132 



GLEA^'1NGS IN KEE CULTURE. 



Feb. 15. 



The facts they have brouglit forward are gradual- 

 ly becoming- more widely known among fruit- 

 growers and bee-lseepers, and additional evidence 

 accumulates. A case Illustrating very clearly tlie 

 value of bees in an orchard has recently come to 

 the notice of the writer, and its autlienticity is cori- 

 flrmed by correspondence witli the parties named, 

 who are gentlemen of long and extensive experience 

 in fruit-growing, recognized in their loeality as 

 being authorities, particularly in regard to cherry 

 culture. The facts are these: For several years the 

 cherry cro|) of Vaca Valley, in Solano Co., Cal., has 

 not been good, although it was formerly quite sure. 

 The partial or complete failures have been attribut- 

 ed to north winds, cliilling rains, and similar cli- 

 matic conditions; but in the minds of Messrs. Bass- 

 ford, of Cherry Glen, these causes did not sufficient- 

 ly account for all the cases of failure. 



These gentlemen recollected that formerly, when 

 the cherry crops were good, wild bees were very 

 plentiful in the valley, and hence thought perhaps 

 the lack of fruit since most of the bees had disap- 

 peared might be due to imperfect distribution of 

 the pollen of the blo.ssoms. To test the matter they 

 placed, therefore, several hives of bees in their 

 orchard in 1890. The result was striking, for the 

 Bassford orchard bore a good crop of cherries, while 

 other growers in the valley who had no bees found 

 their crops entire or partial failures. This year 

 (1891) Messrs. Bassford had some sixty-five hives of 

 bees in their orchard, and Mr. H. A. Bassford writes 

 to the Entomologist: "Our crop was g»od this sea- 

 son, and we attribute it to the bees." And he adds 

 further: 



Since we have been keeping bees our cherry crop has been 

 much larger th.an foiineily, while those orchards nearest us, 

 five miles from here, where no bees are kept, have produced 



but liglit crops. 



The VacaviJlc Entetp>i!<c said last spring, when 

 referring to the result of the experiment for 1890: 



other orchardists are watching this enterprise with great 

 interest, and may conclude that, to succeed in cherry culture, 

 a beehive and a cheiry-oichard must be planted side by side. 



And now that the result for 1891 is known, 

 "others," .so Mr. Bassford writes, "who have 

 cherrj"-orchards in the valley are procuring bees to 

 effect the fertilization of the blossoms." 



HOW BLOS.SOMS ARE FERTILIZED: WHY SOME 

 FLOWERS ARE MORE GAUDY THAN OTH- 

 ERS; EXPERIMENTS OF CHARLES 

 DARWIN. 



By J. E. Crane. 

 Many volumes have been published in sever- 

 al different languages upon the fertilization of 

 flowers— the Hrst by Christian Conrad Sprfngel, 

 in 1793; but tlie subject attracted but little at- 

 tention until thirty or forty years later, since 

 which many botanists have given the subject 

 much attention. Our most eminent botanists 

 now classify flowering plants in their relation 

 to fertilization into two classes: Ancrnopliilous 

 and -K/itomo;>/(i/Yj us— literally, wind-lovers and 

 insect-lovers. Tlie flowers fertilized by the 

 wind are dull in color, and nearly destitute of 

 odor or lioney. The sexes are frequently sepa- 

 rated, either on the same or on separate ])lants. 

 They produce a superabundance of pollen, light 

 and dry, easily transported by the air or wind. 



Pines, firs, and other conifera, are familiar 

 examples, which sometimes fill a forest with 

 "showers of sulphur" when shedding their 

 pollen. Our nut-bearing trees are examples 

 among decidious trees. The grasses and grains 

 are familiar to all. A kernel of corn will grow 

 as well alone as with other plants; but •* the 

 ear will not fill " unless it can receive the wind- 

 wafted pollen from neighboring plants. On 

 the other hand, those plants which seem to 

 have need of bees or other insects to carry their 

 pollen from one flower to another have more 

 showy blossoms, with bright colors, or white, 

 which are showy at dusk, or they give out a 

 strong perfume or nectar, or both. The pollen 

 grains are moistor glutinous, or hairy, or other- 

 wise so constructed as to adhere to the insects 

 that visit them, and thus be carried from 

 flower to flower. In this class of plants or 

 flowers many ingenious arrangements are pro- 

 vided to secure cross-fertilization. One sex is 

 found in one blossom, and the other in another, 

 on the same plant, as in the squash and melon 

 families. In other species the sexes are found 

 upon separate plants, as the willow-trees. In 

 some plants the pistils appear first, and become 

 fertile before the stamens ripen their pollen. In 

 others the stamens shed their vitalizing dust 

 before the stigma of the pistil is ready to 

 receive it. 



The common red raspberry matures its pistils 

 first, so that, unless the bees or other insects 

 carry the pollen to it from other earlier blos- 

 soms, the fruit is imperfect. 



The partridge-berry is very interesting. The 

 blossoms upon about half of the plants produce 

 their stamens first; the other half, the pistil. 

 In a week or ten days the order is reversed in 

 the same flowers. 



Many flowers that invite insects appear to be 

 capable of self-fertilization, and often are; but 

 the pollen from som.e neighboring plant of the 

 same species seems more potent. Some flowers 

 are so constructed that the stamens are placed 

 so that their pollen can not fall upon the stig- 

 ma of the same flower, but with special adapta- 

 tion for the transport of pollen by insects from 

 one flower to another. One curious plant pro- 

 duces small inconspicuous flowers early in the 

 season, capable of self-fertilization; later in the 

 season it produces more showy flowers that can 

 become fertile only through the agency of in- 

 sects. 



Many plants remain constantly barren unless 

 they receive the visits of insects. Many of 

 your readers have doubtless observed how the 

 fucshia or begonia never produces seed in a 

 closed room; yet, when set out of doors in sum- 

 mer, they seed abundantly. Still other plants 

 never produce seed because the insects that 

 feed upon their blossoms have not been import- 

 ed with the plants. 



But this is a large subject, and to me one of 

 great interest, as I study the many ways the 



