BEE-spoke-data/bees-v0 huggingface dataset:
Squashes are widely cultivated for food. There are numerous varieties, but all are valuable sources of pollen and nectar. They secrete nectar freely, and where sufficiently abundant, a considerable quantity of honey is stored.
**STAR THISTLE or KNAPWEED (Centaurea). BARNABY'S THISTLE.**
There are several species of star thistles or knapweeds widely distributed. The yellow star thistle **(Centaurea solstitial)** (Fig. 131) is an introduced species from Europe that occurs from Massachusetts and Ontario, west to Iowa. It is also common in parts of California. It is only from the latter State that it is reported as an important honey plant. According to C, D, Stuart (American Bee Journal, page 340, October, 1948),
Figure 131: Yellow star thistle.
it furnishes from one-third to one-half of Butte County, California's honey crop, an average of about sixty tons. Concerning the plant he writes as follows:
"Star thistle begins to bloom about the first of July and continues till frost, which usually comes between October 1 and November 1. The yield of nectar is slow but continuous. If it is stopped by drought it will start yielding nectar again after a rain. The plant has the faculty of existing in arid soils for long periods of drought, and when apparently dried up, it will start to grow and blossom after a rain. Some cattle growers find that thistle hay can be fed profitably when cut and dried like other hay, if it is moistened before feeding. The dampening of the fodder takes the sting out of the leaves and blossoms.
"Star-thistle honey is heavy-bodied, white, almost cloying in its sweetness as orange, and has a greenish yellow tinge, like olive oil. It is considered by large buyers equal in quality to any white honey in the State, and with the price at two cents a pound more than light amber of the alfalfa type, and still rising, bemen in northern California should worry."
Richter lists Napa-thistle or tocalote **(Centaurea melitensis)** as yielding light amber honey of good flavor and fair body in Sacramento County, from May 15 to June 15. It is regarded as a bad weed and is abundant everywhere in fields and pastures. Like the foregoing, it has been disseminated with seed grain and grass seed. According to Richter, it does not yield nectar in southern California. School lists American knapweed **(Centaurea Americana)** as not important in Texas.
**STICKLEAF, see Mentzelia.**
**STICK-TIGHT, see Spanish Needle.**
**STINKING CLOVER, see Rocky Mountain Bee Plant.**
**STINKWEED, see Jackass Clover.**
**STONECROP (Sedum pulchellum).**
Stonecrop is common from Virginia to Arkansas and south to Georgia. It is abundant in many localities and is reported to be a valuable honey plant in the South.
**STORK'S BILL, see Pin Clover.**
**STRAWBERRY (Fragaria).**
The wild strawberries are seldom sufficiently abundant to be of much value to the bees, but the cultivated varieties are grown in large plantations and are the source of both pollen and nectar. They bloom in early spring, for the most part, although some of the everbearing varieties continue to blossom through the summer. Strawberries, like most other fruits are of principal value to stimulate early brood rearing.
The bees are very important to the strawberry growers, as many varieties of strawberries are not self-pollinating or are deficient in stannens. The bees carry the pollen from the stannate blossoms to the pistils of the incomplete flowers.
**STRING BARK, see Eucalyptus.**
sippi River and the Rocky Mountains. In the East, the surplus secured from this plant has been disappointing, and eastern meu insist that sweet clover is overrated as a honey plant. However, those who have seen the big flows that are frequent along the Missouri River and westward are enthusiastic in its praise. In the region about Sious City, Iowa, it is grown extensively as a farm crop. In this section an average of 200 pounds surplus per colony from sweet clover is not uncommon. On the limestone soils of Alabama and Mississippi it also yields freely and large yields are reported. In the irrigated regions of the West it is of great importance and beekeepers who ship sweet clover honey in carlots are not uncommon.
The quality of the honey is excellent. It is light in color and mild in flavor, although slightly pepper to the taste. It granulates more readily than white clover, but is regarded as of number one quality in the principal markets.
