1907 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



621 



FIG. 1. — CLUMP OF SUMAC BUSHES IN FULL BLOOM. — PIG. 2. 



Fig. 2 the same as Fig. 1, but taken three weeks later. Bloom all fallen; only the leaves and bare flower- 

 stalks remain above the brush. 



and begin work in the sections. From July 

 16 to the 22d the maximum bloom is on, and 

 the sections are tilled then if ever. From July 

 22d the bloom drops off rapidly, and the 

 bees simply complete the sections already 

 started. To put on more supers after the 

 22d of July almost invariably means a lot of 

 unfinished sections. 



While the bees are busy on the bloom, 

 there is usually a bitter odor about the api- 

 ary, resembling the smell of crushed lettuce 

 leaves. The new honey is more or less bit- 

 ter to the taste. Probably some essential oil 

 of the plant, an oil which is also in the milky 

 juice of the plant, is present in some amount 

 in the honey. As the smell also resembles 

 the fragrance of milkweed, and as the bees 

 work on milkweed while the sumac is in 

 bloom, it is possible that this bitter odor 

 and taste come from that source. If it is not 

 the milkweed which lends the bitterness, 

 then sumac honey varies greatly. I used, in 



Worcester Co., Mass., to get sumac honey 

 so bitter that almost no one could eat it. 

 There the milkweed was in greater evidence 

 than the sumac. Fortunately, the bitterness 

 is transient, and, even in the case of honey, 

 so bitter at first that it is as though one dis- 

 solved a grain of quinine in each spoonful, 

 age will remove the disagreeable taste, and 

 by winter the honey becomes edible. In the 

 case of the sumac honey in the vicinity of 

 Norwich the bitterness is mostly gone soon 

 after the honey is sealed. 



One has to eat sumac honey to appreciate 

 it. I have yet to find any one who does not 

 like it, provided he can eat a?iy honey. In 

 fact, many pei'sons who dislike honey as a 

 rule have expressed a liking for sumac hon- 

 ey. There is a richness but at the same time 

 a mildness aljout it that will suit the most 

 sensitive taste. Once a customer always a 

 customer, if one buys sumac honey. 



When pure the honey is a golden color, 



FIG. 8. — A SINGLE SPRAY OF SUMAC BLOOM. — FIG. 4. 



Fig. 4 is the same as Fig. 3, but is taken three weeks later; only the main stem of the flower-cluster remains 

 and even the curling tip of that is broken off. 



