Bees in California

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Section nine of The American Bee Journal, Volume one, number three,
March eighteen sixty one. This is a LibriVox recording. All
LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information
or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org. Read by

(00:22):
scam the American Bee Journal, Volume one, number three, March
eighteen sixty one. By various bees in California. The following
is among the latest items of news from the Land
of Gold the be annoyance in California. Since the extensive

(00:43):
importation and production of bees in California, they have become,
in many respects a source of great annoyance. The housekeeper
in cooking, the grocer, and fruit dealer all have them
swarming by hundreds and perhaps thousands around their premises, rivaling
the housefly in troublesome propensities. A Sacramento coal dealer recently

(01:06):
obtained a quantity of coal which had a cask of
molasses broken over it. When the coal was brought into
the yard, the bees collected in such quantities that he
spent half a day with a hose in washing off
the coal in order to remove the temptation. They have
partially destroyed the produce of several vineyards near Sacramento. When

(01:27):
the grapes were gathered, it was found that the little
thieves had extracted the juice. As a matter of course,
a large number of bees are necessarily destroyed while poaching
on forbidding ground. Is there no remedy for these difficulties,
as the Sacramento News. Can bees be kept from annoying
everybody but their owners and at the same time preserve

(01:51):
their own lives, or must the evils complained of continue
to increase in magnitude. This annoyance to housekeepers, grocers and
fruit dealers results, we suspect chiefly from carelessness and mismanagement,
just as that from houseflies does measurably in every climb
and country. In the latter case, cleanliness is found to

(02:12):
be the most effectual corrective, and in the former, do
care not to lead the poor bees into temptation will
doubtless prove to be an efficient preventive. If the housekeepers
will keep their luscious confections, the grocers their sugars, and
the fruit dealers their sweetmeats underdue supervision and guard, the

(02:32):
bees will cause them very little trouble, especially if at
the same time they keep their tables, counters, and boxes.
Fastidiously nice, and unbe daubed. Bees like flies, make their
annoying visits mainly on special invitation, and are very apt
to retire as soon as they discover that no provision
has been made for their entertainment. They are not fond

(02:56):
of short commons, and never linger long where there is
not an odor of welcome. Nature has given them a
carp lunch to appropriate whatever is sweet to the taste,
and to interpret every well flavored aroma as a loud
call for their presence. They are not particularly abundant in
these parts. Yet a few months ago, a worthy dame

(03:18):
residing within a furlong of our sanctum, undesignedly tempted them
to visit her in countless multitudes. She had placed a
pot of honey on her kitchen stove to warm, but
being busy about other matters, the pot began to boil
and boiled over before she was aware. The overflowing honey

(03:38):
ran down in streams on the stove and thence ascended
in fumes, filling the air with a sweet smelling savor.
The ever watchful and wide awake bees soon snuffed a
treat in the tainted breeze, and in a few minutes
the kitchen was filled with these winged worshipers of sweetness,
thronging in from all quarters, some even descending the chimney.

(04:02):
Here was an annoyance with a vengeance, And well might
the good woman exclaim with him of the Sacramento news.
Is there no remedy for these difficulties? The seething pot
was forthwith snatched from the stove by her husband, and
hurriedly deposited in a dark corner of the cellar. The
stove was promptly sponged with a wet mop, and when

(04:24):
the grateful fumes ceased to exhale, the unwelcome visitors speedily decamped,
save a few hundred that happened to get scorched in
their eagerness. Like causes we opine will produce like effects
both here and in California. And if we allure bees,
we must expect to have them buzzing around us, no

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matter whether we fumigate our kitchen with honey or anoint
our stone coal with molasses. As to the depredations alleged
to have been perpetrated by our favorites in the several
vineyards near Sacramento, we asked to be allowed to hold
them guiltless till we have some more conclusive evidence than
mere newspaper on its or the declaration of superficial ignorance.

(05:09):
A competent jury would probably have discovered that before the
bees extracted the juices, some other insect had punctured the grapes,
or over ripeness had caused them to burst their skins.
To ascertain the truth in the premises, let a duly
qualified committee of investigation be appointed next season by the

(05:30):
grapegrowers and horticulturists of that highly favored land, and let
the chairman be instructed to send us a copy of
their report for publication. If when examining a hive to
ascertain whether the young queen has become fertile, we find
one or more rudimental royal cells containing eggs or larvae,

(05:50):
we may safely conclude that the queen has been lost,
and that the eggs were laid by a fertile worker.
End of Section nine