February, 1917 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



109 



particular yard. About the same kind of 

 liives and equipments are used for all the 

 yards, so a view of this apiary will serve 

 to show them all. The reader will notice 

 that there is nothing particularly dilapidat- 

 ed in this yard, which is a fair sample of 

 all of them. The main thing is that the 

 colonies are all in fine condition. Regular 

 Jumbo hives are shown in the foreground, 

 with others of a different type in the back- 

 ground. Mr. Byer is using eight and ten 

 frame Langstroth hives, and also at his 

 Cashel yard hives even deeper than the 

 Jumbo. He therefore has an excellent 

 opportunity of comparing the relative 

 merits. 



We have asked him to tell in one or more 

 articles of the good and bad points of all 

 his liives. Ke admits there are some pe- 

 culiar advantages in favor of the Jumbo 

 hive, both for the production of honey and 

 for keeping down swarming. The en- 

 trances of these big liives, however, were 

 about 1x3 inches.. When we asked him 

 if the mice did not bother him he said they 

 did not, because he kept strychnine scat- 

 tered around in each yard. We asked if 

 it would not be an advantage to have larger 

 entrances as recommended by the Dadants. 



" Perhaps " was his reply. But he has 

 not had any trouble from these entrances. 



It is true that Mr. Byer started in a small 

 way. He bought 27 colonies, giving his 

 note for $108.* He wintered 25 of them 

 successfully, procured a crop of honey, 

 and, after paying off the note and putting 

 his bees into winter quarters, he had $110 

 left. With this amount as a beginning he 

 " bought more bees " and has been buying 

 and making increase ever since, until now 

 he has something over 700 colonies, and 

 colonies they were, mind jou. He gives his 

 wife credit for much of his success, as she 

 has been a good home - maker and has 

 put ill many hard days with the uneapping- 

 knife. 



The past season was Mr, Byer's best. 

 He is not giving out to the public what he 

 did; but we will say this: A man must 

 be something of a beekeeper who can take 

 the equipment that he has, consisting of 

 big and little liives, some of them thirty 

 or forty years old, and get the crop he did 

 and does get from year to year. While 

 location, no doubt, plays a very important 

 part in this case, the hives could not and 

 would not do it. We must, therefore, give 

 credit to the man and his methods. 



M 



SAN JOAQUIN VALLEY 



The Enormous Waste in Parts of 



California. A Great Opportunity 



for Progressive 'Beekeepers 



By Florence B. Richardson 



ANY east- 

 ern people 

 are coming 

 into the San Joa- 

 quin Valley o f 

 California each 

 year, and many 

 more would come 

 if they were as- 

 sured of a living. Xot every one is adapt- 

 ed to the bee business as a single source 

 of income; but tliousands more colonies 

 could be profitably kept by diversified farm- 

 ers if 4 hey but realized the fact. 



Bees are not only profitable on the honey 

 count but are of inestimable value to the 

 great orcliards thruout the country, yet 

 there are orchards of many thousands of 

 trees in this valley with no bees at all, 

 and many more with only a couple of hives. 

 To be sure, the orchardist himself has little 

 or no time to attend to them; and if any 

 are kept, the women of the family are the 

 owners. If there were anj^ big beekeepers 

 near they would doubtless be glad to use 

 the borders of the orchard as an out-apiary 

 for the blooming period. 



The first thing that eveiy Easterner no- 

 tices in California is the waste — waste of 



everything; fruit 

 under the trees, 

 lying in heaps as 

 it has fallen, that 

 in the far East 

 would be consid- 

 ered very usable; 

 watermelons lying 

 i n windrows i n 

 the fields because it doesn't pay to pick 

 them up for marketing late in the season ; 

 enough vegetables to supply a city, going 

 to waste in every town, and no om seems to 

 be worrying about it. In fact, when the 

 Easterner who has undoubtedly been used 

 to getting a small amount of fruit for a 

 large amount of money, speaks of this 

 waste, the inhabitants look pityingly at so 

 daring a person, and stamp him at once as 

 a new comer. 



The finest Malaga grapes I ever saw, 

 great perfect bunches that would weigh 

 from three to five pounds each, and every 

 single grape as perfect as a nursery-man's 



* Mr. Byer says he told the man of whom he 

 bought that he hadn't ii dollar, and he did not 

 know how he fould pay for them. Tlie old fellow 

 looked at hitn a minute and said, " Young man, I 

 have cnufidenoe in you. You give me your note and 

 you will make good," and he did. 



