356 GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE June, 1918 



FROM NORTH, EAST, WEST AND SOUTH 



for the beekeeper is the fact that the blos- 

 soms are full of nectar. Such an abundant 

 secretion has hardly been known before. 

 When I say that many orchardists, who 

 work in the groves, wash the nectar from 

 their horses and harness every night, one 

 can get some idea of what a quantity of 

 nectar there is in the flowers in one of our 

 banner years. One can take a blossom just 

 opening and jar a drop of the precious 

 sweet onto his hand. In that local district 

 where so many thousands of colonies are 

 located near together, all are getting good 

 results. Some orange-growers, whose or- 

 chards are only a half mile from several 

 hundred colonies, remark on seeing few 

 bees on their orange trees. Where there is 

 more nectar in one blossom than a bee can 

 carry^ — and Dr. Phillips says that each bee 

 carries but four loads a day — with the 

 trees one mass of bloom (there must be tens 

 of thousands of blossoms on a tree 20 feet 

 high and 15 feet across), you have a faint 

 conception of the chance the bees have to 

 get to all the flowers. So the question as to 

 whether the southern California orange dis- 

 trict can be overstocked during a good honey 

 flow has been answered this season in the 

 negative. 



With the exception of three or four days 

 of dry north wind, the weather in these 

 parts has been almost ideal for the secretion 

 of nectar during the orange flow. Many 

 years we have foggy, cool weather so much 

 of the time that the bees are not able to 

 work, but this year has been very satisfac- 

 tory. Unfortunately, some beekeepers con- 

 sider that from 25 to 50 per cent of the crop 

 has been lost owing to the poor condition of 

 bees, disease, and slowness of colonies in 

 getting ready to gather honey. 



Navel oranges are the first to blossom, 

 and are now pretty well past. Sweets, St. 

 Michaels, Valencias, and Seedlings follow 

 in order, overlapping each other in bloom- 

 ing period; and one who has all of these 

 varieties on his range is very fortunate in- 

 deed. The orange bloom will last in most 

 sections of the southern part of the State 

 until May 15 or 20. 



It is reported that buyers are offering 20 

 cents per pound for white extracted orange 

 honey, with but few producers ready to con- 

 tract. So many sold their honey last year at 

 prices so far below what others got, that 

 very few are willing to contract at any 

 price. They prefer to wait until the crop is 

 made before selling. 



Weather conditions here are not good for 

 the later crops of honey so far as moisture 

 is concerned. The ground is dry and rain 

 is needed very badly. Even tho we had co- 

 pious rains for a month during the latter 

 part of February and the first of March, 

 since that time it has continued dry and 

 prospects are not goo(? for any more rain. 



It is very seldom that we get enough rain 

 to be of any benefit after May 1. In some 

 sections where the rainfall has been over 

 15 inches, and where the character of the 

 soil is such as to hold moisture well, bee- 

 keepers will likely get fair crops of sage and 

 buckwheat honey. But in much of the hon- 

 ey-producing territory that depends on the 

 rainfall for a crop, the prospects are not 

 good for much of a yield. Mild weather, 

 such as we had last year until the liot wave 

 ii. June, will givo a much better chaueo for 

 honey than very warm weather. 



Many beekeepers of this section are of the' 

 opiiiion that the heat wave of last summer 

 so injured the queens that they have not 

 had the usual vitality to properly build up 

 a colony for the early spring flow, especial- 

 ly for the orange, flow. In my own yards, 

 while I find many colonies that have built 

 up well, they are now, just at the height of 

 th'_' orange season, preparing to supersede 

 the old queens. Many of these queens ap- 

 pear to be in excellent condition — large, 

 plump, active, and with good frames of 

 compact brood. To all appearances, these 

 conditions would indicate a queen in her 

 prime. But the bees seem to realize that 

 all is not well with her, as in manyi cases 

 we find from two to six fine queen-cells 

 ready to hatch. Sometimes vv^e find one that 

 has hatched, and the old queen still laying. 

 In some cases a swarm goes out with the 

 virgin, while the old queen is still laying in 

 the hive. Sometimes this swarm will go 

 back; but, if we happen to hive them, they 

 are a week or so gettinsr a laying queen, in 

 which case the hive is filled with honey and 

 the queen is forced into the super to lay. 

 Conditions this year are in many ways dif- 

 ferent from any other I have ever experienc- 

 ed. The bees in some apiaries seem to be 

 determined to swarm, no matter how much 

 honey is coming in or how much room they 

 have; while others swarm but very little. 



Some apiarists moved several hundred 

 colonies from the back country, as we call 

 it, in the sage and wild buckwheat range of 

 the eastern part of Eiverside County, to the 

 oranges of Riverside. One of these on visit- 

 ing his home ranges found honey almost 

 ready to extract, while the bees in the 

 orange district were doing nothing. The 

 manzanita, which begins to bloom in Febru- 

 ary and in ordinary years when the weather 

 conditions are too cold for bees to gather 

 honey, this year came when the weather was 

 almost like sumnie'-. With plenty of nectar 

 in the blossoms, the bees in many cases 

 filled their hives full in February and 

 March. 



Reports from the great alfalfa regions of 

 Imperial and Riverside Counties indicate 

 that the crops will be satisfactory, and 

 prices are sure to be good. 



L. L. Andrews. 



