O«tober, 1912. 



American Hee Journal 



of cheaper construction, as a rule. The 

 claim is made that there is far more 

 money in putting up comb honey, as 

 they do in Idaho and some parts of 

 Colorado, and selling at ■^'1 '>» and ^'i.lo 

 than grading more closely and getting 

 $2.8(1 to ^■■i:^:j. It certainly takes less 

 time and effort than where one follows 

 the new rules closely. 



Comb honev is selling in the Arkan- 

 sas valley at $;i()0 to $3.10, and sales 

 being made about as fast as tlie pro- 

 ducers can get the honey ready. There 

 will be but few carload shipments of 

 comb honey from the valley this year 

 on account of the demand in Kansas 

 for local shipments. A sale was made 

 late in August of nearly a car of ex- 

 tracted honey at $8..')0 a case of two liO- 

 pound cans. In local shipments of 

 more or less size the price is $10 a case 

 with good sale. Bulk-comb honey sells 



faster than the producers can cut out 

 their baits and fill the cans with them 

 at $(i 00 for a tiO-pound can. .A few get 

 $t)..jO for this honey. 



In southwestern Colorado comb 

 honey brings about $2.10 a case; the 

 price would be better if the freight- 

 rate was not so prohibitive, making it 

 impossible to cater to anything but a 

 local market. Extracted honey, how- 

 ever, brings 8 to 1" cents a pound, 

 which helps even things up a trifle. 

 There is not going to be a large 

 amount of comb honey left in Colorado 

 after Christmas, and this is as it should 

 be. There are a great many bees for 

 sale in the State this year, and any one 

 wishing to get a foothold should have 

 no trouble in buying an outfit at less 

 cost than moving a carload into the 

 State and crowding some other bee- 

 keepers' territory, or perhaps making 

 him think he is being crowded. 



Southern 



Beedom^ 



Conducted by Lovis H. ScnOLi . New Braunfels. Tex. 



What Strain of Bees is Best for Soutfi- 

 western Texas? 



One of the ditficulties the apiarist has to 

 contend with in this iiart of Texas is the 

 long-continued drouth, although taking: the 

 State over, I don't siippo-;e it is more subject 

 to drouths than many others. It is a very 

 large State, and portions of it are almost a 

 barren desert. 



Tlie extreme drouths are mostly confined 

 to central west and southwestTexas. When 

 they prevail it is next to impossible to get 

 the bees to breed up; all vegetation dries. 

 and there is practically nothing for them to 

 get in the way of either pollen or honey. 

 Queens stop laying, the bees cluster on the 

 outside of the hive, and the novice is often 

 led to believe that they are preparing to 

 swarm. This goes on from day to day. even 

 weeks, then a shower comes, followed with 

 more or less bloom, and the queens soon till 

 the hives with eggs, but by the time the 

 mesQuite pronounced meskeet) blooms, 

 which is from three to four weeks after the 

 rain, the old bees have died off until there 

 are very few left to gather the harvest. Such 

 is the case here at the present w-riting. We 

 are having a fine mesquite flow with very 

 few bees to gather i-t. 



We often resort to feeding at such times, 

 but unless there is something to furnish 

 pollen, that is a failure, for the bees do not 

 develop the eggs into brood. 



Some ^11 year^ago. when the Cyprian and 

 Syrian bees were imported by n. .A. Jones 

 and Frank Benton, we gave them a trial 

 with the hope of overcoming this trouble. 

 They were said to be great breeders by the 

 late B. F. Carroll, of Dresden. Tex., and 

 others tliat were favorably impressed with 

 ttleiii. 



They were an improvement over the Ital 

 ians as breeders, and perhaps as workers, 

 but their extremely cross disposition was 

 too much for me. I have since kept more or 

 less Carniolans. and their crosses in one of 

 my out-apiaries, but their excessive swarm- 

 iOK. when everything is favorable, makes 

 them undesirable for an out apiary, al- 

 though they are good workers and comb- 

 builders I would be pleased to hear from 

 Mr. l^ouis Scholl.or others who have tried 

 the Caucasians in the South, w-here we have 

 these long drouths. I.. B. Smith. 



Rescue. Tex. 



Now, Mr. Smith, you leave the im- 

 pression that we have an awful laud 

 here in Texas, when you lament about 

 the serious drouths that we have to 

 meet sometimes. But is it not a fact 



that these drouths do not exist in all 

 parts of the State at the same time, 

 and that they do not always affect the 

 honey crop ? We may say that we 

 make just as good honey crops in vari- 

 ous localities, with a long drouth at 

 some time of the year, if we only have 

 a fall or winter season to aid the plants 

 and trees in nectar-yielding the follow- 

 ing spring or early summer. Mes- 

 quite is one of these. 



I hardly think that we can overc^ime 

 the difficulty mentioned by you with 

 any race of bees as readily as we might 

 with the proper management and ma- 

 nipulation of our colonies. I know 

 that there are localities in north Texas 

 where long, continued drouths exist 

 between the early spring and the fall 

 honey seasons. It is impossible to 

 keep the colonies over this dearth suc- 

 cessfully by leaving the honey on the 

 the hives, for the reason that they will 

 breed heavily until it is all used up. 

