1921 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



S3 



importance of this limited section is 

 increasing yearly. It does not ex- 

 tend much farther nort hthan Knox 

 county, nor farther east than Spen- 

 cer county. 



Region 7; Smartweed 



Where the bhievine ends, however, 

 the region of best yields from smart- 

 weed begins. That is to say, from 

 Knox county northward to Vermillion 

 county. In this limited area smart- 

 weed, following clover, makes a sec- 

 tion for surplus honey not to be de- 

 spised; in short, one of the very good 

 ones in the entire State. If clover 

 happens to be good, also, the j'ields 

 may become astonishing, and all the 

 honey is white and saleable, and sells 

 as readily as pure clover honey. 

 Smartweed may be considered the 

 main source of surplus honey in Sul- 

 livan, Vigo and Vermillion counties. 

 An average of 100 pounds per colony 

 is not infrequently reported here. 



From Vermillion county northward, 

 to the Kankakee valley lands, in 

 Fountain, Warren, Benton, Tippeca- 

 noe and White counties, the farming 

 land is the best in all the State, but 

 there is in all this section no distinc- 

 tive source of surplus honey, none 

 very dependable. White clover is but 

 fair, having been almost eradicated 

 by the high degree of tilling of the 

 lands for farming; alsike clover is 

 but scantily sown, and sweet clover 

 has not yet gained much of a foot- 

 hold. The fall flows are good only in 

 limited areas. Goldenrod does not 

 seem to yield much, if any, honey, 

 and the bees are almost never seen 

 working it. Smartweed does not 

 count much except in very wet sea- 

 sons. Some Spanish needle is found, 

 but only local and scattering. 



Just east of Warren county, begin- 

 ning about Tippecanoe county, and 

 extending for a narrow strip along 

 the Wabash river northeast, the 

 white sweet clover is about as good 

 as anywhere in the State; for miles 

 along the highways and railroads, in- 

 terurban lines and in the waste lands 

 generally, the sweet clover yield is 

 the best in any county, save possibly 

 the eastern strip of Indiana named 

 above. It reaches into the region of 

 best white clover. 

 Region 8; Kankakee Valley Marsh 



It remains to consider the north- 

 western section as unique and dis- 

 tinct in honey-flora, as is the south- 

 western section. The valley lands of 

 the Kankakee River are almost an- 

 nually inundated where not well 

 drained by the large irrigation and 

 drainage ditches. Much of the sur- 

 rounding land is marshy, and only 

 partially reclaimed, and that, too, 

 rather recently. Reclamation is still 

 going on. In general the region in- 

 cludes large portions of Laporte, 

 Starke, Lake, Newton and Jasper 

 counties. Some of the best and best- 

 known beekeepers of all the Hoosier 

 State are located in this region, both 

 in Indiana and also across the border 

 in Illinois. Here white clover can 

 not be counted on for surplus oftener 

 than once in five years. The main 

 flow is in fall, from buckwheat (the 



one buckwheat region of Indiana), 

 from Button-ball (Cephalanthus oc- 

 cidentalis), ' Spanish needle (Bidens 

 Bipinnata), milkweed (Asclepias in- 

 carnata), boneset or thorowort (Eu- 

 patorium), together with wild asters. 

 .'Ml these make up a flow that is very 

 dependable. When white clover hap- 

 pens to have its "innings," as it did 

 two years ago, the yields secured are 

 astonishing. In those cases, the con- 

 ditions are much like northeast Ohio, 

 where, though the main flow is from 

 fall sources, the years when the clo- 

 vers do make good give a double 

 chance for surplus that makes the 

 smile of the beemen one "that won't 

 come off." 



A glance at the accompanying re- 

 gional map of Indiana may help to 

 make plain the seven more or less 

 overlapping areas here described. 



The regions, while more or less dis- 

 tinctive, are not bounded by hard and 

 fast lines, of course, except for the 

 southwest and northwest portions of 

 the State. The Kankakee region and 

 the bluevine region could almost be 

 outlined with a rope. Of these seven 

 regions, four or five offer consider- 

 able inducements to commercial bee- 

 keeping, some of which are as good 

 as are to be found in the central west. 

 Specialists are to be found in almost 

 every part of the State, and as the 

 number of colonies is variously 

 given from 150,000 to 250,000, the 

 aphorism of Mr. Townsend is proba- 

 bly as true for Indiana as for the bal- 

 ance of the United States, viz.: 



"'Nine-tenths of the honey of the 

 markets is produced by one-tenth of 

 the beekeepers." 



