PASTURAGE FOR BEES. 199 



ing. Dzierzon strongly recommends buck-wheat being 

 sown in the winter stubbles on behalf of the bees, and 

 he tries hard to persuade fanners that it is to their interest 

 to cultivate it. It should be named that all the ordinary 

 fruit blossoms, especially those of the apple, supply 

 abundant store for bees. 



It is, however, to wild or field flowers that the bee- 

 master must chiefly look for the raw niaterial on which his 

 myriad artisans shall exert their skill. The white clover of 

 the pasture* — the wdld thyme on the hill — the heather on 

 the moors — the furze and the broom on the sandy waste 

 — offer exhaustless stores for a greater number of bees 

 than can ever be located near them. Lime-trees, when 

 in blossom, and mignonette are also' most valuable 

 resources. There are also two or three peculiar sources 

 of honey which one would not have suspected, zs, for 

 instance, the blossoms of the onion plant, of turnips, 

 and, in still greater degree, the flower of the mustard 

 plant. 



In those districts of England where mustard seed is 

 cultivated so extensively, it would be well wort h while 

 for the farmers to keep large colonies of bees. Another, 

 but a very uncertain, source of honey is the "honey- 

 dew," which, in some seasons, appears in large quanti- 

 ties on the leaves of the oak, the lime, and some other 

 trees. 



* It is a good practice to induce the owners of adjacent fields 

 to sow clover-seed. 



