1198 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Sept, 15 



[The plan that you have pi-esented seems 

 to have considerable merit in it, but involves 

 the same principle as was proposed by M. 

 M. Baldridge, of St. Charles, Ills., about ten 

 years ago, but he used an outside chute in 

 connection with the bee-escape that deliver- 

 ed the bees directly outdoors. They would 

 go to the field, then on returning would go 

 back to the hive beneath. The only question 

 is whether the bees going down through the 

 perforated zinc into the other hive might 

 not, before they go outdoors, feed some of 

 the infected honey to larvaj and thus spread 

 the disease in the lower hive. If they have 

 never done so, then the method has some ad- 

 vantage in the fact that it pei'mits one to 

 save practically all of the good brood.— Ed.] 



WHITE CLOVER. 



A Theory Offered to Show AVhy it Does 



not Always Yield; the Effect of 



Drouth; Young Plants. 



BY VIRGIL WEAVER. 



Producers, consumers, and dealers alike 

 can take warning from this; for the very 

 drouth that made Dr. Miller's cow-pasture 

 brown, page 478, last summer, prevailed over 

 75 per cent of the white-clover belt of the 

 United States. Eastern Kansas, Eastern 

 Nebraska, Missouri, Iowa, Illinois, Northern 

 Indiana, and Northern Ohio are all included 

 in the list that will not produce twenty-five 

 per cent of a white-clover crop in 1907; so 

 the producer that secures a crop of honey 

 this year can expect a pretty stiff price. 

 While the crop north of the Ohio River will 

 be a failure from white clover, the reverse is 

 true of the conditions south of the Ohio. In 

 the white-clover belt of Kentucky and Ten- 

 nessee, which is a very limited area, pros- 

 pects are the best in ten years. With the 

 largest area covered with clover in years, 

 and an unusual amount of rainfall at just the 

 right time, prospects are very flattering in- 

 deed. 



How do I know these conditions? There 

 has not been a drouth over this territory since 

 1901, when the dry weather cleaned out all 

 of the old white clover. Weeds and grass 

 were cleaned out to a certain extent. The 

 year 1902 was excessively wet, and the young 

 white-clover plants simply covered the face 

 of the earth. Then 1903 gave the greatest 

 yield from clover on record. So do not have 

 the blues, for an occasional drouth is very 

 beneficial to white clover. Without the drouth 

 we can not have a crop of young white-clo- 

 ver plants; and without these young plants 

 we secure only a moderate honey-flow. So 

 while 1907 will be a failure, 1908 may give a 

 bumper crop. 



There has been a great deal said by the 

 knowing ones of late years about weather 

 conditions for a honey-flow. Bee-keepers 

 seem to be superstitious about conditions that 

 produce a flow of honey. Dr. Miller was 



puzzled last year as to why his white clover 

 did not yield. In the first place the clover 

 was old and poorly rooted; also a moderate 

 supply of embryo blossoms set in 1905 to 

 bloom in 1906. Then with a falling-off of 

 his rainfall last spring there was very little 

 white-clover bloom in his locality — just 

 enough for one to think that he should have 

 a honey-flow; but a few thousand clover- 

 blossoms will not make a honey-flow. It 

 takes billions. 



There is a difference of opinion as to why 

 a honey-flow will suddenly stop after a thun- 

 der-shower. This is the case only where the 

 blossoms are large and open. Bass wood, 

 tulip, buckwheat, etc., are affected thus. 

 Before the thunder-shower, with low baro- 

 metric pressure, the flow is great, as the 

 large amount of moisture in the air adds to 

 the honey secreted by the flower; while after 

 the thunder-shower, with high barometric 

 pressure, the flow is least, as the dry air 

 takes from the honey secreted by the flower 

 and the flow stops. White clover, asters, 

 goldenrod, and, in fact, all flowers that have 

 a close blossom, are not affected to a very 

 great extent by the high or low barometric 

 pressures. So, watch your weather condi- 

 tions closely, and be governed accordingly. 



Baldwin, Ky., May 9. 



[Knowing that Dr. Miller had spent a good 

 deal of time in studying on this same ques- 

 tion, we sent the above article to him. His 

 reply follows. — Ed.] 



The nub of Mr. Weaver's theory, as I un- 

 derstand it, is that a severe drouth kills off 

 the old clover, which is not so good for nec- 

 tar; the succeeding year young clover springs 

 from seed, and the second year after the 

 drouth is the one to be depended on. 



I don't know enough to say whether this 

 theory is right or wrong, but may suggest 

 some points that need reply by any one de- 

 fending the doctrine. 



What is the proof that old plants do not 

 yield nectar as well as new? 



In a year of drouth one would think the 

 seed would not be so plentiful nor so good 

 as in a prosperous year. Do not seeds form 

 in as great abundance in a good year, and 

 will they not produce as many and as good 

 plants in good as in bad years? 



Perhaps it maybe offered that the "old 

 and poorly rooted" clover occupies the 



ground, so that the young has no chance, 

 ut if there is any crowding out, ought not 

 the " old and poorly rooted " to be the part 

 crowded out? 



But it must be remembered that propaga- 

 tion by seed is not the only means, nor, in- 

 deed, the chief means, of increasing white 

 clover. Give it time enough, and a single 

 seed is enough to stock an acre, as it goes 

 creeping and rooting at the joints. Are not 

 the new plants thus formed every year of 

 the most vigorous sort? 



Mr. Weaver refers to the article on page 

 478, where I say that white clover didn t do 

 its best "although blooming abundantly," 

 and he says, "there was very little white- 



