744 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



J^ov. 21, 



California as a Bee-Keepiug State. 



BY J. F. M'INTYBE. 



It is not my purpose to boom the bee-business in Califor- 

 nia in order to help those who are already engaged in it to sell 

 out to good advantage, or to depress the business, buy it up, 

 and have a monopoly ; but to give the whole truth as I see it, 

 without regard to what has already been said, or who said it. 

 I believe that the majority of bee-keepers in Southern Cal- 

 ifornia, at least, have their locations fully stocked with bees, 

 and do not care either to buy or sell, or to induce others to 

 bring more bees into their locations, which would overstock 

 them and surely bring disaster to one or both parties occupy- 

 ing such a field. 



It is human nature to take pride in your own State and 

 county, and your own achievements ; to tell only the big things 

 done, and to cover up the mean features and your failures; 

 but I will give both sides. 



When all the conditions are favorable, California can pro- 

 duce the largest crops of the finest honey in the world, not ex- 

 cepting the famous thyme honey of Hymettus, the clover and 

 basswood honey of the East, or the alfalfa honey of Arizona 

 and Colorado ; but during the last 20 years we have had these 

 favorable conditions only on an average once in three years ; 

 or, to be more explicit, we have had seven good years, nine in 

 which the bees stored from 10 to 60 pounds to the colony. and 

 four years in which the bees had to be fed large quantities of 

 honey to keep them from starving to death. 



When only the large yields, (ranging from 150 to 600 

 pounds per colony ) are reported to the tenderfoot, he natur- 

 ally grows enthusiastic and concludes to endure bee-stings for 

 a few seasons and use the bee-business as a stepping-stone to 

 the banking business ; but oh, how different in the morning, 

 when he finds that we have such things as dry years, hot 

 winds that destroy the prospects of a honey crop in three days, 

 when he thought that success was certain, to say nothing of 

 the three bee-diseases — foul brood, dead brood, and bee-paral- 

 ysis; and when he does secure the long-looked-for crop, and 

 attempts fo dispose of it, he finds the honey-merchant and the 

 railroad company waiting for it with low prices and high 

 freight rates. This applies to the sage-brush bee-keeping in 

 the mountains of Southern California. 



There is another section of the State, however, which is 

 rapidly coming to the front as a bee-country, and is not affect- 

 ed by dry years or hot winds. I refer to the alfalfa districts 

 of Kern, Tulare and Kings counties. A neighbor who sold his 

 bees to me and moved to that section to engage in the bee-bus- 

 iness there, is well pleased with the change, and reports a 

 profit of .$12 per colony for this season. Alfalfa honey is am- 

 ber-colored, and not so fine flavored as sage honey, but the ad- 

 vantage of making a crop every year more than conpensates 

 for the difference in price, which is always higher when the 

 sage honey crop is a failure. 



In the northern half of the State few bees are kept, and a 

 small amount of inferior honey is produced ; consequently this 

 section is not worth considering by the man or woman who 

 wishes to make a specialty of bee-keeping. 



Compared with Eastern bee-keeping, California has some 

 advantages. Our warm winters enable us to winter our bees 

 without having to carry them into the cellar in the fall and 

 out again in the spring ; a larger number of colonies maybe 

 kept in one apiary, which saves an immense amount of travel 

 from one apiary to another ; the average yield per colony, 

 taking a number of years together, is a little higher — the yield 

 of the Sespe apiary, which is about an average location, being 

 72 pounds per colony per annum for 20 years. 



Some of the disadvantages are : lower price for honey, 

 owing to distance from market and high freight rates ; dry 

 years, which often kill more bees by starvation than die of 

 cold in the East; most apiaries are located in the mountains, 

 away from society, schools and churches, and are lonesome 

 places to live in, especially for women, and consequently many 

 bee-men are bachelors. 



The disadvantages, however, may be somewhat modified. 

 Bees, can, and should, be fed in dry years in time to keep 

 them from starving to death. The price of honey may be 

 helped out somewhat if the bee-keeper keeps well on his feet 

 financially, and is not obliged to sell as soon as his crop is 

 harvested. 



The bee-keeper may also marry and live in town six or 

 seven months in the year, and his wife might not object to 

 spending a few "honeymoons" in the mountains occasionally, 

 when a crop is to be harvested. 



Although the advantages and disadvantages appear about 



equally divided, when our fine, healthy climate is thrown into 



the balance it tips the beam in favor of California, every time. 



