GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



tioD, requesting the Wisconsin College of Agricul- 

 ture to introduce work with bees with an offer of a 

 donation of bees and supplies if such resolution 

 were accepted, the Wisconsin University Board of 

 Regents, about the last week in April, 1912. decided 

 to introduce an elective course in beekeeping. 

 I'his course will be given by Prof. J. G. Sanders, 

 probably the last half of next year— that is. from 

 about Feb. 15, 1913, to about June lo, 1913. An apiary 

 of about ten or twelve colonies will be owned by 

 the college, and be used by students and for experi- 

 mental use. 



From my acquaintance and work with Prof, band- 

 ers I can state that he is interested In beekeeping, 

 and is especially well fitted for giving work in it. 



I drop you this little notice as a bit of news, 

 which, perhaps, you may associate with data con- 

 cerning college recognition of beekeeping. 



Madison, Wis., May 4. L. V. France. 



THE YELLOW FLOWERS OF NORTH AMERICA 



BY JOHN H. LOVELL 



Owing to the great abundance of butter- 

 cups, goldenrods, and sunflowers, yellow is 

 more predominant in the floral landscape of 

 North America than any other color. Yel- 

 low may well be our national color, and the 

 goldenrod our national flower. It is the 

 most bright and cheerful of colors, since it 

 reflects the largest quantity of light, and it 

 is doubtless for this reason that yellow 

 flowers enjoy so great a popularity. 



Yellow flowers owe their hue to a solid 

 pigment called carotin, familiar to every 

 one in the root of the carrot. It usually oc- 

 curs in petals in small round granules call- 

 ed plastids. It is insoluble in water, but 

 readily soluble in ether. It invariably ac- 

 companies chlorophyll in leaves, and is 

 widely distributed in seaweeds, fungi, lich- 

 ens, mosses, and ferns, in autumn leaves, 

 and in fruits and seeds. The yellow plastids 

 of flowers are not always round, but are 

 sometimes angular, as in the garden nastur- 

 tium. In the tomato, asparagus, thorn- 

 bush, and in some species of rose, the plas- 

 tids of the fruit are spindle-formed, or ir- 

 regularly shaped, and are fire-red, orange- 

 red, or yellowish red. In yellow leaves the 

 plastids are round; but in autumnal leaves 

 they occur in irregular masses. 



The scarlet poppy, tulip, and fire-red can- 

 na owe their color's to a mixture of yellow 

 plastids and red cell sap. On the other 

 hand, dingy or dull colors result from a com- 

 bination of violet sap with yellow granules. 

 In a few flowers and fruits, as the yellow 

 snapdragon, dahlia, and the peel of the 

 lemon, the color is due, not to carotin, but 

 to another yellow pigment (called leaf yel- 

 low) dissolved in the cell sap. 



Yellow is an old and primitive color, 

 which in its natural state does not vary 

 readily. This may be shown by the follow- 

 ing experiment. If the carotin contained 

 in a few slices of the root of the carrot be 

 dissolved out in ether, the yellow solution 

 will not lose its color under ten days, while 

 the green hue of a solution of chlorophyll 

 will disappear in twenty-four hours. But 

 under cultivation sudden variations from 

 yellow to white have been observed. A dou- 

 ble yellow hollyhock turned one year into a 



single white kind, and a chrysanthemum 

 has been seen to bear both yellow and white 

 flowers. The bright-yellow flowers of the 

 golden currant and the bush honeysuckle 

 in fading change to rose or red; and a species 

 of forget-me-not is at first pale yellow, and 

 changes to sky-blue. 



There are 790 yellow flowers in northeast- 

 ern America which vary greatly in size and 

 form. Usually they are wheel-shaped as in 

 the buttercups and five-fingers; but not in- 

 frequently they are very irregular in form, 

 as in the pea and figwort families, where 

 the corolla bears a more or less fancied re- 

 semblance to butterflies and the heads of 

 reptiles. As a whole, however, they are 

 much less specialized than red or blue flow- 

 ers. Irregular yellow flowers probably owe 

 their hue largely to the great persistency of 

 the yellow pigment, carotin. 



Both yellow and white flowers are com- 

 mon in primitive families. For instance, 

 in the buttercup family there are 38 yellow 

 and 26 white flowers; in the mustard family, 

 46 yellow and 54 white; and in the rose fam- 

 ily, 39 yellow and 35 white. Since carotin 

 is very widely distributed in the foliage of 

 plants, and petals are only modified leaves, 

 it is not difficult to imagine how the first 

 yellow flowers were developed. 



While trees and shrubs with white flow- 

 ers abound everywhere, as has already been 

 pointed out, trees and shrubs with yellow 

 flowers are comparatively rare. A number 

 of common trees have small yellowish or 

 greenish-yellow flowers, as the rock-maple, 

 striped maple, chestnut, and basswood; 

 while among shrubs there are the barberry, 

 fly honeysuckle, jessamine, and bush hon- 

 eysuckle; while under cultivation the For- 

 sythia, golden currant, and yellow rose are 

 familiar examples. The willows owe their 

 yellow hue to their stamens (they have no 

 perianth), and are, like the basswood and 

 rock-maple, most valuable honey-plants. 



Most plants with yellow flowers are her- 

 baceous. When the blossoms are of small 

 size they are usually like small white flow- 

 ers, groiiped with level-topped clusters, as 

 in the mustard, saxifrage, carrot, and thistle 

 families. The most important sources of 

 nectar in this group are the mustard, wild 

 parsnip, and goldenrods. 



In the pink family, though there are 56 

 white flowers, there are no indigenous yel- 

 low species; and in the aquatic water plan- 

 tains the entire 19 species are white; but, on 

 the other hand, in the St. .John's-worts 

 there are 22 yellow and 2 red flowers, while 

 white fails entirely. Yellow is very com- 

 mon among the jirimroses and night-shades, 

 but rare among the heaths and gentians. 

 Yellow blossoms vary greatly in size, from 

 the large campanulate cups of the squash 

 to the small flowers of the creeping butter- 

 cup. 



In the aster or thistle family {Compositce) 

 there are 262 yellow flowers and 134 white. 

 Though this is the highest of plant families, 

 the central florets of each head are very 

 small, and the floral leaves have been very 