### Sweet Clover as a Farm Crop
When our older readers were beginners in the beckeeping business it was a popular thing for the beekeepers to buy sweet clover seed and stealthily sow it along the roadsides. So general was this practiced that whenever the plant appeared in a new locality it was generally charged up to the beekeepers living nearby. So great was the prejudice against the plant that much ill-feeling developed in some places because of it. It even went so far that in some States it was placed on the list of noxious weeds and its eradication required by law. When Frank Coverdale, well-known Iowa farmer who did so much to popularize sweet clover, first sowed it in his own fields, neighbors called on the county attorney to enquire whether he could not be prosecuted for sowing weed seed. For a generation the beekeepers kept up the fight, and constantly preached that sweet clover was not a weed, but a valuable forage plant. It remained for men like Coverdale, who were both beekeepers and farmers, to prove the assertion and convince the unwilling public, by making as much profit from sweet clover pasture for forage as the neighbors could make from other farm crops.
It was on poor lands which had been worn out by bad tillage, that the plant made the best showing. When lands which had been lying idle, because no other crop could be raised profitably, were made to produce good yields of milk, butter and beef from sweet clover, the neighbors were inclined to give it a trial on their own poor lands. The change in sentiment has been very marked during the past few years and now the demand for sweet clover seed is greater than the supply, and will continue so for several years, since the area where it is being grown is constantly being enlarged. There are large areas where sweet clover is grown generally as a farm crop, in Kentucky, Nebraska and Kansas. The increased acreage of this plant will double the possibilities of honey production in most any locality, and in numerous instances will treble and quadruple it. In the early years of his experience, Coverdale kept bees in several outapiaries, so that much travel back and forth was necessary. Since sweet clover has become so generally grown in his locality, he is able to keep three hundred colonies in one yard in his orchard, where they are under his immediate care at all times. After traveling over much of the Central West, it has become apparent to the author that within a few years the beekeeping possibilities of parts of Kansas, Nebraska and South Dakota will be almost inexhaustible because of the increase of this plant. On visiting Falmouth, Ky., I was amazed at the stories they told of what sweet clover had done for that region. One of the pioneer growers was E. E. Barton, and his experience with it sounded like a fairy tale. Mr. Barton said that following the civil war, most of Pendleton County was given over to tobacco growing, with little live stock, and not much rotation of crops. It was a hill country, and although it had a fertile soil over a clay subsoil, the heavy rains soon washed away the shallow surface soil, and one farm after another was abandoned. Huadreds of farms were abandoned, and many of them were sold for taxes, because no buyers could be found. More than a third of the population left the county, and the farmers who remained had hard lines to make ends meet. Sweet clover was stealthily sowed, probably by beekeepers intent on increasing the bee pasture. At first it was regarded with disfavor and fought as a dangerous weed.
Mr. Barton came into possession of a farm, somewhat against his will, because the owner could not pay the mortgage. He tried renting it, and the tenant was unable to make a living, much less pay the rent. After it had been abandoned, he went to great trouble to keep down the weeds, especially sweet clover. Then came a year of drought, when there was very little feed for the cattle, and they were turned into the roads to graze. Even there there was but little except the sweet clover, which was by this time rather common along the roadsides. It was soon noticed that the cows were eating the sweet clover with relish and doing well. Then somebody tried an experiment by sowing it in a field. It thrived, the cows liked it, and the milk flow was increased. Mr. Barton by this time was quite ready to profit by the experience, and within five years the farm which would not grow grass was producing good crops. He bought more abandoned farms and sowed them to sweet clover, and his neighbors began to do likewise. One by one the farmers came back to their abandoned farms, new settlers came in, and everybody began to grow sweet clover. Now there are fifty thousand acres of it in that county. Ask any farmer you meet on the streets of Falmouth what he thinks of sweet clover and he will tell you such tales of rebuilt fortunes from a combination of dairy cows and sweet clover as you never expect to hear. There are now shipped from the county about half a million pounds of seed yearly, besides thousands of dollars' worth of dairy products every week. They find that an average of 300 to 600 pounds of hulled seed per acre can be secured from the white variety and 500 to 700 pounds of the yellow. An average yield of from $40 to $100 per acre is the return from the sweet clover, according to local reports picked up on the streets. Now one finds evidences of prosperity on every hand. The farmers have fine homes, automobiles, and money in the bank.
