AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



407 



Florida as a Honey Country. 



Florida is a land of tlowers and has 

 many successful bee-keepers. Some 

 Northern bee-keepers who were disgusted 

 with their bees being destroyed by the 

 severe cold, emigrated thither expecting 

 to find a perfect paradise, were surprised 

 that even there they had obstacles to 

 contend against. 



While attending a convention at New 

 Orleans, during the World's Fair there, 

 I met an extensive honey producer from 

 the Indian River country, who said that 

 their best honey districts were malarious 

 and infested by insects, mosquitoes, sand 

 flies, jiggers, etc. 



One of the greatest sources of honey in 

 Florida is the black mangrove, which 

 grows in the water, and bee-keepers were 

 badly disappointed by its being frozen a 

 few years since. 



There are large apiaries in the vicinity 

 of East St. Andrews Bay, and the bees 

 gather honey from the orange groves. 

 This honey is of good body and flavor, 

 but not equal to the white clover honey 

 of the North, in my opinion. 



Owing to the dampness of the climate, 

 honey producers secure the most of their 

 surplus in the extracted form. — Mks. L 

 Harrison in the Prairie Farmer. 



How Beeswax is Made. 



One of the most interesting productions 

 of a colony of bees, and perhaps one of 

 the most curious, is that of making the 

 wax which forms the receptacles for the 

 nectar that the bees gather from every 

 opening flower, and which, when melted, 

 forms the beeswax of commerce. 



If you examine the under surface of a 

 cell-building worker-bee, you will find 

 beneath the abdomen four pairs of white 

 plates projecting from as many pockets 

 in the rings of this part of the body. 

 These are wax-plates made from the life- 

 blood of the worker. 



If you now examine with a lens one of 

 the hind legs you will find that the stout- 

 est joints are "square-shouldered" at the 

 hinge, and that the hinge is well over to 

 one side, so that the shoulders form a 

 pair of jaws which open when the limb is 

 bent, and close when it is straightened. 

 The upper jaw has a row of spines which 

 bite on a plate on the lower jaw. With 

 this apparatus — by piercing it with 

 these spines — the worker-bee withdraws 

 a wax-plate from its pocket, transfers it 

 to the front legs and then to the mouth, 

 where it is laboriously masticated with a 

 salivary secretion. Unless it undergoes 

 this process it lacks the quality requisite 



for cell-building. Few people would 

 imagine that the tons upon tons of this 

 article which is produced in the United 

 States originates from such a minute and 

 wonderful laboratory of Nature. — Wm. 

 Styaist, in Pacifio. Rural Press. 



Bee-Culture in Arizona. 



The people of the Salt River Valley 

 probably do not know the result of one 

 year's co-operative work of the Bee- 

 Keeper's Association of Maricopa County, 

 Arizona. 



It is just about one year ago that 

 after a very hard struggle one carload 

 o*f honey was shipped from this valley by 

 this association. 



For a long time it was hard to make 

 the individual growers understand the 

 advantage of co-operation, and it was 

 only by experience that it finally dawned 

 upon them. This year there has been 

 shipped to date seven carloads of ex- 

 tracted and comb-honey, aggregating 

 217,236 pounds, which we understajid 

 has netted the shippers an average of 

 about 9 cents per pound over all ex- 

 penses, or about .$13,000. 



This is the natural home of the bee, 

 and there is no reason why this industry 

 should not continue to increase for years 

 to come, as the quality of Arizona honey 

 is said to be superior to any other. 

 While the amount is small, yet it shows 

 that we can sell our products at a profit, 

 if we raise the right kind. — Phoenix 

 Republican. 



.Bee-Pasturage for California. 



The Chapman honey-plant is a fraud ; 

 plants self-sown two years ago are weak 

 and of little account. Our experiments 

 with it have not been a success, and how 

 in the wide world the plant obtained the 

 reputation it did, as a nectar producer, 

 we do not understand. 



It will be remembered that the United 

 States Government purchased quite a 

 large quantity of seed from Mr. Chap- 

 man, which was widely distributed by 

 the Agricultural Department to the bee- 

 keepers of the country. So far we have 

 heard no favorable report of it from any 

 quarter. The plant does not seem suited 

 to the soil or climate of Southern Cali- 

 fornia. We have a few plants yet living 

 out of three different sowings in different 

 years, and watch for any good results. 

 In time to come, possil3ly, it may be 

 acclimated. 



The Bell-flower, indlgenious to Cuba, 

 has a great reputation as a honey-pro- 



