102 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Feb. 9, 1905. 



strange, for they are laboring- under the impression that 

 the bottom-bar constitutes the bottom of the hive. In this 

 case we have to let them have their own way, and patch up 

 again whenever it is convenient. Niagara Co., N. Y. 



Bees, Birds and Fruit in California. 



BY C. W. DAYTON. 



FIVE years ago last July a man came into my honey- 

 house, and while I was filling his pail with honey, 

 casually remarked with a smile: " Mr. Williams, up 

 there, who owns the big orchard, is badly worked up be- 

 cause of the bees working on his apricots, and is making all 

 kinds of threats ". 



" Is that so ? I did not know that 'cots were ripe yet," 

 I answered. 



"Yes, they are ripening pretty fast. I suppose on 

 account of the four or five days of hot weather we have just 

 had. I was up there yesterday and got some." 



As he stepped out of the door I remarked, " I guess I 

 also will have to go up and hit Mr. Williams for some apri- 

 cots some time to-morrow ". 



About 10 or 11 o'clock I called on my wife for the largest 

 pail in the house, as I was going after some 'cots, and, I 

 assure you, it was not slow in forthcoming. 



Near the side of the orchard I inquired of a picker where 

 I could find Mr. Williams, and was directed up a road toward 

 the middle of the orchard, where I found him and some SO 

 or 75 boxes of fruit from which he was sorting out the occa- 

 sional mutilated ones which had been mistakenly thrown in. 



" Good morning, Mr. Williams. I came up to get a few 

 'cots. You seem to be getting an abundant crop of fruit 

 this year." 



"Good morning, sir; good morning. Yes, we will get a 

 good deal of fruit if we succeed in getting it off the trees 

 before the bees do." 



" Indeed", said I, " it does look that way." 



" May I inquire your name ? I do not remember having 

 seen you, although I am acquainted with nearly all the 

 neighbors around here." 



" My name is Dayton, but I am quite commonly known 

 as the honey-man, but possibly bee-man would be easiest 

 for you to recollect." 



" Dayton — Dayton ", he repeated ; "I do not remember 

 having heard your name." 



" I live a quarter of a mile below the post-oflice, and 

 own those white hives you may have noticed ; and since I 

 have more bees than any one else about here, I suppose 

 most of these in your orchard came from my hives." 



" Well — yes ; I believe I do remember the place ; and — 

 how many apricots did you wish to get, Mr. Dayton ?" 



" I guess I will take the pail full." 



"When he had poured out of one of the boxes of mark- 

 etable fruit enough to fill the pail about one-third, I said to 

 him, "That will do of that kind, Mr. Williams. If it will 

 be agreeable to you, I would prefer to fill up the pail with 

 those which the birds have pecked ". 



" Birds 1" he exclaimed. " We have not seen any birds 

 around, as I know of." 



" Well, I always supposed the mutilation of fruit in this 

 manner was the work of birds." 



"■John — John !" called he, to the spokesman of a band 

 of five or six Chinamen, " have you seen any birds in the 

 orchard?" 



" Nope — na, no any." After a long pause, he added, 

 " Yick, yick. Two four, sizplacee " (meaning nests). "Ober 

 'im cook 'ouse. Us eat 'im ' fore'efix ' 'im wing out. 

 Muchee gone". 



After a good laugh by several bystanders had subsided, 

 I ventured, " If you will listen closely, Mr. Williams, I think 

 you can hear a chatter of birds in that row of eucalyptus 

 along the side of the orchard ". After listening a moment, 

 he said, " Yes, I wouldn't wonder if there were a thousand 

 birds up in those trees ". 



As he turned around to fill my pail from the box of muti- 

 lated apricots, which were lately sorted out, I interrupted 

 him with, " Mr. Williams, if it would still be as agreeable 

 to you, I should prefer to go out and pick the mutilated 

 ones from the ground and trees ". 



" He said, " Yes, take your pail and pick up as many as 

 you want. We do not consider them as worth anything ". 



As I started out, thinking that he might conclude that I 

 possessed about as much "cheek " as my bees, I returned, 

 "That is, from your standpoint; but from my position 



they are worth even more than the marketable ones, and I 

 shall be quite as glad to pay for them ". 



When I returned and had paid for them, he gave vent to 

 his curiosity by saying : " If it is a fair question, I should 

 like to know the reason why you prefer the mutilated apri- 

 cots ?" 



