OCTOBER 15, 1916 



967 



BEEKEEPING IN CALIFORNIA 



P. C. Chadwick, 



The first general rain of the sea- 

 son is falling- today (Sept. 30). 



I was glad to have Mr. Frank E. 

 Cliff, page 614, July 15, verify my 

 connuents as to the handling of 

 by the emi?loyes of the Postoffice 

 The reading of Mr. Cliff's 



honey 



Department 



article will be well worth the time. 



]\tr. Doolittle's article on the middlemen, 

 page 782, Sept, 1, is timely and to the 

 jioint. The fact of the matter is that there 

 must be a middleman, and if the beekeeper 

 thru the medium of organization is not ready 

 to fill the gap it will continue to be filled 

 by one who exacts a profit for his labor. 



Our annual weather records are computed 

 I'l'om July 1 and all rain is figured from that 

 date. I'p to this date (Sept. 27) we have 

 had in this city an inch as measured by 

 official records, yet the value to the beekeep- 

 eis of this amount, falling as it has during 

 the summer months, amounts to practically 

 nothing as a factor on next year's crop. 



* » « 



J. L. Byer says, page 780, Sept. 1, " If 

 there is anything to be made in any busi- 

 ness, the man who stays with the job is the 

 one who will win out in the end " — and he 

 is right. My father spoke those words to 

 me twenty-five years ago and he Avon out. 

 However he was later nearly ruined finan- 

 cially by the great Kaw Valley flood of 1903. 



* * » 



Tt seems I owe Mr. M. J. Meeker, our 

 county inspector, an apology, in that T 

 quoted him as favoring the caging of queens 

 in tlie treatment of black or European foul 

 brood. Instead he informs me he is oppos- 

 ed to the caging of queens in the treatment 

 of this disease, giving as his reason that a 

 queen not showing sufficient strength of 

 stock to resist the disease in the start is not 

 worth any future trials against the disease. 

 His reasoning is backed by experiments, and 

 to most of us must seem logical. I am 

 pleased to make this correction as I con- 

 fused his conversation with that of another 

 party. * « .* 



IMPERIAL valley's PECULIAR SEASON, 



T am handed some notes taken by a friend 

 during a conversation with Mr, J. W. 

 George relative to conditions in the Imperial 



Redlands, Cal. 



Valley, which I heiewith present with a few 

 remarks of my own. According to Mr. 

 George there are several conditions that 

 have worked against the success of the bee- 

 keepers of that section during the past sea- 

 son. A change of climate is given as one 

 cause, but 1 am of the opinion it should not 

 be termed a change of climate so much as a 

 peculiar season, which has been the case on 

 this side of the range. There was an in- 

 crease in the acreage of cotton and conse- 

 quently a decrease in the acreage of alfalfa; 

 a shortage of water for irrigation purposes, 

 causing a lighter secretion of nectar; gi-ass- 

 hopi^ers ; a warm early season with a short 

 flow, followed by cold, reducing the bee 

 force greatly, Mr, George says that the 

 average per colony will not exceed 60 

 pounds, the normal yield being from 120 to 



180. 



» * * 



THE END OF THE SEASON. 



With the close of this month (September) 

 ^he season of 1916 may be said to have 

 closed. It is possible there may be a few 

 localities where a light flow of surplus may 

 be gathered, but they -are few and far be- 

 tween. In southern (California as a rule the 

 season has been a sad disappointment, and 

 this is also true of the central and northern 

 valleys to a large extent. Inyo County seems 

 to have been favored by a good crop if all 

 reports are true, while the Imperial country 

 is by far below its usual output. In this 

 part of the state the early prospects were 

 never better up to the first of March, but 

 at this time the rain stopped short, and we 

 were the victims of warm dry' Aveather that 

 shortened our crop materially. So we now 

 stai't thru another winter with high hopes 

 that only a beekeeper can possess. When a 

 beekeeper loses hope it is equivalent to an 

 apiary for sale or the beginning of a run- 

 doAvn yard that no one Avould pay much for, 



[Early in the season, the prospects for 

 a big yield in California Avere never better. 

 The rains had been coming on just right; 

 and had it not been for the hot dry winds 

 there is every probability that there would 

 have been a big yield. The shortage of the- 

 erop in California and other parts of the 

 West has offset tlie big crop in the East in 

 the clover region. Had there been a large 

 yield in the West as well as in tlie East, 

 prices certainly Avould have taken a tumble. 

 As it is, they are nearly liolding their own 

 in the East, and are more than holding 

 their own in the West, — Ed.] 



