November, 1907. 



American Hae Journal 



turn are lobed, one lip showing two 

 lobes and the other three. 



The stamens are as peculiar as are the 

 petals, or showy parts of tlie flowers. 

 Each filament bears at its end a longer 

 or shorter sort of a balance pole, which 

 is termed the connective, thus all is T- 

 shaped ; and at the ends of this are 

 the anthers, that produce the pollen- 

 grains. Often the ends of this con- 

 nective are not equal, as noted in the 

 white sage, and often one of the fila- 

 ments is wanting. The arrangement of 

 the stamens, the lips of the flower, and 

 the stigma, are all such as to secure 

 cross-pollination, and the great nectar- 

 drop at the base of the bloom is to at- 

 tract the bee, that she may not fail in 

 her part of this important office. 



All the mints are nectar-producing 

 plants, and so are valuable honey-plants. 

 The horsemint and the white and black 

 or ball sage are among the most noted, 

 as they are among the best. So far as I 

 know, all the mints produce honey that 

 is white,, and of delicious flavor. In 

 many places various of the mints are 

 grown for commercial purposes, and in 

 such cases are often, plenteous enough 

 to be of value to the bee-keeper. We 

 all know the worth of motherwort and 

 catnip, and wise is he who sees that 

 these plants are thick in waste-places 

 about his apiary. I know of no plant 

 in the East that pays better for plant- 

 ing along railroads, etc., than does 

 motherwort. 



The white and ball sages of Califor- 

 nia are of great importance, as they both 

 furnish honey that is very white, very 

 delicious, and the quantity is often phe- 

 nomenal. There is a good reason for 

 this latter. The plants are of a kind 

 that yield heavily, and besides, the blos- 

 soms on the ball sage, as the name indi- 

 cates, come out in balls and open in 

 successive periods, and so are in bloom 

 a long time. The white sage is equally 

 prolonged in its period of blooming. 

 Here the flowers are in long racemes, 

 and as the opening commences below 

 and proceeds gradually to the tip, the 

 time of bloom is very great. It is not 

 uncommon to find flowers for the space 

 of six weeks. Both of these plants 

 usually commence to bloom in late May 

 or early June, yet the time varies not a 

 little. The period of bloom is still fur- 

 ther lengthened by the locality of the 

 plants. Often they are on the plains 

 at or below the mouth of the canyon, 

 and then e.xtend up into the latter, and 

 this still further prolongs the period of 

 bloom. 



It is not at all improbable that the 

 value of the sages could be much in- 

 creased b}' artificial means. At one of 

 our farmer's institutes in San Diego, 

 Mr. Harbison, of bee-keeping fame, 

 stated that he had set the black sage at 

 a great profit. There are acres and 

 acres of land all along the mountains of 

 Southern California, which can never 

 be brought into profitable cultivation, as 

 they are in old washes, and so are so 

 stoney that to cultivate them would be 

 quite impossible. These are often cov- 

 ered with sage. In many cases the sage 

 is absent. I believe that it could be in- 

 troduced in many places, and that in 

 this way barren spots mig'ht become val- 

 uable. 



Of late it is the practice to flood these 

 wastes in winter by spreading the water 

 from the mountain streams, so that what 

 would be run off^ is thus conveyed into 

 the great gravel reservoirs. This is a 

 very wise thing to do, and will surely 

 be practiced m«re and more, as water 

 vi-ill greatly aid in clothing these waste 

 places with these valuable honey plants. 



I believe that these sages can be im- 

 mensely increased with a little labor, 

 and thus bee-keeping and the general 

 horticulture and agriculture of the sec- 

 tion will be immensely increased. Agri- 

 cultural and pomology need the bees 

 to do the necessary work of pollination, 

 while the sages will make the bees so 

 profitable that they will be kept in great 

 abundance, and thus a great double 

 benefit will come as a result of this wise 

 planting. 



Claremont, Calif. 



Breeding of Bees— When Done 



BY G. M. DOOLITTLE 



There came in my multitudinous mail 

 of a day or two ago, a letter with ques- 

 tions about bees. This is not peculiar, 

 for I have spent much of my time for 

 the past 30 years answering questions 

 about bees and bee-keeping. But there 

 \vas one question in this letter that was 

 peculiar, and I am going to use it as a 

 text to say a few words to the readers 

 of the "Old Reliable," which means the 

 American Bee Journal. The question 

 reads as follows : 



"Will you please answer through the 

 -\merican Bee Journal the following 

 question : 'Where will bees hatch the 

 soonest, in the cellar or out-of-doors? 

