SlCPTKMBKR, 1922 



gtjEaninor in bee culture 



505 



HEADS OF GRAIN I £?pQ^ m DIFFERENT FIELDS 



Robbing a Means 1 li.ive, us ;i rule, seen 

 of Selection. robbing inentioiied as a 



Icind of inexplicable oc- 

 currence, or sad tliievish trait in the char- 

 acter of tlie otherwise so virtuous bee, 

 sliglitly liinting at tlie sad occurrence even 

 in the animal world of the original sin. 1 ad- 

 mit that it is a very annoying thing, and 

 under modern conditions even a very bane- 

 ful thing, inasmuch as it is an effective 

 means of spreading disease. But considered 

 under natural (not domestic) conditions, it 

 seems to me to be a most effective means of 

 selection; the means by which the weaker 

 strains were eliminated, and only the strong 

 ones loft to perjietuate tlie race. 



St. Thomas, Virgin Islands. Axel Ilolst. 



Wild Cucumber Near my home is a Mis- 

 a Honey Plant, souri Eiver bluff about 

 three miles long and 150 

 feet high. It is no exaggeration to say that 

 this bluff is completely covered with wild 

 cucumber vines. They have choked out the 

 underbrush, climbed the trees and covered 

 hundreds of feet square with a thick car- 

 pet. This condition has prevailed only for 

 two years, the vines formerly not being no- 

 ticeable in any way. 



It blooms for four or five weeks, and u]) 

 until noon is alive with bees, wasps, flies 

 and many other insects. It seems to yield 

 large quantities of nectar, and the bees go 

 wild over it. Last year four stands of my 

 bees averaged 60 pounds from this source, 

 there being practically nothing else for 

 tiiem to work on. The honey has an excel- 

 lent flavor, better than clover to my mind, 

 and is very thick, with a light amber color. 



Last year one vine grew out of a small 

 hotbed in my back yard and was allowed to 

 mature. It completely covered a space 35 

 by 70 feet, went all over a large cherry tree, 

 and I think would have entered the house 

 if allowed. The main stalk of this plant 

 was thicker than a man 's wrist and had a 

 taproot four feet long. 



The early honey flow in this vicinity was 

 a complete failure, none of my bees storing 

 enough to winter them — to say nothing of 

 surplus. All beekeepers I know are in the 

 same boat, so the wild cucumber is a big 

 help. 



Incidentally, the wild cucumber last year 

 choked out many acres of elderberry bushes, 

 much to the chagrin of the home brewers. 



Kansas City, Mo. C. J. Latham, 



I Wild cucumber is usually identified as 

 Holiiiiociixlis lolmtn, also called the wild bal- 

 sam apple. It is thus determined by Pellett 

 in his book on honey plants. There are, 

 however, several other climbing vines, 

 which belong to the gourd family or Cucur- 



bitaceae, and are known as climbing cucum- 

 ber vines, as the star cucumber (l^icyos aii- 

 (jiilafu.-i) and creeping cucumber (Mrlolhria 

 pendula). They occur in many eastern states 

 and extend westward to Kansas and Mis- 

 souri. Specimens of the flowers and leaves 

 are, therefore, very desirable for determina- 

 tion with certainty. Blue vine is also very 

 abundant on the bottom lands of the Mis- 



Wild nifumTiPr in bloom. 



soui'i River in tlic state of Missouri, espe- 

 cially in Chariton County. Assuming that 

 wild cucumber is Echiiioci/stis lohitla it has 

 been reported to yield a white honey in cer- 

 tain localities in the bottom lands of the 

 Mississippi and Missouri Rivers. In the 

 Beekeepers ' Review, November, 1902, at 

 Humboldt, in the southwest corner of Ne- 

 braska, "the garden of the state" it is de- 

 scribed as on stream flats covering the 

 ground completely and tree trunks, trans- 

 forming the forest into a scene of surpass- 

 ing beauty. "Each vine bears clusters of 

 small white flowers, Avhich yield honey abun- 

 dantly until the vine is killed by frost." I 

 have cultivated wild cucumber in my gar- 

 den at Waldoboro, Maine, and enclose a 

 photograph of the flower, Jiatural size. It 

 proved to be practically nectarless here, 

 and was very rarely visited by bees. How- 

 ever, all the species of the gourd family are 

 nectariferous, and it is very likely that un- 

 der favorable conditions, in a climate where 

 it flourished as a wild plant, it would yield 

 nectar freely. — J. H. Lovell.] 