Soil Requirements.
There is no forage plant that will succeed on such a wide range of soil conditions as will sweet clover. It will succeed under unfavorable conditions on the heaviest clays and on light sand. It will grow on hardpan and on gravelly and stony land unsnited for general cultivation. It does well on soils too wet for either alfalfa or red clover and on soils so dry that neither of these will succeed. It will grow on land so poor and devoid of humans that no other clover or grass will grow. It is the greatest soil builder known, and now that the public has finally accepted the fact that it is not a noxious weed, it will shortly be used to redeen untold thousands of acres of otherwise waste land. It grows all the way from sea level to the mountain sides, and is spreading in the semi-arid sections of Colorado and other Western States, where the annual rainfall is very light.
In the October, 1917, number of the American Bee Journal has been told the story of the sweet clover region of Alabama and Mississippi. In those States sweet clover has spread over thousands of acres of land which had been abandoned for agricultural purposes; and it is not only furnishing abundant pasture to the bees, but is restoring the fertility of these worn-out plantations.
The growth of the plant, however, is no longer confined to the road-sides and worn-out fields, but farmers are growing it successfully and profitably on lands worth $300 per acre in Iowa and Illinois, because it pays them to do so. In some cases the railroad companies have discovered that sweet clover growing along the right of way is the best possible insurance against erosion of the roadbed. A heavy growth of sweet clover protects the banks from the washing of heavy rains, as no other plant will do. In places, one can see a continuous strip of sweet clover for miles and miles along the railroads. It would seem the part of wisdom for the beekeepers' associations to bring this fact to the attention of the men in charge of keeping the lines in repair wherever possible. Once established along the railroads, it is bound to spread more or less along the byroads and into the fields, thus increasing the supply of forage within reach of the bees.
One of the most useful purposes which sweet clover serves is to smother out obnoxious weeds. So persistent is the plant where sowed in waste places that there are few weeds which can compete with it. Where bad weeds are present in old lots, along roadsides, etc., the easiest way to eradicate them is by sowing sweet clover freely. Within a few years the sweet clover will generally crowd them out. In spite of this fact, sweet clover itself is one of the easiest plants to destroy. Since it only lives two years and must come again from the seed after that time, all that is necessary to clear the ground of sweet clover is to cut it low when in blossom and before the seeds are formed.
Where there is difficulty in establishing alfalfa, sweet clover is often grown in advance to establish the nitrogen-gathering bacteria, which are peculiar to the leguminous plants. Following sweet clover, there is usually little difficulty in getting the alfalfa to grow, if the seed bed is carefully prepared. However, many farmers who have been growing both plants, are of the opinion that sweet clover is the more profitable of the two, and that it can be handled successfully with less difficulty.
There is no pasture crop which will support as many cattle or other live stock as will sweet clover during the second season of its growth. A small experimental plot of little more than an acre yielded two big loads of hay. The plants were permitted to get a good start after the hay was cut before pasturing, then two cows and a horse were turned in for the rest of the season. In addition to furnishing an abundant pasture for three, more than twenty bags of seed were secured. Allowing $15 per ton for hay, $1 a month per head for pasture, and $3 a bag for the seed, all very conservative figures, the crop returned about $96 per acre. While this small plot was experimental, there are numerous farmers who have received more than $100 an acre for seed alone.
### Cultural Requirements
It frequently happens that, having seen sweet clover growing along the roadsides, on gravelly banks and other unpromising situations, we are surprised to fail in getting a stand in a well prepared field. Sweet clover requires a firm seed bed, and will not succeed on land where the soil has been deeply stirred and left in a loose condition. It is well to scratch the surface with a tool that does not penetrate deeply, leaving the surface loose for an inch or so, and compact below. While it will succeed on a great variety of soils, it requires that they be in a well settled condition and not freshly plowed to a depth of several inches, such as best suits many forage plants. This condition probably accounts for more failures in getting a stand of sweet clover than any other cause.
