4 BULLETIX 325, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
of most honey plants east of the Kockies improved materially after 
the date of this inquiry. 
The July 1 reports indicated that the honey season had been late 
from 1 to 3 weeks over most of the country, due to cold and generallv 
wet weather. The prospects hi the Ohio Valley region were very poor 
owing largely to the damage to white clover from former droughts. 
The crop outlook from clover in the Central Atlantic and New Eng- 
land States and west of the Mississippi was fair to good. The outlook 
for alfalfa honey in Utah and in sections of adjoining States was 
unfavorable because of damage to alfalfa from insects. Freezes in 
Colorado had destroyed the fruit bloom. The relatively poor crop at 
that date in California was reported as due mostly to light nectar 
flows from orange and button sage. 
The returns from the States that normally produce a fair propor- 
tion of their surplus honey crop by July 1 were sufficiently complete 
to permit of estabhshing satisfactory estimates except for two States, 
which are omitted. The reports from Northern and Mountain 
States which usually produce little surplus by July 1 were not as 
numerous, and the averages drawn from these are therefore not con- 
sidered altogether dependable. It has been necessary to omit a 
number of such States for lack of information. The influence of 
these upon the United States averages is fortunately not large. 
The average yield of surplus honey per colony up to July 1, 1915, 
for the States reporting is estimated at 18.3 pounds against 20.7 
pounds last year. (Columns 11, a, and 11, b.) 
Last year the proportion of the total surplus produced by July 1 
was approximately 65 per cent, the early flow being favorable and 
that later in the summer poor. This year the proportion is 50.6 per 
cent, the summer bloom having been abundant tliroughout most of 
the Northern, Central, and Eastern States. Notwithstanding the 
season's abundant bloom, the large proportion of rainy and cool 
days, by suppressing the secretion of nectar, washing nectar from 
the bloom, and most of all by keeping bees confined to the hive, has 
resulted in merely a fair crop instead of a heavy one. 
The estimate of the usual production by July 1 is 51.9 per cent. 
These estimates on the proportion of honey usually produced by 
July 1 (11, c) are of much interest, indicating the degree to which 
the July 1 report may be accepted by producers and others interested 
in forming a judgment of probable supplies and prices. It appears 
that, speaking generally, from two-thirds to three-fourths of the 
surplus is ordinarily produced by that date in the Southern States, 
including Maryland, Tennessee, and Arkansas, under one-fourth in 
the extreme Northern and Mountain States, and 40 to 50 per cent 
in most of the remainder. The usual average for the entire United 
States is estimated by correspondents to be slightly over half the 