 And which will be the best hatching, in 

 February, March or April ?' " 



Before answering the above question 

 I wish to say that from its wording, 

 and the general tone of the other ques- 

 tions which the letter contains, I judge 

 the questioner is a beginner in apicul- 

 ture, and, if so, I desire to say a word 

 to him, and also to all other beginners 

 who have thought, or will think, of ask- 

 ing questions on bees. 



The first thing to do in starting in the 

 bee-business is to get one of the many 

 good books on apiculture, aM of which 

 teach the first principles of our pur- 

 suit. Thoroughly read the book, for in 

 it you will find the most of the ques- 

 tions answered which you will be likely 

 to want to ask before you get past the 

 rudiments of this branch of agriculture. 

 This is a duty you not only owe to j-our- 

 self, but one you owe to others as well. 

 While I am, and have always been, will- 

 ing to answer all questions which come 

 to me, (having answered hundreds and 

 thousands when the questioner felt too 

 poor to enclose a stamp to pay the re- 

 turn postage), yet it is not fair to the 

 older bee-keepers who are readers of the 

 American Bee Journal, to have its col- 

 umns filled up with questions and an- 

 swers which are of such a primitive na- 

 ture that they will be of no use or inter- 

 est to the great majority. After you 

 have thoroughly mastered all there is in 

 any one of such books as "Langstroth 

 on the Honey Bee," "Cook's Manual of 

 the Apiary," "Quinby's New Bee-Keep- 



ing," or "Root's A B C of Bee-Culture," 

 then your questions will be such as will 

 be of interest to all. 



Hoping that the above will be taken 

 only in the kindly spirit in which it has 

 been given, I will offer a few of my 

 thoughts and ideas on the queries above 

 propounded. 



First, then, we have, "Where will bees 

 hatch the soonest, in the cellar or out- 

 doors?" To this I will say, that, as a 

 rule, bees commence to breed much the 

 soonest out-doors, with the exception 

 of where a very warm cellar is used, 

 and in this case my experience says they 

 are not likely to winter as well as they 

 would where the cellar was cool enough 

 so that the mercury stood at from 40 to 

 50 degrees therein. I know that there 

 are advocates of warm cellars for win- 

 tering bees, but my experience with cel- 

 lars where the mercury was likely to 

 run above 50 degrees has been anything 

 but a success. 



To the second question. "Which will 

 be the best hatching?" I will say, that 

 here our questioner makes a mistake, 

 for in the breeding of bees there are 

 young bees in all stages of maturity, 

 from the egg to the mature bee just 

 ready to emerge, or already emerging 

 from the cell; so that there is no regu- 

 lar hatching, as is the case with eggs 

 incubated by the mother hen, or in an 

 incubator ; but young bees are emerging 

 or "hatching," as our correspondent puts 

 it, all the time for a period of nearly 

 nine months, or from January till No- 

 vember, if out-doors ; or from April to 

 November if wintered in the cellar. 



When the bees first commence to 

 breed, but a few hundred eggs are laid 

 by the queen or mother-bee, and as 

 these eggs hatch into Jarvae, more are 

 laid, sparingly at first ; but as the sea- 

 son advances, an increase in prolific- 

 ness is the result, till in June the queen 

 is laying at the rate of from 2,000 to 

 4,000 eggs daily, so that now the hive 

 is soon populous with bees, resulting 

 in swarming, unless the apiarist takes 

 measures for the prevention of the same. 

 As the season draws to a close, the 

 queen restricts her egg-laying, so that 

 in October few if any more eggs are laid 

 than in February, hence the colony is 

 kept only about so populous, during the 

 three summer months. 



Now about early breeding: The 

 questioner conveys the idea through his 

 questions that he thinks the earlier the 

 bees breed the better. The time was 

 when nearly all thought the same, but 

 experience with many of us has proven 

 that some of the old notions of the past 

 were mistaken ones, for such early 

 breeding results in the wearing out 

 of two old bees to wiiere one young 

 one is produced, owing to the great 

 strain on the vitality of the colony en- 

 gaged therein, which strain is always 

 required to produce the necessary de- 

 gree of heat for brood-rearing in cool 

 or cold weather; while if breeding can 

 be delayed till settled warm weather 

 comes, the old bees can then produce 

 3 or 4 young workers to wbere one of 

 these old bees die off, and that with less 

 strain on the colony than is required 

 when the bees are kept confined to the 

 hive by cold and unpropitious weather. 

 The heat inside tlie cluster of a colony 