Sowing the seed on top of the ground or on the snow in winter, will often secure a good stand with no cultivation at all. Good results often come from sowing it with small grain in spring, on land that has been cultivated the previous season. Some succeed by sowing after the last cultivation of corn, the seed germinating to some extent the same season, while some does not sprout until the following spring. The ideal condition is to cover the seed from half an inch to an inch with finely pulverized soil, with a firm soil underneath.
### Time of Sowing
Sweet clover may be sowed in the winter or early spring, as above stated, or at any time from March until August. It should not be seeded when it is likely to start so late that it will not have time to establish itself firmly before winter. Under the different conditions of soil and climate of this great country, it is difficult to give general directions that will apply everywhere.
The time of sowing will depend much upon the manner in which the crop is to be handled. Where it is desired to sow the seed on old meadows or pastures without plowing, it will probably be best to scatter it in winter or early spring. The freezing and thawing have a tendency to soften the hard coat of the seed, as well as to cover it with earth. As a field crop, the writer's limited experience would indicate that spring sowing, with a nurse crop that can be cut early, will be best, though winter seeding on stubble should bring good results.
There is a great diversity of opinion as to the proper amount of seed to sow. Where it is used to thicken up meadows or pastures a smaller amount is needed than where sown as a field crop on newly prepared land. Some growers say that 4 pounds of good unhulled seed per acre is sufficient to sow on grass lands. As high as 20 pounds of hulled seed per acre is advocated by some for a field crop. The seed covering is very hard, and, unless treated, only about half of it will grow the first year. If the seed is scarified, the hard coat is scratched until it germinates readily, and much less seed is necessary to secure a stand than otherwise. Ten pounds of hulled and scarified seed per acre should be sufficient on good land.
It is often difficult to get a stand on old land which is deficient in line, for lack of the nitrogen-gathering bacteria that thrive on the roots of clovers. It is sometimes necessary to treat a small area with a good coat of manure, and sometimes with crushed lime. After the sweet clover is growing well on this land the area can be gradually extended.
### Utilizing the Crop
Probably there is no forage crop which will furnish as much pasture per acre as will sweet clover in its second year of growth. It should be allowed to get a good start in spring before stock is turned in, and the area should be sufficiently large for the animals thus kept. Cattle, hogs and horses all eat it with relish after they become familiar with it, and thrive equally on it. It is a common practice to pasture the crop during the first part of the second season and then to turn the stock off and harvest a seed crop. The writer has harvested a very good crop of seed from a limited area, which was pastured lightly through the entire summer until the crop was cut. Of course, it is not possible to pasture heavily after mid-summer, and still secure a good crop of seed.
Sweet clover makes a good quality of hay if cut at the proper time and well cured. If a seed crop is to be cut, the first crop of the second season may be cured for hay by cutting high enough to leave some of the small branches on the lower part of the stem. If cut too low at this time the plants will die. Sweet clover hay requires more time to cure properly than the clovers with small stems, but if piled in small cocks it is little damaged, even though some rain falls on is. If properly cured it makes a very good winter feed. When cut for hay it should be known before it begins to bloom to any extent. When it is about two feet high is the right time. The first year it may be cut at almost any time the grower finds convenient.
Some practice sowing sweet clover with early oats, cutting the oats with a high stubble and later getting a crop of hay.
### Saving the Seed
The seed crop sometimes fails because the plants are too thick on the ground. They spread or branch widely as they grow, and where they are too thick the blossoms may drop off without setting a full crop of seed. Usually best results are obtained where a first crop is cut for hay or is patured until mid-summer. The second crop does not grow as high as the first would do if permitted to seed, thus making it easier to handle.
