SKl'TEMBKK ], 1915 



BEEKEEPING IN CALIFORNIA 



P. C. 



'llie field meet held at San Ber- 

 ii;irdino I'OOcMilly is said to have 

 been a biir success. I regret that I 

 Av;'.s not able to attend so impor- 

 tant a nicetiny so close at hand, 

 but it was impossible for me to get 

 a leave of absence. 

 » « • 



1 recently enjoyed a few hours' visit with 

 my friend J. D. Bixby, of Coyina. Mr. 

 I5i\by was just shipping the last of his 

 honey to Los Angeles, where he finds a 

 ready market for comb honey when extract- 

 ed is a drag. Comb honey is all right I 

 guess, but then — well, I kinder hate to 

 tackle it — lots of work. 

 » « « 



The editor tells us, page 609, Aug. 1, 

 " how to get a cheap automobile truck for 

 the beeyard work," which doubtless is cor- 

 rect; but what we need in California just 

 now is a racing auio to run down a honey- 



lyer. Beekeepers are a little too mucli 

 discouiaucd at invsenl to be tiguring very 

 heavily on automobiles. 



• * * 



1 read in the morning paper of August 

 1 of a beekeeper in Florida being arrested 

 as a spy. A German by birth, and only a 

 short time in this country, he was, as the 

 t-lory goes, making drawings of important 

 places from a military standpoint along the 

 .southern coast, and was hiding his identity 

 by posing as a beekeeper, which goes to 

 .•-■how that you can't always tell what these 

 l)cekeepors have up their sleeves. 



• * • 



1 use only five-frame nuclei hives for 

 mating colonies — two to four framas in 

 each hive. After the season is well advanc- 

 ed I stock them with five combs; and by 

 p|)rlrg T have a splendid start for an in- 

 crease in workina' colonies if a good season 

 is in prospect. The most satisfactory way 

 to build the riuclens up to a strons' colony is 

 to set another luicleus body filled with combs 

 over a little colony, allowing the queen as- 

 cops to both sections. A full colony will be 

 the result at no distant time. A five-frame 

 <i)Iony will build up far more rapidly on 

 ii n combs so arranged than if the combs 

 were s^ei into a fen-frame hi\e-body and the 

 Oilier five combs placed by their side. 



• « * 



There is a ]>retty well-disconraged bunch 

 of beekeepere in this part of the world just 

 now. The crop and price, none too large, 



Redlaiuds, CaL 



with the usual expense of supplies, makes 

 the situation very discouraging. The price 

 that is being ottered by buyers compared 

 witli quotations to retail grocers by whole- 

 sale grocers is too wide apart to look good 

 to the beemen. The situation resembles a 

 transaction I have just read about in the 

 East. A peach-grower in Arkansas shipped 

 41 bushel baskets of peaches to a commis- 

 sion house in Kansas City. He received 

 .f2.3.'S for his 41 bushels of fruit. In one 

 basket a note was placed addressed to the 

 final pui'chaser, with the request that the 

 sliipper be notified what the consumer paid 

 for the basket of fruit. A letter from the 

 purchaser, living in Kansas City, Kansas, 

 said she paid $1.15 for the basket, but they 

 had been selling for $1.25 until that time. 

 The shipper received less than six cents per 

 basket, while the consumer paid twenty 

 times that amount. Doesn't look just right, 

 does it? Just such work as this threatens 

 llie whole business fabric of the nation. 

 « * # 



Southern California is very much in need 

 of a beekeepers' organization for the south- 

 ern half of the state — not a state organiza- 

 tion, but a southern California organiza- 

 tion, sorriething on the line of the one main- 

 tained by the northern part of the state. 

 Indeed, I am very much in doubt if a state 

 a.«sociation is practical in this state. The 

 elements are wideh' separated, and the get- 

 ting-together in a worldng unit is very ex- 

 penf^ive, and, as a whole, is not profitable, 

 if we are to judge by the results of the 

 past. There has been a .state organization 

 for the past twenty-five years, yet we find 

 ourselves groping in the darkness as to the 

 marketing situation at this very hour. The 

 only source we have from, which to judge the 

 market is what we are told by the buyers; 

 and as a business policy Ave cannot expect 

 them to encourage prices until they are 

 loaded up. Then, loo, they well know thaf. 

 the lower the figure at Avhich they can turn 

 honey at a profit, the more they can turn 

 and the greater the net profit. The condi- 

 tion of the beekeepers is so well known that 

 we may be handled with impunity. We 

 should :.t least get together in one central 

 meeting in the southern part of the slate. 

 There are many of us who thoroughly en- 

 joy the annual meeting in Los Angeles, and 

 who will miss the opportunity to meet there 

 the coming winter to talk over and di.scuss 

 matters affecting our business. 



