July 20, 1899. 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL, 



451 



for the very g^ood reason that they do not do it, no more 

 than do bees pierce sound fruit. 



I wish an}' one who finds what they think is plant- 

 secreted honey-dew would send me a sample of the plant 

 with the honey-dew on it. Claremont, Calif., June 4. 



Are Italian Bees Yellow or Maroon ? 



BY DR. C. C. MILLER. 



A "STRAY STRAW" in Gleaning-s in Bee-Culture for 

 July 1, reads as follows : 



" G. M. Doolittle says, in American Bee Journal, ' I 

 never saw a single worker-bee from an imported queen that 

 had any yeltozv on it at all. The color was always a maroon, 

 chestnut, or leather color, not yellow." My imported queens, 

 or those that I bought for imported, have always had work- 

 ers that I called yellow. Now the question is. Have I been 

 swindled, or has some one been working- oif maroon bees 

 instead of yellow on Doolittle ? I don't believe I ever saw 

 a dozen imported Italian queens, and I doubt whether Doo- 

 little has seen many more than I, for I've been buying since 

 he thought no more importations were needed, and at 

 Medina you've had perhaps more imported queens than at 

 any other place. Please tell us, are the workers of an im- 

 ported Italian queen yellow or maroon ?" 



Editor Root, in his foot-note to the above " Straw," 

 saj-s this : 



" I do not know where Mr. Doolittle gets his notion of 

 colors; but if he will consult his good wife I feel sure he 

 will have to revise his idea somewhat. I do not think I am 

 boasting when I say that I have seen perhaps 50 imported 

 queens where Doolittle or yourself have seen one; for we 

 import from SO to 75 every year. Years ago, as you say, 

 Doolittle went on record as saying that lie believed further 

 importation was unnecessary, so I take it he has not seen 

 an imported queen for some time. The color-bands, both 

 on bees and queens, are what are generally called ' leather ' 

 color. I never saw one queen or bee direct from Italy that 

 had bands that were either chestnut or maroon. Maroon ? 

 my, oh my I what's the matter with Doolittle's eyes ? To 

 my notion these colors are the same as those given in the 

 Standard Dictionary, the latest and best in the English 

 language, under the heading of ' Spectrum.' Strictly speak- 

 ing, the yellow on the Italians is not exactly yellow, but 

 leather-colored; but when we use the term 'yellow 'we 

 usually mean it in the broadest sense, and that may mean 

 from a leather color to a lemon yellow. To say that Italian 

 queens and bees do not have anj' yellow on them is to per- 

 vert the word from its ordinary accepted meaning. We sav 

 that the sun rises in the morning. While the statement is 

 not correct, the phrase has an accepted meaning: in the 

 same way, 3'ellow, when applied to Italians, conveys an im- 

 pression to the average person that is not misleading." 



I have no extended remark to make, but I trust Mr. 

 Doolittle will gratify my curiosity by answering a question. 

 I don't remember ever seeing Italian bees called maroon 

 until the present, and there was nothing original in mv 

 calling them yellow. Now, Mr. Doolittle, if you knew thern 

 to be maroon, while all the authorities, the books, and the 

 bee-journals, were calling them j'ellow these years and 

 years, will you be kind enough to tell us why you never 

 mentioned it before ? McHenrv Co., 111. 



Riding- Hog-s'-Backs —Southern California Api- 

 arian Conditions and Prospects. 



BY "THE R.\MBLER." 



THE above seems to be a sort of an undignified perform- 

 ance for the Rambler, and, indeed, it would be, under 

 the common interpretation of the words. But when we 

 speak of hogs'-backs in this country, there is a variety to 

 select from, and even the most dignified man might mount 

 one of them without so much as ruffling the frills of his 

 dignity. 



It is now mid-day. and hot as furj' in the sun. and I am 

 sitting in a chair and leaning against a California walnut 

 tree and enjoying its shade. The bees in the apiary close 

 by are humming a hot-weather tune. In yonder clump of 

 bushes a mourning-dove is cooing to its mate, a mocking- 

 .bird is shouting and whistling in a sycamore tree, and a 

 blue-jay is trying to be neighborly by picking the crumbs 



from mj' table which stands in the open air. To my left, a 

 canyon leads oif to the west ; to the front a larger one leads 

 off to the north, and this is subdivided into man}- other 

 smaller ones. As a consequence of the division of the land 

 into so many canyons or ravines, there are a great number 

 of ridges between them, .some of them are quite sharp, with 

 hardly enough room for a person to walk. These ridges 

 are called " hog-backs," and when we explore these moun- 

 tains it is always much more comfortable traveling on the 

 hog-back than it is in the depths of the canyon, for there 

 we find all manner of underbrush and obstacles. 



