Shasta Bees. A Honeyful Region - The Bee Lands - A Summer Paradise. (From Our Special Correspondent.) Sisson's Station near Mt. Shasta, December 17, 1874.

• Main Author: Muir, John
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: Scholarly Commons 1875
• Subjects: John Muir; Bibliography; Kimes; William F. Kimes; Maymie B. Kimes; pamphlets; journal articles; speeches; writing; naturalist; annotation; Ice cap
• Online Access: https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/jmb/40; https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1039&context=jmb

SHASTA BEES. A Honeyful Region-The Bee Lands-A Summer Paradise. (FROM OUR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT.] Sisson's Station, near Mt. Shasta"! December IT, 1ST4. ( The Shasta woods are fall of wild bees, and their honey is exactly delicious. At least such was the quality of roy samples, and no wonder, inasmuch as it was in great part derived from the nectar bells of a huckleberry bog by bees that were let alone to follow their own sweet ways. The hire was a living pine- tree, and tne distance to the honey-bells was only a moment's btssz. Bees themselves could hardly hold the conception of a more honeyf ol place—noney-bog to left of them; honey-bog to right of them; blooming wiSSows for springtime; golden-rods for autumn; and beside athat and a'that, miles of acres of butteismps and columbines and rosy chaparral. Kegardmg Mount Shasta from a bee point of view and beginning at the summit, the first 5,000 feet is clothed in summer with glaciers and rags of snow, and is, of course, almost, entirely honeyless. The next 1,000 feet of elevation is a brown zone tufted and matted with bush penstemon and brvanthus. Next comes the silver-fir zone, about 2,500 feet in height, containing few sweet flowers, but rich in honey-dew and pollen: Kext trie zone of honey-bearing chaparral or Shasta heather, forming the smooth, sunny slor.es or She base. This last-is six or seven miles wide and has a circumference of more than seventy miles. Companies of spruce and pine break: across "it in weflvwatered sections; yet, upon the whole, it is remarkably regular and contains all the | principal honey-grounds of the mountain. THE BEE LANDS. . The formation oStheShastabes lands is easily understood. Shasta is a Sre-mouneain, created by a succession of eruptions of ashes and molten lava, which, pouring over the lips of the-craters, layer over layer, grew out- wa'rd and upward like the trunk of an exogenous tree. Durit.g the gteeial period the whole Shasta cone was capped wath ice, which by erosion degraded it to some extent arid rerrodeied its flanks. When at length the glacial penosl began to draw near a close the ice-cap was gradually melted oT arouDd the bottom, and iu receding and breaking up into its present condition deposited those irregular heaps and rings of noramo matter upon which the Shasta for- e-ts -are growing. The glacial erosion of most of the Shasta lavas gives* rise to soils composed of rough, bowlders oi moderate size and a great deal of light, porous, sandy dehrOSuK,. which yields very readily to tae transporting power of running water. An immense quantity of this finer material was sorted out and washeo dowa fram the upper slopes of the moani- ain by an ancient flood of extraordinary magnitude, and redeposited in smooth, delf.s-like beds around the base. These form the main Vionev- grounds. The peculiar vegetation for which they were planned was gradually acquired, huckleberry bogs were planted, the,seasons became summer, ie chaparral became sweeter, until honer distills like dew. In this glorious honey zone the Shasta bees roTe and revel, cambering in bramble and hucSl?-bloom, ringing and singing, now down among buttercnps,.now out of sight in the rosy blossoms of t'ne buckthorn. They cousirierthe lilies, and roll into them and like lilies they toll not, for bee3 are run by sun-power, just as mill-wheels are by water-power, and whea the one has olenty of water and the otlier p/ienty of sun they ham and quiver a! ike. I have often thought in bright, settled sun weather, that I could tsilthe time of day by the comparative energy of bae movements. Senile and moderate in the cool of the morning, gradually increasing in I fervor, and at high noon thrilling and quivering in wild sun-ecstasy. Bees are as directly the outcome of bright light as flowers are. Bee death and flower death are also alike—merely a snn-wrtheiing and evaporation. Shasta bees appear to be better fed "than any other I know of. They are dainty feeders and enormously cordial withal. Misrt moths and humming-birds seldom set foot'on a fiower, but reach out and suck through long tubes as through straws; but bees hng ', and clasp and rub their bsnnt countenances upon them ike rouna,.awkward children upon their mothers. JfflLISBTTOL RESION. Of all She overworked and defrauded toilers of California towns, onlyjabont twenty came to the daylight of j Shasta last season. How the glories of this region have been 30 long unvoiced when the Oregon and California stage has run daily past for years on the very skirts ef the great white cone, is a mystery. There is no daylight in towns, and the weary public ought to know *hat there is lighthere, and I for one clear my skirts from the responsibility of silence by shouting a cordial ra. Come a beeing; huckleberry bogs in fall bloom are glorious sights, and they bloom twise a year. The flowers are narrow-mouthed purple bells that seem to have caught the tones of the alpeh glow. Later, these blooms turn to berries, and the leaves to crimson petals. Here yon may go with the bees. Conceive if you can the magHetism of brushing through the bushes with myriads of honey- i bells ringing against your knees, and, besides, no i softness ever enjoyed by human foot is comparable \ with the softness of a bog. Come all who need rest and light bendins: and breaking with over work, leave yonr profits and losses and metallic dividends and ! come a beeing. It is hard to die the dark deatijo? : towns, hearse, coffin, cloth and countenances all b.ack. ! In June the base of Mount Shasta will be as white with boney bloom as the summit with snow. F5low the bees and be showered with blossoms; take a baptism and a honey-bath and get some sweetness into your lives. If you like to think, there is plenty here to think at. How Shasta fires have burned and buiided, and how, notwithstanding it is still hot within, glac'ers dwell on its flanks; and how as one of the grand as&y hearths of nature its base flows witn honey. Geology, boisny. zoology, gland object lessons in ech, and if you like , banting there is game in abundance. But better let j blood alone and come purely a beeing. The hoijey j grounds will be blooming in June. Jon Mors. https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/jmb/1039/thumbnail.jpg