Indiana has not a honey flora that 

 will give big yields without good bee- 

 keeping methods, and the slogan is 

 especially true for Hoosier beedom: 



'"Better keep bees better, or better 

 not keep bees." 



WILD THYME IN NEW YORK 



We have received some interesting 

 information in regard t wild thyn.e 

 from J. B. Merwin, of Prattsville, N. 

 Y. Mr. Merwin lives in a section 

 where this plant has successfully es- 

 tablished itself over several square 

 miles 'of territory. He writes that he 

 never fails to secure a good crop from 

 that source each year, although in 

 wet seasons it does not do so well. In 

 1914 the thyme was established over 

 an area of about ten miles square, but 

 the past summer he has found it 

 growing 18 fniles east and about the 

 same distance north of his home. 



The honey from thyme is very light 

 amber in color, of good body and 

 very good flavor. Customers like the 

 flavor very much and once tried, the 

 customer always wants the thyme 

 honey again. Mr. Merwin states 

 that although the quality is very good 

 the bees do not winter on it quite as 

 well as on clover honey. It begins 

 to bloom about the 15th of July, just 

 at the close of the basswood flow, and 

 lasts until killed by frost, sometimes 

 blooming into November. In 25 years 

 it has never entirely failed, even when 

 no honey was secured from anything 



else. As high as 125 pounds per col- 

 ony average has been secured from 

 thyme in one season. 



Thyme came originally from Eu- 

 rope, and IS gradually spreading in 

 the regions where it has become es- 

 tablished. It is now reported from 

 various localities from Nova Scotia 

 to Southern New York, and also from 

 North Carolina. In a few localities 

 in Massachusetts it is a well-known 

 source of honey, as it is also in south- 

 western Vermont. It occurs also in 

 Connecticut, but we can find no rec- 

 ord of any locality where it is suf- 

 ficiently established to furnish honey 

 in large quantity. 



In Delaware County, New York, 

 where Mr. Merwin lives, it is com- 

 monly called "summer savory" or "sa- 

 vory." This name is incorrect, as the 

 savory is a different plant. Britton 

 and Brown state that it has the fol- 

 lowing old English names: Brother- 

 wort, hillwort, penny-mountain and 

 shepherd's thyme. 



Where it is well established the 

 thyme covers the ground with a car- 

 pet and it furnishes a good forage for 

 animals as well as bees, coming as 

 it does in midsummer. Mr. Merwin 

 states that there is no land too poor 

 for it, nor winter too cold or summer 

 too dry to prevent the plant from 

 thriving in his region. In a very dry 

 summer it has covered a gravelly hill- 

 side with a luxuriant growth. Many 

 of the farmers keep cows which are 

 grazed on thyme during the summer 

 months. It is very persistent and 

 hard to eradicate, once it gets estab- 

 lished. Farmers who tried to get rid 

 of it made but poor progress. One 

 who tried to kill it out by plowing, 

 only made a better seedbed for it and 

 it grew more luxuriantly than ever. 



TAKE AN INVENTORY 



By E. S. Miller 

 Do not fail at the beginning of the 

 year to take a complete inventory of 

 all supplies, as well as ill honey, wax, 

 etc., if you are a business beekeeper. 

 To get at the value of hives and other 

 paraphernalia, ascertain from the 

 catalogs the replacement value, or 

 what it would cost new. Then deduct 

 for depreciation. For example, if the 

 average hive-body with good care 

 will last fifty years, the depreciation 

 will be 2 per cent for every year the 

 hives have been in use. If a cover 

 is good for 25 years, then 4 per cent 

 should be deducted. If the life of a 

 bottom-board is 20 years, deduct from 

 replacement value 5 per cent for each 

 year of use. Of course, the life of a 

 hi\e, and consequently the rate of 

 depreciation, will depend upon the 

 care given. With outdoor wintering, 

 depreciation is a much larger item 

 than if colonies are wintered in a dry 

 cellar. The diflerence between an- 

 nual inventory values plus cash re- 

 ceipts, less cash expenditures, less 

 cost of labor and other items such as 

 rent, interest, etc., will enable one to 

 figure net profits and cost of pro- 

 duction. The commercial honey pro- 

 ducer will, of course, have a more 

 elaborate system of accounting. 