 They may even swarm during the 

 dearth and the swarms be lost by starva- 

 tion unless fed or supplied with honey. 

 To prevent this I recommended, many 

 years ago, to take away the combs of 

 honey and keep them stored so that a 

 few at a time could be given when 

 actually needed. This would help to 

 discourage the heavy breeding and 

 swarming during the drouthy period. 

 Tiding the colonies over the drouth in 

 this way would keep them in normal 

 strength ; but witli some extra labor, 

 however, they would be in good shape 

 for the cotton honey-flow from which 

 the main part of the honey-crop is 

 realized. 



Another remedy that I have sug- 

 gested is the planting of sweet clover, 

 so that a moderate flow of nectar may 

 be created during the drouth period. 

 Since this generally lasts during May 

 and June, sweet clover comes in very 

 nicely, as it begins to bloom and con- 

 tinues over the entire drouth period 



that usually plays havoc on the colo- 

 nies as related by Mr. Smith. 



This same question came up at one 

 time when I attended the North Texas 

 Bee-Keepers' Association meeting. I 

 recommended the aforesaid two reme- 

 dies to be tried out by the bee-keepers 

 who were thus located. What the re- 

 sults were I have never learned, but 

 being interested in these things, as well 

 as all information on apicultural topics 

 of the State of Texas in the capacity 

 of Apicultural Expert of the Texas 

 Department of Agriculture, it would 

 give me great pleasure to hear 

 from some of the north and central 

 Texas bee-keepers on this subject. 



For the benefit of those who have not 

 a copy of my recent bee-bulletin, the 

 following concerning sweet clover is 

 herewith reproduced: 



WHITE AND VELLOW SWEET CLOVER. 



As a general rule none of the clovers thrive 

 well in this State except the sweet clovers — 

 white sweet clover Meli/otm ttNhi' and yellow 

 sweet clover {.!/. offiiiatiaU.A Seasons over 

 most of the State are too dry for the white 

 clover, from which the greater part of the 

 honey of the northeast is produced. There 

 are a few localities in the south Texas coast 

 country, however, where this grows well. 



In many places in Texas there are periods 

 during which there is no bloom from which 

 the bees can obtain even enough honey for 

 the sustenance of their colonies. These 

 dearths, between honey flows from natural 

 sources, are sometimes very long ones. In 

 some localities they occur between the 

 spring and fall flows, and are very serious, 

 as the bees sometimes starve during their 

 continuance unless fed. Feeding bees at 

 these times is objectionable, because it in- 

 cites robbing and stimulates the bees to un- 

 necessary brood-renring. besides using up a 

 large q lantity of food. In such cases, plant- 

 ing of sweet clover beforehand, to tide the 

 bees over, might bring good results, as the 

 clover, if it thrives, will come into bloom 

 and yield nectar during the time. There is 

 great variation in the length of these dearths 

 in various localities, beginning and ending 

 soon in some and late in others. In many 

 places the gap maybe tilled entirely by the 

 blooming period of sweet clover, which be- 

 gins about June i in most localities, and a 

 lilile earlier in other and more protected 

 situations, and depending alsoui)on weather 

 conditions. The yellow variety begins to 

 bloom several weeks earlier in the season. 

 Either variety, however, would cover the 

 period of the average dearth, and the meli- 

 lotus blooms very well in favorable seasons 

 when planted in localities favorable to its 

 growth In situations not so favorable, and 

 during dry seasons, the blooming period is 

 shortened considerably. Ho«'ever. it gen- 

 erally extendsduringjune. Julyand August. 



Swt et clover grows well .ifter it is started, 

 and waste places, in which are found the 

 poorest soils, can be planted with this for- 

 age crop for the bees. There are thousands 

 of acres of such waste land that could be 

 made to grow sweet clover in the [ilace of 

 weeds. Our fence rows would be worth 

 tliousands of dollars if sweet clover grew 

 where weeds of no use whatever now dis- 

 port themselves. Especially would the 

 clover be valuable where the nectar yield 

 would be produced just at a timewhen there 

 was nothing else in bloom. 



It was once feared that sweet clover was a 

 noxious weed that spread rapidly and was 

 iiard to kill out of a field. Tiiis apprehen- 

 sion has been proven to be baseless, since a 

 single plowing will kill the clover, and there 

 is no danger of its spreading out of its 

 bounds. It grows well in the northeastern 

 part of the State, where it has become 

 abundant in various places. It needs little 

 attention in localities where the atmos- 

 pheric and sc il conditions are not too dry. 

 In the dry parts of the State west and south- 

 west Texas it is hardly advisable lo plant 

 sweet clover except in some of the lowland 

 fertile vaJleys and along streams It has 

 been found that it grows luxuriantly when 

 drilled in rows and cultivated, but it would 

 hardly pay to do this as a forage plant as its 

 growth is large and coarse. 



The seed should be obtained in the fall of 

 the year and scattered in v^■aste places and 

 along fence rows, and rains will beat it. in 



