CHAPTER IX 

 The Alluvial Regions. 



BETWEEN the tropics of the South and the mountain regions 

 toward the North lies a vast alluvial region of rolling clay- 

 sand hills, interspersed here and there with patches of rich, 

 black land. This belt extends across South Carolina, Georgia, 

 Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas and up into parts of Ten- 

 nessee, Oklahoma and Arkansas, between the mountain ranges 

 there. We are concerned principally with the region east of the 

 Mississippi, where beekeeping conditions differ radically from 

 the tropics and from the mountain regions and where beekeeping 

 conditions more nearly approximate the Northern "white clover 

 belt." It is this vast alluvial region which forms what most of 

 us are accustomed to think of as the "South." 



On the line next the tropics, the seasons approximate tropical 

 beekeeping conditions, as with J. E. Marchant of Columbus, 

 Georgia, while as one goes north toward the distant mountains 

 of Tennessee and the Carolinas, the season shortens and the 

 winters become more severe. In the centre of this belt from 

 north to south, conditions are not unlike those of the Middle 

 West, except for shorter, lighter winters and longer summers. 

 One of the cardinal points, which has impressed the writer, is 

 that most of the honey sources of the alluvial section are plants 

 and shrubs and few of them are trees. In both the tropics and 

 the mountainous section of the South, many of the most impor- 

 tant honey plants are found among the trees. While there are a 

 great variety of honey plants in this alluvial section, the terri- 

 tory may be roughly divided into belts, as to the most important 

 honey plants. 



Another influence on the secretion of nectar in honey plants 

 is the soil and climate. Neither of these features has been studied 

 much as yet. However, it is quite interesting to notice that the 

 alluvial region differs in soil types from both the mountain 



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