This has been a sort of an alas season for California 

 bee-keepers; our bees are making a precarious living, and 

 one after another of our hopes of a honey crop have been 

 blasted. We hoped for a yield of honej- from tlie sage, 

 which was in profuse bloom, but the fogs from Old Ocean 

 kept hanging over us with their cooling influence until the 

 bloom past, and then when the sun did exercise its preroga- 

 tive of shining it was too late for the bees to get any honey. 



Sumac is now coming into bloom, and our hopes are 

 reviving again, for the buds are set very plentiful, and the 

 few that are out are immediately visited by the bees. Wish- 

 ing to explore the extent of the sumac pasturage I set out 

 one morning for that especial purpose. I followed up the 

 larger canyon to the north, and in the lower depths of it, 

 where there was much shade and moisture, the bees were at 

 work upon the wild heliotrope. This is a valuable honej'- 

 plant, for it is a profuse bloomer, and holds its flowers for 

 a long time. There is a good amount of pentstemon — a 

 trailing shrub, and having brilliant scarlet flowers ; the 

 tubes of these flowers are too deep for the bees to reach the 

 nectar below, but there is another variety with white blos- 

 soms that are the proper length for bees to find the nectar, 

 and I have an idea that the propagation of this variety 

 would be a good scheme for bee-keepers to undertake. 



I now climb up an abrupt trail, taking hold of the 

 bushes to aid. and soon find myself upon the lower end of a 

 hog-back. The first thing that attracts my attention is a 

 brilliant spike of white flowers, and I can now see dozens 

 of them scattered over tiie sides of the mountain. They 

 look like plumes, tho quite rigid against the influence of 

 the wind. This is tlie yucca or Spanish bayonet, and I do 

 not wish to get too near it for the needles with which the 

 lower portion of the stalk is armed are not agreeable to run 

 against. Some species of it are credited with secreting a 

 large amount of honey, but these specimens, and especially 

 in this dry season, have not a drop of honey in them, and 

 the bees did not notice the pretty and fragrant flowers. 



Wild buckwheat and deerweed, or commonly known as 

 wild alfalfa, abounds more or less upon the mountainside, 

 but the bees are shyly working it, which shows that there 

 is but little honey in it. 



I am now well up to the top of this hog-back, and be- 

 fore I cross over to another let me sit down here and rest, 

 and take in the scenery. Looking to the southwest I have 

 the Cahuenga valley before me ; it has recently been shorn 

 of its grain, and there is nothing but stubble-fields sur- 

 rounding the buildings on these great ranches. A little 

 later a vile weed — variously known as flea-weed and vin- 

 egar-weed, but the true name is " blue curls " — will come 

 in quite plentifully. Bees gather much honey from this, 

 and it is a very low grade of honey, but it will be welcome 

 this year, for it is as good as any hone}' for the bees to win- 

 ter upon. 



Before the advent of the Anglo-Saxon with his enter- 

 prise, these valleys were the best bee-pasturage in Califor- 

 nia ; the sage here found a depth of rich soil for its growth, 

 and the plants were vigorous, and yielded a greater amount 

 of honey than the plants which grow upon the barren hill- 

 sides. That was the condition of the honey-pasturage in 

 the early days when Mr. Harbison came to this portion of 

 California and obtained tliose wonderful yields of honey. 

 Now. the bee-keeper is thrust back to the hills, and the val- 

 leys are under cultivation. 



Beyond the valley is a broad expanse, and it looks like 

 a vast blue plain, and sky and plain merge together in the 

 far distant. With a glass to aid our vision the plain would 

 appear to be greatly troubled, and white crests would roll 

 over it. Why, certainly, I see what it is now, it is the grand 

 Pacific Ocean. It is six miles from this point of vision. 



A little to the south we see Catilina Island. 25 miles 

 from shore. It was here that Mr. Wood, of Michigan, pro- 

 posed to establish a queen-breeding station some years ago, 

 but one of California's poor seasons nipt the enterprise in 

 the bud. I do not have much faith in island-reared queens 

 mj'self, for just as good queens are reared on the main land 

 now. So many localities are so thoroly Italianized that the 



