Gleanings in Bee Culture 



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p. C. Chadwick, Redlands, Cal. 



Bees in this locality are in much better 

 condition, on an average, than they were a 

 year ago. 



The carpet of green vegetation caused by 

 the early rains will add greatly in holding 

 iuture rains until the soil can absorb it. 

 4>- 



Page 616, the paragraph relative to the 

 poisoning of skunks, I should have used the 

 word strychnine instead of arsenic. The 

 latter is loo slow, while the former usually 

 lets them get but a few feet from the bait. 

 4>- 



I should like to have every California 

 reader of Gleanings read at least the last 

 five lines of column one and the first seven 

 of the second column, page 615, Oct. 15. 

 Mr. Crane has written the equal of an en- 

 tire chapter in twelve lines. 



DO BEES DESERT SUPERS TO KEEP THEM- 

 SELVES WARM? 



Arthur C. Miller's "Bee Behavior," page 

 663, Nov. 1, is interesting reading. I am 

 not ready to comment generally on his sug- 

 gestions until I have experimented some- 

 what. During our frosty nights the past 

 week I observed enough to reach the con- 

 clusion that his views in regard to bees not 

 drawing down out of the supers to keep the 

 brood warm, but to keep themselves warm, 

 would be hard to prove either way — the fact 

 being that they cluster for mutual protec- 

 tion, whether they have brood or not, but al- 

 ways around brood, if any, for its protection, 

 and over great areas of eggs in the spring 

 where there is little brood of an age that 

 could possibly produce warmth. I doubt 

 the "warming-pan" theory. 



4!- 



PROOF THAT BEES FLY LONG DISTANCES. 



Our Tremont yard is located at an eleva- 

 tion of 600 ft., at a distance of three miles 

 from the nearest orange-trees. About every 

 other year the sage fails to yield, leaving us 

 dependent on the orange alone for our crop, 

 and there has not been a season in the 18 

 years the yard has been located at this place 

 when it has not given a surplus, with only 

 ten cases, 1904 being the nearest to a failure. 

 I mention this more especially to call atten- 

 tion to the distance traveled, for there are 

 many who do not believe a bee will fly so 

 far for nectar. There can be absolutely no 

 doubt in this case, for it has been proven 

 year after year during this long period of 

 time. I have proof, too, that bees some- 

 times travel seven miles to the orange; but 

 I do not believe that such distances are com- 

 mon, being made only where the entire 

 flight is directed to one source of special at- 

 traction. That good progress can be made 

 at three miles is shown by the fact that this 

 apiary gathers as much per colony as those 

 two miles nearer the orange. 



SAGE RANGES DOOMED. 



If I should predict that thirty years hence 

 the sage ranges of California would be al- 

 most a thing of the past there would doubt- 

 less be criticism of my views; but I firmly 

 believe that, by that time, we shall face 

 such a condition, for emigration to this part 

 of California is increasing rapidly, and our 

 State has recently voted a large sum to in- 

 duce it. Hillsides are yielding to the plow 

 where, twenty years ago, it would have been 

 thought almost impossible. By that time 

 most of the available water supply will have 

 been developed. The small goat-ranches that 

 are appearing will spread over our ranges. A 

 generation yet unborn will be seeking a ref- 

 uge from the less desirable climate of the 

 East and North. They will all have to be 

 cared for, and a way found by which they 

 can help produce life-sustaining elements. 

 Hundreds of acres now in sage will yield to 

 spineless cactus or some other valuable plant 

 of a semi-arid region of the world, that the 

 Agricultural Department is now searching 

 for, and, I am told, with some success. 



QUEER THINGS ABOUT BEES. 



In the December issue of The Technical 

 World is an article entitled "Queer Things 

 about Bees," by Edward F. Bigelow, accom- 

 panied by some of the finest engravings I 

 have ever seen. Mr. Bigelow takes a broad- 

 side at the ignorance of the bee-keeping fra- 

 ternity in general, and then shows a lack of 

 knowledge on some points himself. He 

 tells in the same article how the eggs of bees 

 are deposited in the cells; how they hatch, 

 and then says that bees in embryo are fed 

 on "royal jelly." Imagine what a comb 

 would look like if all larva? were fed only on 

 royal jelly! An instance is also cited where 

 a hee carried a grain of sand, presumably 

 for ballast. As a reason for the hexagonal 

 shape of the comb cells, he says, "forced 

 into hexagonal form by physical environ- 

 ment." The article will, no doubt, be read 

 very widely, and it seems too bad that the 

 writer had not been better informed, so that 

 these misleading statements might have 

 been avoided. 



Many bee-keepers have been drawn into 

 the business by their love of nature and the 

 study of the bees as a part of nature's field, 

 and this interest has developed into a never- 

 ending love for the work as well as a practi- 

 cal and commercial knowledge. The writer 

 is one such, and has been more or less of a 

 close student of nature for a number of 

 years. 



[Some authorities have stated that work- 

 er larva^ are fed on royal jelly for the first 

 three days, then on a coarser and less con- 

 centrated food, while the larvae intended 

 to produce queens are so fed right along. 

 What the truth really is, we do not know. 

 —Ed.] 



