512 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



July, 1917 



BEES IN THE MIDDLE WEST 



Sweet Clover Making a New Future 

 for Beekeeping in a Land Already 

 Favorable for Honey Production 



By E. R. Root 



HORACE 

 G r e € 1 ey, 



when he 

 gave out the 

 slogan i n the 

 early 60's, "Go 

 west, young 

 man," must have 

 had in mind the 



territory comprised by Indiana, Illinois, 

 Iowa, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota. 

 At all events, beginning with the western 

 part of Ohio the soil seems to grow richer 

 and darker, increasing in fertility and depth 

 clear up into Kansas, Nebraska, and the 

 Dakotas. 



Some of the most productive land it has 

 ever been ray pleasure to see has been on 

 a recent trip across the country to attend 

 the field meet at Sioux City, la., located on 

 the western border, and overlooking 

 Nebraska and South Dakota. Indeed, from 

 the hills around the city itself one can look 

 over into three states. 



Where I have seen good deep rich land 

 on my various trips I have also found that 

 bees flourish. The real honey-plants that 

 yield table honey in quantity grow on good 

 land, as a rule, altho there are some marked 

 exceptions, as in the ease of mountain sage 

 of California and the sweet clover of the 

 whole United Stales. But sweet clover 

 thrives better on good land. 



When all patriotic farmers are speeding 

 up food production thruout the country, it 

 did my heart good to see the immense 

 amount of land that is being cultivated this 

 spring. I think I never saw so nuieh plow- 

 ing and harrowing. Pastures and meadows 

 are being plowed up to grow wheat and 

 corn. The plowing up of clover-fields did 



not make me 

 h a p p y, but I 

 said if the world 

 can be better fed 

 by plowing up 

 our m e a d ws 

 and pastures of 

 clover, then I 

 welcome it. As 

 a general thing, land devoted to corn and 

 wheat does not help the beekeeper except 

 in a very small way, for the pollen; but 

 land plowed to alfalfa, and especially to 

 sweet clover, means a great deal to the 

 honey-j^roducer. 



The thing that delighted me was that 

 many of the western ranchmen are begin- 

 ning to learn that sweet clover is almost as 

 valuable as alfalfa. It grows more readily 

 than alfalfa, and as pasture does not bloat 

 cattle like alfalfa. The result of it is 

 that the business of honey production in 

 the middle West is starting up in a way 

 that is going to mean a gi'eat deal for the 

 future of the beekeepei'. 



In the western part of Iowa the land is 

 more rolling and quite hilly. Some of the 

 hills are so steep that it is impossible for 

 either plow or harrow to reach them. But 

 some of the ranchmen have learned that 

 sweet clover will gTow on these tops. All 

 that is necessai-y, I am told, is to scatter 

 seed over these hills and let dame Nature 

 do the rest. When the sweet clover gets 

 well under way, the cattle and bees are 

 turned loose. 



As my train neared Sioux City, la., I 

 noticed the land became more rolling and 

 hilly, with vast stretches of deep rich land 

 between the hills. The soil is so deep and 

 rich that it needs no renewing; and the mar- 



Fig. 1. — Sergeant Bluff, near Sioux City, la^ 

 Iowa, on top of which sweet clover is grown., 



This is one of the characteristic hillis iu western 



