628 AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



to see big trees. The account " by one of the younger Roots," in a recent issue of 

 "Gleanings," about a sawmill in Michigan, does not begin to describe how logs are 

 worked up into lumber in a California sawmill. I saw them take logs 8 or 10 feet 

 in diameter and saw them up with band-saws. Great big slabs, one or two inches, 

 would be taken off that would be of various sizes or widths, as the saw worked its 

 way toward the center of the log. These big boards would be all handled by auto- 

 matic machinery, and come out boards of the desired size. I did not see any pre- 

 cautions taken against fire ; none are needed I should judge, as the logs are taken 

 out of the water where they have lain for months or years. Then redwood is hard 

 to burn (that is one of the reasons we have no big fires in this State ; all our wooden 

 buildings are mainly constructed of that wood). Another thing, the wood is not 

 piled in big heaps at the mills; it is nearly all put aboard vessels at the mills about 

 as fast as sawed, and shipped to various parts of the coast. I did not go into the 

 forests where the biggest timber is to be seen ; I saw some, however, that was 12 

 or more feet in diameter. I have seen bigger trees in Santa Cruz county, south of 

 here— some 80 miles away. But enough of this ; I was going to tell about the white 

 clover. 



In one section along and west of the Eel river, where the redwood trees had 

 been cut off some years ago, and where potatoes had been grown for a number of 

 years, there is nothing now but cow-ranches, so to speak. The laud is low and rich. 

 Then Humboldt county is one of the most rainy in the State. It is no uncommon 

 thing there to have 70 or more inches of rain every year. You know that in the 

 southern portion of the State they often fail to have 2 inches. Well, this abundance 

 of rain always insures them crops of every thing they wish to raise. Both red and 

 white clover have been sown, and they do well ; the former having the preference. 

 But white clover is now spreading in every direction, and it won't be long before 

 the whole section of country along the lower Eel will be well covered with white 

 clover. It is now growing all along the roadsides. It blooms the year through, 

 and, of course, furnishes good pasturage for the bees. 



If it were not for the weather being cool a good portion of the year, there would 

 be enormous yields of honey in and around Ferndale. I was told by one bee-keeper 

 near there, that it is no uncommon thing for him to take 100 pounds of honey from 

 a new swarm. He said the honey is finer than that from the southern portion of 

 the State. I do not know about this ; I have only his word for it. He said that 

 with a hundred colonies of bees he could make more money than is made off any 

 three dairies in the valley. 



I left the Rambler and Mr. Wilder at Hydesville, where they had been for five 

 weeks, last Saturday morning. I took the steameiV from Ferndale at 2:30 the same 

 afternoon, and arrived in San Francisco a little after 8 the next evening. At 9 I 

 took the ferry boat Piedmont (the finest ferry steamer in the world) for Oakland, 

 and I arrived home at 11 o'clock that night. I was away a little over two months. 

 I enjoyed the trip immensely. I saw more of the country than did my two friends, 

 as they were more tied down to business than I was ; they were taking pictures 

 right and left in and about Hydesville. 



I find that my own bees are in better condition than I expected to see them. 

 The early rains we had brought out a lot of early, or, perhaps better, late flowers, 

 which they have been collecting honey from very industriously. I think they will go 

 through the winter better than they have usually done heretofore. Here, near the 

 ocean, it is not so easy to carry bees over the winter as It is more inland. The 

 climate is much damper in winter, as might be expected. 



Mr. Wilder wanted to go to a part of Humboldt county where bear hunting Js 

 said to be good. He is about as anxious to kill a bear as anybody I ever saw. At 



