THE APIARY

Otago Witness, Issue 3250, 28 June 1916, Page 9

THE APIARY

By J. A

Those lines are written from a new home in Tasman, on the Moutere Hills, Nelson. The home consists of a little lean-to wharo 20ft bv 10ft, with a temporary partition in it to divide it mm two rooms. The situation is on top of a bluff some 120 ft high, and overlooking- Tasman Bay. Standing on the bluff and looking eastward, away about 13 or 20 miles to the right lies tho town of Nelson, while to tho loft, about nine miles round tho bay, lies Motueka. Looking directly eastward is D'Urville Island, with the entrance to the Trench Pass showing clear in the distance. The bay is credited with being nearly always calm, the climate being remarkable for tho absence of wind. Lying to the westward of the whare on a gentle slope is the orchard, which contains some 30 acres of apples and pears, something like 4500 trees, tho oldest break of which, live acres in extent, is five years old. This may seem largo to those not acquainted with what is going on in fruit-growing districts; but just over tho fence is, another orchard nearly 100 acres in extent, and just beyond that are two others still larger. Going from here to Maxiri, six miles round tho coast, the apple orchards are continuous You can trace rows of apple trees for miles over ridge after ridge, whilst hundreds of acres more are being planted. There is nothing else but apples and pears here—no stock, no grass lands, no cropping—nothing but apples, apples, apples. Round in the older settlements there are lots ol stone fruits— apricots, peaches, nectarines, plums, and cherries, also quinces and lemons; tut here on these Moutere Hills, where the land is of the poorest, and where it could have been bought five years ago for 5s an aero, and is now in its natural state worth £3O an acre, there is only one intention, and that is to cater to an export trade in apples and pears. While the young apple trees are being planted and are coming forward to the fruiting age co-opera-tive associations are being started, and tho necessary preparations are being made to handle the fruit to the best advantage It is impossible to imagine a district more engrossed in one thing than is this. The whole thought is of ploughing and spraying and priming. Perhaps I am wrong in saying that. There is another interest, and the most is being made of it, and that is the taking up of new blocks, cutting them up, and boosting them. To my mind the land shark is very much in evidence here, and is doing a rearing trade. Orchards arc changing hands frequently, and always at much-enhanced values. A throe or four-year-old orchard can hardly be bought now for less than £IOO per acre; whilst in the case of the older orchards round ytoke and Richmond, it takes £2OO per acre to buy them. This trade is a lucrative one, and is causing a boom that, should tho export trade from any cause fail, will end only in disaster.

From a beekeeper's point of view this district does not appeal to me at all, and yet in the whare where I- am writing there are the remains in three different corners of the building of colonies of bees which have made their home there and built out their combs. There is some native bush along the bluff, and the manuka scrub seems to bloom most of the year ; but there is. no clover. I am going to test it with a colony or two, but do' not expect much result. When the summer comes wo will cast longing eyes, towards Southland again, and already we are beginning to look forward to a summer amongst the bees in the old location.

BEES AND APPLE BLOSSOMS.

"I live in a locality where there are many orchards of apple trees. What relation do these trees bear to our friends the bees, in having them in shape so that they can, by the ' great army of workers' produced through the stimulation of apple bloom, gather for us the tons of honey from the white clover and basswood?"

Tims writes a correspondent. In reply, I would say that nothing in the line of early honey so stimulates early brood-rearing as does that which comes from the pink and white blossoms of the apple trees—in fact, it has always been a'proverb in this section of the country, "As goes apple bloom, ho goes the season," as to honey. More than half a century ago the hand of that most noted beekeeper, Moses Quinby, of St. Johnvifle, New York, penned these words: "In good weather a gain of 201 b is sometimes added to the hive during the period of apple blossoms. But we are seldom fortunate enough to have continuous good weather, as it is often rainy, cloudy. cool, or windy, all of which are of very detrimental. A frost will sometimes destroy all, and the gain of our bees is reversed—that is, their stores are lighter at the end than at the beginning of this season of flowers. Yet this season often decides the prosperity of the bees for the summer. If there is ffood weather now, we expect our first swarms about June 1. If not, no subsequent yield of honey will make up the deficiency." Never were truer words uttered, as applied to Central- New York ; and what applies to this locality will apply generally to northern States; hence we see that the apple tree bears no mean relation to the beekeeper. In 1377 we had the best yield of honey from apple bloom, that I ever knew; and the results from the apiary that year were the highest ever obtained by the writer, which was an average of 166'2-31b of honey, mostly comb, from each old colony in the spring. I consider the great value from apple bloom to lie in its stimulating finality, towards plentiful brood-rear-ing, and in producing stores to tide over the period of scarcity which immediately follows this bloom for a time approximating two weeks. I believe that if Ave could have the same number of bees in the; hives in apple bloom that we do in basswood time, with equally good weather, the yield from this source would be nearly or quite as .good while the bloom lasted f Iml since the bloom comes so soon after cold weather, we do not have the bees; and. still worse. Iho weather is usually such that the bees do not have an opportunity aftencr than one year out of three "or" four to work on the bloom more than enough to encourage brood-rearing: hence. I doubt the advisability of trying to work the colonics up to an unusual strength with the hopes of securing a surplus from apple bb>om, far T have touched only on the practical or clollar-and-eent side of this matter. However, there is still another side which wo as beekeepers look after so seldom that we grow poor, and to a certain extent ugly. jn our everlasting hust-lo after that which pours Mammon into the homo treasury;

and wo go about continually with a look on our faces which says to every passer-by,

''Time is money." He who sees in tho bees, the apple bloossoms, and the ripened fruit only that which shall put moiicy_ into his pocket lives in a poor, half-furnished house. He who obtains from them only what he can fell gathers but a _ meagre crop. If I can find something besides dollars and cents with my bees or on apple trees, shall I not take it? Apple trees during each year are like some people we know. In their young and blossoming days they are sweet*and pink-hued, and then they grow acid, pale, and hard: but in tho ripened experience of later life they may hecomo sweet again, and more enchanting by their'ministering to the calls of humanity. So if any of us have become arid, pale, and hard in our eager grasping after tho "almighty dollar" which may come from the bees and apple trees, let us once more return to the joy and sweetness wo had in the springtime of life which may again come into our lives as the deep richness of colour comes to- the ripened fruit of the apple trees of autumn. _ If we have allowed our grasping to get the better of our inner being, something as apples led to the loss of Paradise, is it not about time wo begin to reconstruct a bit of Eden by once more listening to that better nature which will, if wo will let it. lead us once more under tho blossom-laden boughs, made pleasant with their perfume and the joyful hum of the boos? Nature might have contented herself by allowing the apple trees to bear seeds "only; but she accompanied such prosaic action with __ fragrant ficyvcrs and delicious fruit.—G. M. Doolittle.