April, 1921 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



209 



Fig. 7. — The plant and blossoms of the titi. This 



yields an inferior honey and a large quantity of it. 



Unfortunately, it is often mixed with gallberry and 



other honeys of good flavor. 



consumed in constant brood-rearing and fly- 

 ing every day for 11 or 12 months that the 

 beekeeper of the Southland should figure on 

 at least two or three pounds of honey to 

 maintain a colony to every pound 

 he will get for surplus. In many 

 instances the ratio would stand 

 four to one. In the far southern 

 States some of the best beekeep- 

 ers admit that, during the winter, 

 their bees have to raise two or 

 three families of brood before 

 they can get a family to gather 

 the honey. That means that the 

 hive will have to be filled with 

 brood two or three times, each 

 generation dying off before the 

 third or fourth generation can 

 gather the main crop. 



On the other hand, northern 

 bees, during winter for five or six- 

 months, are in a semi-dormant 

 state, during which they raise but 

 little brood, consume very few 

 stores, and last, but not least, re- 

 quire no attention. 



There are wonderful opportuni- 

 ties in this southeast section of 

 the Southland; but unless the 

 beekeeper can adapt himself to 

 the conditions he will make a mis- 

 take by moving from the North 

 to the South. 



After having been editor of 

 Gleanings for the last 36 years I 

 have come to this definite conclu- 

 sion: Barring some exceptions, 

 the average beeman will do better 

 in a locality where he has spent 

 most of life than he will to move 



to some other locality where the conditions 

 are radically different. It really takes 

 years to learn a locality; and I have ob- 

 served many and many a time that the 

 new beekeeper moving to the South is at 

 a very great disadvantage compared with 

 a man who has lived in the Southland all 

 his life. So I say, stay where you are unless 

 your health or some other consideration ab- 

 solutely demands a change. From a financial 

 point of view you will, the first year or two, 

 lose money. 



I have come to the conclusion that most 

 localities in the United States have their de- 

 cided drawbacks as well as their good fea- 

 tures. It is the drawbacks that the tender- 

 foot, or new man, encounters that put him to 

 a great disadvantage. Yes, I think the 

 greater the bee country the greater are some 

 of the obstacles to be overcome, and this is 

 particularly true of southeastern United 

 States and in California. 



In California particularly, especially in 

 the southern part, European and American 

 foul brood are ramjiant. Both diseases have 

 obtained an awful foothold, as brood-rearing 

 can progress there more or less all the year. 



While California is a wonderful bee coun- 

 try, producing more carloads of honey than 

 any other State, there are more failures and 

 partial failures of the honey crop there than 

 elsewhere. However, good beekeepers are 

 making money there. 



Fig. 8. — A dense mass of gallberry bushes. This plant yields 

 honey that i.s practically a duplicate in body, color, and flavor 

 of white clover. The biossoni that yields the honey is a small 

 raylike flower about % inch in diiuneter. The honey from it is 

 so superior that, when the plant begins to yield, the bees will 

 leave white tupelo that may be secreting nectar so abundantly 

 that the little transparent globules of nectar may be seen in the 

 blossom along the roadside, and seek the gallberry. 



