JUNU, 1919 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



MORE CALIFORNIA NOTES 



Uncertain Times of Honey Flow a 

 'Disadvantage. Some JVinter Packing 

 Needed. Advertising in the Movies 



By E. R. Root 



AFTER I had 

 been here 

 some f o 11 r 

 or five months I 

 thought I knew 

 something about 

 the climate; but 

 this year the 

 time when the 

 honey plants 

 should yield is all mixed up and out of har- 

 mony with the climate. The mountain sage 

 and the orange blooms are all jumbled to- 

 gether, both yielding at the same time. 

 Orange, by rights, should have come first 

 about three weeks ahead of the sage. The 

 wild alfalfa and the wild buckwheat — well, 

 they too have forgotten all about the calen- 

 dar. The blooming things are all blooming 

 this year at all kinds of times. Old resi- 

 dents tell me this is nothing very unusual — 

 that the honey plants in this State come 

 into bloom when they please. It is very un- 

 fortunate for the beekeepers when they all 

 come together, as they would very much like 

 to have them come so they could catch a 

 yield from each. 



Value of Packing in California. 

 We have sunshine here, and lots of it, but 

 also cool nights and lots of them. Now, this 

 is very hard on bees, as I have pointed out 

 in former articles. This reminds me that 

 my experiments in packing bees this spring- 

 worked out magnificently. The little three- 

 frame colonies that I found trying to oc- 

 cupy two stories in January, and which I 

 reduced to one story and packed in paper, 

 have built up to strong colonies and aie 



now bringing in 

 the honey. I am 

 sure it is best to 

 give the bees 

 protect i;0 n i n 

 California; but 

 just how much 

 a n d in w h a t 

 form I would not 

 dare to say. 

 I find a large number of beekeepers, how- 

 ever, are making it a practice to confine 

 their colonies in late fall to one story, put- 

 ting a couple of sheets of newspaper be- 

 tween the upper and the lower stories, scat- 

 tering the stores in both stories. In the 

 spring, when the bees need more room, they 

 will gnaw a hole thru the paper, go upstairs, 

 and rapidly build up. I am sure that thou- 

 sands of beekeepers in the State are losing 

 because they do not confine their colonies 

 to one story during the winter months when 

 the climate here is so treacherous. What is 

 the use of trying to make a colony warm 

 two stories, wasting its energy and its sup- 

 plies of honey, when it could much more 

 economically warm one story? Taking the 

 State as a whole, I am satiisiied that a little 

 added protection would save thousands upon 

 thousands of pounds of winter stores. This 

 is not a mere guess from a one winter's stay, 

 but is based upon a knowledge of many 

 spring seasons thru which I have been. I 

 certainly know that protection in the spring 

 back home i^ays and pays well. 

 Free Advertising. 

 By the way, as some of you may know, I 

 have been ti'ving to get n lot of free ad- 



A quite characteristic view in the sage district in San Die?o County. All the sage regions are in some of 

 the most beautiful country in the world. A tenderfoot at least can sit down and enjoy the flowers and 



scenery for hours at a time. 



