patch of sweet clover upon 

 which Mr. Burbank is experimenting 

 in view of eliminating tlie bitter flavor 

 of the plant, which is said to be the 

 cause of the- dislike of cattle for this 

 forage in many sections of the country. 

 Mr. Burbank expects to succeed, in the 

 course of time, in eliminating this bitter 

 taste, and making the sweet clover a 

 first-class forage plant. 



Well, we had a little talk with him 

 about the honey-bee, and I incidentally 

 mentioned the efiforts made to produce 

 a long-tongue bee, and enquired as to 

 the possibility of obtaining a red clover 

 with short corolla. Of course, this is 

 e.\actly in the line of Mr. Burbank's 

 work, and he at once described the pro- 

 per steps to take to secure this im- 

 provement, which he said would prob- 

 ably take years of patient work with 

 mi-ending perseverance. But as this 

 work may be carried on by many agri- 

 cultural workers at the same tinu-. tliere 

 is no reason why success would not In- 

 linally achieved. 



Here is a .synopsis of his suggestion: 

 The best method to ascertain the ex- 

 istence of short-corolla clover, is to take 

 notice of it at a time when the bees 

 work upon it. We all know- that there 

 are seasons, usually during the second 

 crop, when the corolla is shorter, and 

 the bees sip nectar from it. Closely 

 watch the bees and mark and select the 

 heads upon which the bees are positively 

 seen, not nierelv to alight, but ?cliially 

 to sip nectar. Such heads as are most 



success fully worked upon by the bees 

 should be secured for seed. Season 

 ater season, this selected clover should 

 be watched during bloom. Whenever 

 blossoms are found upon which bees 

 succeed in harvesting nectar during the 

 first bloom, the problem will be prac- 

 tically solved, and all that will be neces- 

 sary then will be to continue the se- 

 lection from year to year until a clover 

 is produced that is readily visited by 

 bees. \ot only will this give a great 

 addition to the honey-yield, but it will 

 also secure a seed-yielding crop during 

 the first season as well as during the 

 second crop, for it is a well-acknowl- 

 edged fact that the first crop of red 

 clover yields no seed because there are 

 no insects that can work upon it and 

 fertilize it. 



I am just now reaching the honey- 

 producing section of California, and al- 

 though we promised ourselves to make 

 our vacation entirely devoid of busi 

 ness cares, yet it is possible that I inay 

 meet enough bee-subjects before I re- 

 turn home to give something more on 

 these questions to our friends of the 

 AiTierican Bee Journal. 



C. P. Dadant. 



Honey as an Anti-Dyspeptic 

 Agent 



BY iMKS. 1'. P. WHITE. 



For more than a year I had dinned 

 into my unbelieving ears this sentence : 

 "Use honey instead of sugar and you 

 will not have sour stomach." Not be- 

 cause I believed my friend's prescription 

 would help me, but merely to please her. 

 I tried it for two weeks. I did not 

 like it at first, but after a few days 

 became rather fond of it and since it 

 relieved me of many ills to which my 

 too abundant flesh had been heir, I 

 would have eaten it had I really disliked 

 it. For two years I had seldom eaten 

 a meal without suffering from indiges- 

 tion and its attenaing evils. I could 

 use as much honey for sweetening as 

 I cared to with impunity. The flatu- 

 lence, eructation and distension entirely 

 disappeared and my old friend took full 

 advantage of the situation by her fre- 

 quent "I told you so." 



I am a trained nurse, and in Octo 

 ber, 1906, received into my home a man 

 seventy-nine years of age, and, accord- 

 ing to medical opinion, not likely to get 

 much older. He was a paralytic, and 

 was carried up stairs by four men. He 

 ate heartily, and with no exercise, indi- 

 gestion followed as night into the day. 

 I tried giving him two meals instead of 

 three for one day. I emphasize one. 

 for at 1 1 p. m. of that day I arose and 

 prepared his belated supper lest he dis 

 turb the neighbors. I next reduced the 

 meals in quantity, and his lamentations 

 w-ere not to be endured. He ate sugar 

 in and on everything possible, so I be- 

 gan sulistituting honey, and found that it 

 worked like a charm. Wishing to be 

 sure. I returned to the sugar, then back 

 to the honey four times in two week 

 periods until I am convinced past all 

 doubting thai for him and me honey 

 -» a ministering angel. 



My patient is an old friend of Mr 

 \. E. I'Vancc, who visits him often ; 