Seed is obtained only the second year, and if the first growth of that year is permitted to seed, the plants will die when cut, so that only the one crop can be obtained.
The seed ripens so irregularly that it is not always easy to tell just when it should be cut in order to save the largest amount of seed. At best, much of it will shatter off and be lost, since the first to ripen will be ready while there is still a large amount of bloom. The most seed will be secured by cutting when about three-fourths of the seed pods have turned brown. If cut sooner there will be too many blossoms and immature seeds; if cut later too much of the ripe seed will shatter in the harvesting. Usually enough seeds shatter off to resced the land. Some growers have been able to continue the same land in sweet clover for fifteen or twenty years by sowing two years in succession to begin with. After the first year a crop of seed will ripen every year.
It is something of a problem to harvest the seed without losing a large portion of it. The writer has cut a small field with an ordinary newer when the plants were wet with dew, and immediately raked it into windows. This method is hardly to be advised where the seed is to be hauled to a threshing machine, since more of the seed will be wasted than where it is bound into bundles. This small field was threshed by hand with forks. A large sheet of canvas was laid on the ground and the sweet clover carefully lifted on it, after it was fully dried. By beating with the forks the seed was readily separated from the stalks.
The ordinary grain binder is generally used for this purpose. Where much seed is to be harvested, it is necessary to provide some special pans to catch the seed that shatter off. Corn binders have been used in some cases.
When threshed with a grain separator, the straw is broken up so much that it makes a fair forage for wintering cattle or horses. They will not cat it readily when threshed by band, since the straw is not broken up to any extent and the dry stalks are too coarse otherwise.
Those interested in this subject will do well to write to the U. S. Department of Agriculture for Farmer's Bulletins which deal with different phases of the culture of sweet clover. They give in much greater detail information that space will not permit here.
**SWECT FENNEL (Foeniculum vulgare).**
The cultivated funnel from Europe has become naturalized in some places along the Atlantic Coast in Maryland and Virginia and other Eastern States. It is often cultivated in gardens in many localities. Lovell lists it as the source of a light amber honey.
**SUMAC (RHUS).**
There are about one hundred and twenty species of rhus found in Asia, South America and North America. There are fourteen species common to North America. The red or scarlet sumac, shown in Figure 133 (**Rhus glabra**) is most common, being found from New England west to Saskatchewan, Colorado and Arizona, and south to Florida and Louisiana.
This species is a well-known source of nectar and is especially important in New England.
In Texas, Scholl lists the dwarf sumac (**Rhus copallina**) as yielding surplus throughout eastern and south Texas. He also lists green sumac (**Rhus virens**) as attracting the bees in west Texas.
In California, Richter lists poison oak (**Rhus diversiloba**) as yielding a superior grade of white honey which granulates readily. He also reports Laurel sumac (**Rhus laurina**) as yielding amber honey of marked odor but fine flavor.
The poison ivy (**Rhus Toxicodendron**), common to the Eastern States from Nova Scotia to Wisconsin and south to Arkansas and Florida, is a vigorous vine, climbing by means of aerial rootlets. The flowers are inconspicuous, but secrete nectar freely. Where sufficiently abundant, sur plus may be expected from this source.
Some species of sumac may be expected in almost every section of the country where woodlands are common. Nearly all species seem to be attractive to the bees, although it is only in limited localities that honey in surplus quantity is reported. The honey is reputed of good quality, with mild flavor. In the east the honeyflow from sumac is sometimes very rapid and a liberal quantity of surplus secured, at times as high as 100 pounds per colony. New honey from this source is somewhat bitter to the taste,
Figure 135: Leaves and berries of red sumac.
but this characteristic soon disappears. The blooming period usually comes in July and lasts for two or three weeks.
The dwarf sumac is a widely distributed species, known is some localities as mountain sumac. It is common in the Gulf States and is the source of honey in favored localities.
**SUNFLOWER (Helianthus).**
There are many species of the sunflowers, some of which may be found from the Atlantic Coast to California, and from Canada to the Gulf.