y winter is deep. Even higher
than this several bee-trees have been cut which contained over 200
pounds of honey.

The destructive action of sheep has not been so general on the mountain
pastures as on those of the great plain, but in many places it has been
more complete, owing to the more friable character of the soil, and its
sloping position. The slant digging and down-raking action of hoofs on
the steeper slopes of moraines has uprooted and buried many of the
tender plants from year to year, without allowing them time to mature
their seeds. The shrubs, too, are badly bitten, especially the various
species of ceanothus. Fortunately, neither sheep nor cattle care to feed
on the manzanita, spiraea, or adenostoma; and these fine honey-bushes
are too stiff and tall, or grow in places too rough and inaccessible, to
be trodden under foot. Also the canon walls and gorges, which form so
considerable a part of the area of the range, while inaccessible to
domestic sheep, are well fringed with honey-shrubs, and contain
thousands of lovely bee-gardens, lying hid in narrow side-canons and
recesses fenced with avalanche taluses, and on the top of flat,
projecting headlands, where only bees would think to look for them.

But, on the other hand, a great portion of the woody plants that escape
the feet and teeth of the sheep are destroyed by the shepherds by means
of running fires, which are set everywhere during the dry autumn for the
purpose of burning off the old fallen trunks and underbrush, with a view
to improving the pastures, and making more open ways for the flocks.
These destructive sheep-fires sweep through nearly the entire forest
belt of the range, from one extremity to the other, consuming not only
the underbrush, but the young trees and seedlings on which the
permanence of the forests depends; thus setting in motion a long train
of evils which will certainly reach far beyond bees and beekeepers.

[Illustration: WILD BEE GARDEN.]

The plow has not yet invaded the forest region to any appreciable
extent, neither has it accomplished much in the foot-hills. Thousands of
bee-ranches might be established along the margin of the plain, and up
to a height of 4000 feet, wherever water could be obtained. The climate
at this elevation admits of the making of permanent homes, and by moving
the hives to higher pastures as the lower pass out of bloom, the annual
yield of honey would be nearly doubled. The foot-hill pastures, as