" Well, Mr. Williams, there are several reasons instead 

 of one. Had these in my pail not been mutilated you would 

 have picked them for market, partially green, several days 

 ago. And, again, if the bees had not removed the ferment- 

 ing portion wherever it occurred, they would now be en- 

 tirely spoiled. Also, they are the largest and sweetest in 

 the orchard. As you well know, the earliest and largest 

 apricots grow low down on the tree. Their blossoms came 

 out earliest, last February, and by the last of March were 

 the size of hickory-nuts, while those which are beginning 

 to ripen out towards the ends of the limbs could scarcely 

 be seen. They did the most of their growing during the 

 moist weather of winter and spring ; and they grew to the 

 limit, so when hot summer began there was not much else 

 to do but hoard up sweetness for the time of ripening. 

 Being down in partial shade their skins are tender, while 

 those more exposed are thick-skinned and tough, like soggy 

 potatoes ; while those in the pail are so mealy and tender 

 that they can readily be broken into a bowl of milk, together 

 with two slices of bread and one-half pound of granulated 

 honey ; just makes a meal." 



" Well, I declare ", said Mr. Williams, " I don't think I 

 should kick very hard against a dish like that myself. 

 Guess I'll bring out the children to-morrow and have them 

 pick a box of that kind. Those that I have always taken 

 home were out of the market boxes, but our folks did not 

 seem to care much for fruit." 



" As to these mutilations which the bees are working 

 at, some were mutilated yesterday morning, but more of 

 them the morning before, and considerable several days ago. 



" Now, most persons think that bees choose the sweet- 

 est, but in my experience this is a mistake. Sugar is 

 sweeter than honey, and yet they choose the honey. They 

 are attracted to fermented juices in preference to unfer- 

 mented. In fact, a person can prove this to his satisfac- 

 tion by simply walking out amongst these trees. We often 

 see a cluster of bees which entirely hides an apricot, and if 

 we attempt to examine it it will be found to be so rotten 

 that it can not be handled, while the freshly mutilated 

 ones on the trees are scarcely noticed by the bees. 



" Those which were picked into this morning are still 

 sweet, but those of yesterday, after being exposed to the 

 sun, and then the dew falling on them during the night, are 

 now beginning to ferment, and if you should taste of such 

 a one you would say that it is gone beyond all hope of re- 

 demption. But not so with the bees. When a bee alights 

 on a mutilated apricot, or peach, or fig that is still sweet, it 

 does so by mistake, and thrusts its tongue in only long 

 enough to taste, then runs all over the apricot to see if there 

 is not another opening ; and, if not, it goes to another apri- 

 cot, and so on until it finds one of the right flavor, or, sour- 

 ness. 



" An apricot, or peach, or fig does not ferment all 

 through at once, but only at the exposed and ragged 

 edges of the mutilation, and if there is not more muti- 

 lated fruit than the bees can manage, they will remove 

 the fermented portion just about as fast as it forms, so that 

 a mutilated apricot will be eatable so long as a remnant 

 remains. To maintain that bees bite into fresh fruit while 

 there is decaying fruit lying about, is as unreasonable as to 

 say that a rooster continued to jump up against a cornstalk 

 with the hope of once in awhile knocking a kernel out of 

 the ear, when the ground around about was strewn with 

 better corn already shelled. 



" But if you should walk along beneath those trees over 

 there, Mr. Williams, those birds would become as hushed 

 as a flock of quails ; because they may mistrust you had 

 come to demand the return of your fruit. Those birds are 

 like domestic fowls — they want their breakfast as soon as it 

 is light enough to see, and this is some two or three hours 

 earlier than any one comes into the orchard to work ; and, 

 besides, it is difficult to see the birds working on fruit, be- 

 cause they are enough like quails to put out sentinels. 

 These are the red-breasted fellows which perch on the top- 

 most twigs and appear to be singing, but, in reality, are 

 only chirping to their brothers and sisters which are creep- 

 ing from branch to branch among the leaves in the densest 

 part of the trees, selecting the tenderest and sweetest apri- 

 cots. If you get within ten rods they chirp out that a sus- 

 picious biped is stalking down through the orchard at an 

 unusual time of day, and the birds begin to sneak out singly 



