MESQUITE 
593 
Grocerymen are usually very willing to 
grant window space and otherwise get back 
of the whole proposition. They sometimes 
have a member of their selling force who 
can do the “demonstrating” better than 
the beekeeper himself, especially so if that 
beekeeper is not a natural talker or sales¬ 
man. 
This kind of demonstration work with 
live bees on display can be undertaken most 
profitably at county fairs, street fairs, or 
at food shows. Sometimes space can be 
secured in one of the buildings. At other 
times it may be advisable to have a special 
tent at some good location on the grounds, 
where honey can not only be sold but 
where a good demonstrator can help push 
the sales. 
It is sometimes a very great advantage to 
have a beekeeper open up a hive inside a 
wire cage. This cage is usually about six 
feet high, four or five feet wide, six feet 
long. Inside of this cage, an operator with¬ 
out bee-veil or gloves can show just how he 
handles bees. If it is advertised that bees 
are manipulated in this cage at certain 
hours during each day of the fair, large 
crowds will come to see the man bare¬ 
handed, bare-faced, handle the bees. With 
a good salesman or saleswoman at the tent, 
large quantities of honey can be sold. 
A large and important advantage se¬ 
cured from this demonstration before the 
public is its permanent advertising value. 
If these demonstrations are then followed 
up with appropriate window displays at 
the local groceries, there will be no trou¬ 
ble about the selling of the honey. 
No one will dispute the fact that “It 
pays to advertise,” especially so when it is 
done judiciously. It is advisable for the bee¬ 
keeper to do a little advertising in the local 
papers. If these announcements refer to 
certain groceries where beekeepers’ honey 
is sold the groceryman will very often be 
glad to pay half the expense. He should 
be moi’e than willing to do this, because 
when a customer comes in to buy honey he 
is more than likely to buy something else. 
MATING OF QUEEN AND DRONE.— 
See Drones. 
MESQUITE (Prosopis glandulosa ).— 
This genus includes about 15 species of 
trees or shrubs growing in the warm arid 
regions of both the Old and New Worlds, 
but most abundant in America. In the 
United States there are two species P. 
glandulosa and P. velutina. Texas mesquite 
( P • glandulosa ) is also called algaroba and 
honey-pod. In the lower Rio Grande Plain 
it is a large tree attaining a height of 40 
feet and a diameter of 2 feet; but on the 
dryer soil south and southwest of San An¬ 
tonio there is a vast mesquite forest con¬ 
sisting of trees 10 to 15 feet tall. On 
arid land the mesquite becomes a straggling 
shrub with crooked branches. It is found 
from Kansas to Texas and southward into 
Mexico, and westward to New Mexico and 
’southern Nevada. 
It is probable that the mesquite first in¬ 
vaded Texas from Mexico near Matamoras 
about 150 years ago. Until comparatively 
recently the Rio Grande Plain was a grass¬ 
land, but the mesquite and various shrubs 
have spread over it very rapidly. There 
are many who remember when hundreds of 
acres now brushland were in grassland. At 
present a scattered growth of mesquite is 
found over the larger part of Texas ex¬ 
cept in the northwest corner of the Pan¬ 
handle or Staked Plains, and that portion 
of eastern Texas east of the lower Brazos 
River, the Navasota River, and a line ex¬ 
tending northward to Hunt County, and 
then running westward to Montague 
County. The heaviest growth of mesquite 
is in the twelve counties of Atacosa, Bexar, 
Dimmit, Frio, La Salle, Live Oak, McMul¬ 
len, Medina, Nueces, San Patricio, Uvalde, 
and Zavala, embracing an area of 14,915 
square miles southwest of San Antonio. 
The annual rainfall averages between 20 
and 30 inches. The greater portion of this 
area is covered with a shrub-like growth of 
mesquite which stools out at the ground 
into a number of slender crooked stems. 
On the higher and dryer land huisache and 
catsclaw are associated with it. The mes¬ 
quite trees in Texas are about 10 feet tall, 
and average less than 4 inches in diameter. 
Along the streams it is crowded out by elm, 
ash, hickory, and live oak. Only about 
9,000 acres, located in San Patricio, Uvalde, 
and Live Oak Counties, are commercially 
valuable for logging. The logs average 
only 3 feet straight length and 3 to 4 
inches in diameter. 
Thruout the central denuded region from 