Another section which is beginning to attract some atten- 



tion as a honey-field are the bean-fields of Ventura county. 

 The quality of honey produced in this section is good, but the 

 quantity is not very great, and whether or not this field can 

 tie worked to the mutual advantage of both bean-grower and 

 bee-keeper, is not yet fully demonstrated. In the East I never 

 saw a bee on a bean-blossom, and do not think they produced 

 any honey, but in Ventura county even the beans are sweet. 



WrORTANCE OF BEES TO FRUIT-GROWING. 



As the majority present are more interested in fruit than 

 honey and beans, I will say a few words before closing, on the 

 relations of bees to these crops, and if I am wrong in my con- 

 victions and conclusions I trust that Prof. Cook, who has ex- 

 perimented more along this line than any other man in Amer- 

 ica, will set me right. 



I believe that Nature never makes any mistakes ; when a 

 tree or plant is in bloom it stands badly in need of help from 

 the insect world, so it puts out a sign to catch the eye, and 

 offers a suitable reward for the service. The beautiful, showy 

 petals are its sign. It wants the pollen or fecundating-dust 

 carried from the stamens to the pistils so it can become fertil- 

 ized and produce seed. The offered reward for this service Is 

 the sweetest gift of Nj-^re — a drop of honey. When the seed 

 is ripe, another appea\ '.? made and reward offered to larger 

 animals, to perform another service. It wants the seed scat- 

 tered, and the reward ofiered for this service is a beautiful, 

 delicious fruit, placed around the seed in such a way that the 

 fruit will be eaten and the seed thrown away; thus you see the 

 animal and vegetable kingdoms are mutually dependent on 

 each other to perpetuate their existence. I believe that bees 

 are never injurious, generally beneficial, and often indispensa- 

 ble to the blossoms of plants that produce seed. 



You may ask the bean-growers, who have bees on their 

 ranches, how their beans set this year, and if I do not miss my 

 guess those having bees are ahead. I admit that bees are 

 sometimes a nuisance to people who are drying fruit, especi- 

 ally such fruits as are dried late in the season, without bleach- 

 ing. If some cheap plan could be invented to prevent this 

 annoyance, every fruit-grower whose orchard is over two miles 

 from an apiary should keep at least one colony of bees for 

 every ten acres of orchard, to fertilize the blossoms in the 

 spring. 



According to my own experience, bees will not eat fruit 

 that has been bleached with sulphur fumes ; but it is not desir- 

 able to bleach all kinds of fruit, so I think it would pay the 

 fruit-grower to move his bees into his orchard just before 

 it blooms, and move them away again before the fruit ripens, 

 if he has a kind of fruit that would be damaged by the bees 

 while drying, or injured by bleaching. 



At a meeting of the horticultural commissioners of this 

 State, Major Berry, commissioner of Tulare county, told of a 

 case in that county where a man put out a large peach orchard 

 on a wide plain several miles from any bees, and when the or- 

 chard was old enough to bear, the trees would bloom pi'ofusely 

 but bore so little fruit that the owner contemplated digging 

 them up. When the commissioner visited the orchard the 

 owner asked him what he should do to make his trees bear. 

 He looked the ground over carefully, and, taking in the situa- 

 tion, advised the owner to buy 25 colonies of bees and place 

 them near the orchard. The owner followed his advice, and 

 since that tijne the orchard has borne full crops of fruit. — Read 

 before the Ventura Farmers' Institute. Sespe, Calif. 



The Utah Bee-Keepers' Convention. 



BY "REPORTER." 



An interesting and profitable session of the Utah Bee- 

 Keepers' Association was held in Salt Lake City, Oct. 5, more 

 than oO members being present. President Lovesy was in the 

 chair, and John B. Fagg acted as Secretary. 



The President said that bee-keepers should unite in sup- 

 porting and strengthening the Association for self-preserva- 

 tion, if for no other reason. As to markets and transporta- 

 tion, he said if some method could be adopted to collect and 

 dispose of the product of the bee, it would result in much 

 benefit to the bee-industry ; then with more favorable freight 

 rates the bee-keepers could dispose of their surplus and pre- 

 vent, to some extent, the demoralization of the home market. 



The foul brood law should be so amended as to protect in- 

 stead of worry the bee-keepers. lu its present form it does 

 not seem to meet the requirements of the inspectors or bee- 

 keepers. 



As to bees and fruit-tree spraying, Mr. Lovesy said that 

 was a subject that all bee-keepers and fruit-growers should 



