98 
JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY 
[Vol. 13 
a short time and as a result the comb-honey market gets a black eye. 
Granulated comb-honey is a drug on the market and in such a situa¬ 
tion extracted honey only should be produced. At least comb-honey 
supers should be replaced with extracting supers during the flow from 
gum-weed. Enough of this gum-weed alfalfa mixture has gone to 
eastern markets to create a prejudice against Colorado comb-honey 
in some places. 
In several of the southern states, bitterweed (Helenium tenuifoliurn) 
is quite common. The honey is absolutely unpalatable and should 
never be placed on the market. Even a small quantity of this bitter 
honey is sufficient to spoil a whole tankful of good honey. There the 
beekeeper should remove all the good honey from the hive when the 
bees begin to work on bitterweed and give them empty supers of ex¬ 
tracting combs. When the flow is over, if other flows are still to come, 
the bitter honey can be taken off and the other supers replaced. When 
the season is over, the bitter honey can be given back to the bees for 
winter stores. No adverse reports have been found from the use of 
bitter honey for wintering the bees. 
The available pasturage determines the number of colonies that may 
be successfully kept in one yard and this in turn influences the system 
of management. In north Georgia there is a large area where not 
more than twenty-five colonies are profitable in one apiary. There is 
a variety of sources of nectar available but not enough of anything 
to support a large number of colonies. One beekeeper in that region 
keeps 800 colonies of bees, in thirty yards. This requires a large 
amount of travel, but his returns are more nearly constant than in any 
other locality with which I am familiar. In contrast there are numer¬ 
ous locations in the sweet clover districts and some in the buckwheat 
regions where three hundred or more colonies do well in one location. 
The presence or absence of a supply of pollen for brood-rearing is 
also an important factor. In some places, where there are heavy 
flows, pollen is scarce and the beekeepers find it necessary to take the 
bees elsewhere to build up. This requires long distance moving which 
is tiresome and expensive. 
The dependability of the forage is also to be considered. There are 
many places where good crops can be gathered occasionally, with fre¬ 
quent seasons of failure. This necessitates migratory beekeeping if 
the apiarist is to harvest a crop every year. There are numerous 
California beekeepers who make long moves from once to three or four 
times in a season, moving to such locations as promise an immediate 
harvest. This is practiced to a lesser extent in some of the central and 
eastern states. The Dadants find it frequently to their advantage to 
move their apiaries to the lowlands along the Mississippi River 
