1885 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



537 



of arranging the entrance, so you can easily 

 contract it so as to admit only three bees, is 

 very good ; but when you get to admitting 

 more than three you are obliged to give the 

 entrance the whole length of the hive — 

 nearly 20 inches. Is not this a pretty broad 

 passage-way V I much prefer to slide the 

 hive backward and forward, in place of hav- 

 ing loose blocks. 



Bee Bdww, 



OR, MONEY - PLANTS TO BE NAMED. 



WILD DESERT-CDHRANT. 



HEREWITH send a specimen of wild desert- 

 currant, wliich is at this date blooming: to its 

 fullest extent. I now send blooming' branches, 

 and in April will send fruit. A shrub or bush 

 from 3 to 6 ft. in hcig-ht, forminfra dense bunch 

 from 4 to 10 feef in diameter— that is, a sin^'-le root- 

 will have from 50 to 200 stalks, the size of your fln- 

 p:er. The foliage is everjrreen, leaves thick and 

 fleshy; small twifrs, spinous, like the twig-s of an ap- 

 ple-tree; fruit, when ripe, a beautiful cardinal red, 

 many-seeded, like a gooseberry or currant; oblong 

 in shape. The bloom secretes an abundance of de- 

 licious nectar which my bees are now appropriating 

 very rapidly. J. L. Gukgc. 



Tempe, Arizona, Feb. 16, 188'.. 



Prof. Devol says of this plant : 



The wild desert-currant from .1. L. Gregg, is prop- 

 erly so called. It is a species of RihcK, closely re- 

 sembling li. auretim, Ph., the Missouri, or golden 

 currant, and is perhaps a variety of the latter. 

 Nearly or (juite all the members of this fnmily 

 (Sarifrait(ir€(c) produce an abundance of bee-food. 

 It IS hard for us to reali/.e that it could be in full 

 bloom there in the middle of February, when here 

 in Central Ohio the thernionielci- was ranging as low 

 as 20 degrees below zero. The Missouri currant 

 blooms here in April and May. W. S. Devol. 



Columbus, O., March T, 1885. 



I send you a jdant to be named. The coniiiioii 

 name is "arrow-bush," so named because the Indi- 

 ans here all make their arrows of the switches, 

 which grow very straight. It is a bush or shrub 

 from t to 10 ft. in height, and it grows mostly in the 

 sandy river - bottoms, making a douse .iunglc of 

 evergreen brush, sometimes hundreds of acres 

 in extent; and were it not for the plow it would 

 take our upland farms, owing to the seeds being- 

 winged (or having a tuft of cotton attached to each 

 seed). They arc borne by the winds all over the 

 country, and readily germiiuite when the ground is 

 irrigated. It bears a reddish-purple flower which 

 secretes a great abundance of nectar, almost limpid. 

 T think it is ecjual in quality and quantity to the far- 

 famed basswood. When my bees were at work on 

 it I extracted every third day, and the honey was 

 much thicker than basswood. Itbloomcd about the 

 first of last April, and continued in bloom till near 

 the first of .Tune; but the last two weeks the honey 

 became so thick that the bees quit it for the mes- 

 (luite and cat's claw, two honey-bearing trees of the 

 locust family; but it again came in bloom the latter 

 part of Nov., and continued till some two weeks 

 since, when we had a cold spell, the mercury indi- 

 cating ;W .above zero, which stopped the blooming 

 process, as you will see by the specimens sent. 



Some of it contains seeds and flower-buds unopen- 

 ed, but I send two bunches of flowers wrapped in a 

 separate jmper, and placed inside the package. 

 Tempe, A. T., Jan. 19, 18a5. Jno. L. Gregg. 



Prof. Devol says further : 



The specimen from Dr. Gregg, of Arizona, was du- 

 ly received. The flora of the West is not all worked 

 up well, and it is not always easy to determine 

 what a specimen is; and in this case I was unable 

 to identify it. I therefore sent a part of it to Dr. 

 Gray, to get his opinion of it; and in awaiting a re- 

 ply I caused this long delay. It is a species of 

 " Marsh fleabane" [Phichca horcalis. Gray), not de- 

 scribed in the older botanies, but found in Dr. 

 Gray's new work, " Synoptical Flora of the U. S." 



They arc strong-scented plants; growing very 

 persistently, mostly in wet or moist places. The 

 bright-colored pappus gives the plants the appear- 

 ance of being in bloom long after the flowers have 

 faded. w. S. Devol. 



Columbus, 0., Feb. in, IgSI. 



Please find a specimen of what seems to be ciuite 

 a honey-plant in this section— the Upper Sierra. It 

 is remarkable for its singular beauty. Jly bees 

 have been working on it since early in April. It 

 produces honey and pollen; is an cvci-green, and a 

 shrub, about one foot high. There are hundreds of 

 acres of it around here. I do not know the botan- 

 ical name for it. They call it tar-weed here. It 

 grows along what is called the snow-line of the 

 Sierra, and many times is six or seven feet under 

 snow, but comes out as fresh and green as if it had 

 been summer all the year, and puts forth its modest 

 little flowers at the first appearance of spring. I 

 have started in the bee business as an experiment 

 here in the Sierra Nevadas. I think there are some 

 valuable honey-idants here. I am the only man in 

 the county who is keeping bees for a business. The 

 winter is no problem here, as it never gets to zero. 

 We have deep snows, but no frozen ground. I will 

 report on my success at some other time. 



G. w. Cover. 



Dounleville, Sierra Co., Col., June 12, 1885. 



Concerning this plant. Prof. Devol says : 



The inclosed plant from Colorado is called by Dr. 

 Gray Cltanvtlatia fiiU<iliii<a. and is a idant I know 

 nothing about. From the small specimen sent, it 

 looks as if it were a very pretty shrub. 



W. S. Devol, Botanist. 



Columbus, O., July 6, 188.5. 



WEllTLOW GHAS.'i. 



Inclosed you will find a samj)le of a weed I send 

 you. Please tell me what it is. It puts up in the 

 winter; begins to bloom in February, and lasts till 

 April. Bees do not gather pollen from it. I will 

 give you more information in regard to it when it is 

 through blooming. I will send you some seed of it 

 when it is ripe. J. W. Kanx.>.\ville. 



Brandon, Texas, March 18, 1885. 



Prof. Devol replies : 



The plant referred to above is Drnlia, or whitlow- 

 grass (Draha iuneifoUn, Nutt.), an early-flowering 

 low herb of the mustard family, foinid south and 

 west. It is hairy, leafy at the base, and throws up 

 several racemes of small white flowers, 3 to 8 inches 

 high. The jietals are about twice the length of the 

 sepals, notched at the end. One of the earliest- 

 flowering plants. W. S. Devol. 



Columbus, 0., March 25, 1885. 



