190^ 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



82'; 



THE SEASON. 



California bee-keepers are suffering anoth- 

 er disappointment in the failure so far. this 

 season, of realizing their expectations of a 

 fine bee-year. As this is the second in suc- 

 cession, it can not fail to make the less cour- 

 ageous lose heart, and (luestion the reliabili- 

 ty of the business. In the past it has iieen 

 considered almost certain that we would get 

 a good honey crop if there were good and 

 timely rains. This was thought rightly to 

 be a great advantage, as the bee-keeper would 

 know of a surety in the early spi'ing whether 

 he would need supplies, as sections, etc., and 

 so would buy or not according as the rain- 

 fall would be generous or scant. Both last 

 year and this the rains have been very plen- 

 tiful, and bee-keepers, according to all the 

 experience of the past, had reason to expect 

 very prosperous years. Our average rainfall 

 at Los Angeles, for a long period of years, 

 has been 15 inches. At Pomona, 4i miles 

 from here, it is 18 inches. This year we have 

 had over 25 inches, and it came so gently and 

 so well distributed through the season that 

 we had every reason to look forward with 

 very pleasing anticipation. 



But last spring and this have suffered a 

 climatic change that has dampened the hopes 

 of the bee-men. We have very cool weather, 

 so that the bees have been kept from the 

 field much of the time, and, when there, 

 seemed to get no nectar to speak of. We 

 have fogs in the morning, which, though they 

 make our days delightfully cool and pleasant, 

 are not conducive to nectar secretion, and 



freatly hinder the work of the bees. Indeed, 

 hear of many that are having to feed the 

 bees to keep the wolf from the entrance. 

 We may hope that these cool seasons will- 

 not continue: they surely put a second ( '!) 

 after the suitability of our region for bees 

 and honey. 



^^ 



AN INTERESTING EXPERIMENT. 



There is a German bee-keeper living be- 

 tween Claremont and the nearby mountains, 

 by the name of Arms. He has quite an area 

 of land which is so stony that it is good for 

 little else than bee-forage. It abounds in 

 sage and buckwheat, and, with favorable 

 seasons, Mr. Arms realizes good money from 

 his apiary. I suppose that every bee-keeper 

 is the better if he has something of an inven- 

 tive genius. Mr. Arms seems not destitute 

 of this peculiarity. He saw that he secured 

 good honey crops in seasons of good rainfall, 

 and none when the rainfall was far below 

 the normal. So he bethought to divert the 

 water from San Antonio Creek, when it was 



running full, after heavy rains, and wasting 

 its precious freightage in the not distant 

 ocean. So he bethought of digging ditches 

 and filling sink-holes and basins on his land, 

 on which there are not a few. He found 

 that the water sank rapidly into the gravel. 

 This experiment not only benefited Mr. 

 Arms, but all the community, as it was 

 leai'ned that all the winter runoff can be re- 

 tained by dividing the stream and conducting 

 the water on to the porous gravels, which 

 have a wondrous and quenchless thirst for 

 the life-giving water. It will be of great 

 bonefit if all this water can be easily and 

 cheaply retained in the underground reser- 

 voirs, and not lost in the great sea. From 

 the experience this winter, we believe that 

 this will be possible: and very likely, through 

 the accidental demonstration of this poor and 

 unlettered bee-man, our section will reap a 

 lasting benefit. It is probable, if we can fill 

 up these reservoirs every season, as seems 

 possible, we can secure water to make many 

 more of our very fertile acres blossom like 

 the rose. 



POLLEN. 



I have a large and very enthusiastic class 

 in botany at the present time. It numbers 

 32, and for the past days they have been 

 studying pollen. It is a very fascinating sulj- 

 jeet for study. They find that the pollen 

 grains differ very much in form and mark- 

 ings. Indeed, we can almost always tell 

 what flowers bees have visited by simply 

 looking at the pollen grains. In some cases 

 the form of the pollen is beautiful indeed. 

 Nor is it alone in form that the pollen is at- 

 tractive. The students find that the color is 

 quite as attractive, and worthy of attention. 

 They find that yellow is l)y far the most com- 

 mon color, but the yellow varies all the way 

 from a very light yellow or straw color even 

 to the darkest yellow, and from that to 

 orange, often nearly red. Brown pollen 

 comes next in order: and dark pollen, almost 

 black at times, is not wanting. The oppo- 

 site color, or white, is sometimes met with 

 among the plants of the snap-dragon family 

 {Scjrjjylmlariaccce). This is the figwort fam- 

 ily, and has many very famous honey-plants, 

 as the tigwort of Ohio and the East. They 

 also find green and bright- blue pollen. These 

 are rare, but are l)eautiful ornaments as they 

 hug the pollen-.baskets of the hind legs of the 

 bees. The gilias are very common here, and 

 very beautiful. Many of these have the IMue 

 pollen, and we often find the bee getting 

 pollen and honey from the gilias at the same 

 time. These fiowers arc scattered too much 

 to be of the best service: but I feel sure that 

 we get much benefit from them. I gave this 

 subject to the pupils to investigate, and I 

 asked , them how they found out what they 

 reported, and the answer was that they could 

 see the color in the anthers of the fiowei's; 

 that often they could shake the pollen on to 

 white paper so as to determine the color: but 

 best of all was to get the bees to help them. 

 They find all the colors of pollen mentioned 



