1902 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



241 



Mrs. Parting-ton trying- to mop up the At- 

 lantic. To be sure, under exceptional con- 

 ditions (as on a small island) we may be 

 able to make some progress; for under such 

 conditions we should be practicallj' con- 

 trolling- the males. But what would the 

 product of many such islands amount to 

 when distributed through the apiaries of 

 our land? The Atlantic, as before, would 

 beat Mrs. Partington. We have this much 

 in our favor (and it is a good deal): Our 

 bees have begun to vary perceptibly. This, 

 I think, is chiefly due to our introducing to 

 our temperate clime bees of the tropics, and 

 the crossing of them with the native stock. 

 (Scientifically speaking, variation is con- 

 tinuous, though by no means always defin- 

 able). If we acquire the ability to select 

 intelligently, and at the same time have an 

 effective way of controlling mating, we may 

 reasonably hope to reap some of the benefits 

 of our improved strain of bees within the 

 lifetime of many of us, and not leave it all 

 for coming generations. 



From information in my hands I believe 

 the day of controlled mating is not far 

 distant, though I am not yet at liberty to 

 disclose the facts or source of the informa- 

 tion on which I base this belief. 



Providence, R. I., Dec. 21. 



HAY VS. HONEY. 



Alfalfa Cut Before Blooming ; no Honey. 



BY J. A. GREEN. 



A note of warning was sounded in the 

 Dec. 1st number of Gleanings in regard 

 to the probable decrease in the yield of hon- 

 ey from alfalfa, that may be pondered over 

 very pr )fitably by those who depend on 

 this source, or who are thinking of locating 

 in alfalfa regions with the idea of securing 

 a more certain source of honey. I have 

 lately returned from a trip through the 

 West, during which I paid particular at- 

 tention to the alfalfa question. When I 

 learned, in Southern California, that there 

 were districts where alfalfa was the main 

 crop, I thought that I had found the ideal 

 country for a bee-keeper, and I hastened to 

 investigate. I had not felt particularly at- 

 tracted toward bee-keeping as generally 

 practiced in California, where the apiarist 

 lives a secluded life up some almost inac- 

 cessible canyon, and depends for his bread 

 and butter and honey upon a rainfall that 

 is far more capricious than that in the 

 Eastern States. But this country is com- 

 paratively thickly settled, and with a honey 

 source that was almost certain; and since 

 it depended on irrigation rather than the 

 chance of the seasons, it seemed to offer 

 special advantages to the apiarist. I ac- 

 cordingly procured a bicycle and started 

 on an exploring-tour. I found the alfalfa 

 country all right, and learned at first hand 

 some of the possibilities of this wonderful 

 plant in that land of sunshine. In this dis- 

 trict most of the water is pumped from wells. 



Many of the pumps are operated by elec- 

 tricity derived from an electric wire run 

 through the valley for this express purpose, 

 while others are run by gasoline-engines 

 or other sources of power. Alfalfa-raising 

 was evidently a profitable business. But I 

 saw no bees. "All the better,'' I thought. 

 "This is unoccupied territory. The alfal- 

 fa business is new here, and the bee-keep- 

 ers have not got in here yet." But I made 

 inquiries. 



"Are there no bees here?" 



"Lots of them up in the foot-hills and 

 canyons. No bees around here." 



"But I should think that, with so much 

 alfalfa around here, there would be lots of 

 bees." 



"Never heard of its being any good for 

 bees. Don't think they get anj- honey from 

 it." 



Mystified, I went to the bee-keepers. 



"No, alfalfa doesn't yield honey in this 

 country. It is no good at all for bees here. ' ' 



A little investigation showed the reason. 

 The alfalfa business was so profitable that 

 it was run as a specialty. In that favored 

 climate, with plenty of water, six or seven 

 crops a year were cut. Better hay, and 

 more of it, was secured by early cutting. 

 Small farms were the rule. Good livings 

 were being made from pieces of land that, 

 to the hay-raiser of the Mississippi Valley, 

 would seem ridiculously small. The result 

 of all this was that, just as soon as the al- 

 falfa was ready to cut, the mower was start- 

 ed. The proper time for this seemed to be. 

 in their opinion, just as soon as the blos- 

 soms appeared, or a little sooner. With 

 the small farms, divided into fields so man- 

 aged as to come on in succession — an easy 

 matter where the climate is always the 

 same and water regulated at will — cutting 

 did not last over a day or two. The honey- 

 yield is nipped in the bud, as it were, and 

 a colony of bees might starve in the midst 

 of an alfalfa district, if it were not for the 

 few stra3' plants along the irrigating- 

 ditches, which escape cutting. 



I afterward learned that there were other 

 parts of California where alfalfa is the 

 source of considerable honey. Here the 

 farms are larger, and it is the custom to 

 delay cutting longer. In Idaho and Colo- 

 rado, where alfalfa is the main source of 

 honey, it seems to be the custom not to be- 

 gin cutting until the alfalfa is well in bloom; 

 and as the fields are large, the bees have a 

 number of days to gather honey. The ten- 

 dency, though, is to cut earlier, and this 

 tendency is likely to increase as the farm- 

 ers find they can get more hay of a better 

 quality by early cutting. Some with whom 

 I talked thought that, with the large fields 

 that were the rule in their locality, cutting 

 would always last so long that there was 

 little danger of the yield of honey being 

 materially lessened. But, without question, 

 alfalfa must in most places be less reliable 

 as a source of honey in the future than it 

 has been in the past. 



Ottawa, 111., Dec. 10. 



