No. G. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 415 



agaiust it, a prejudice without sufficieut ground, for it may remain 

 along the roadwide for years and not encroach upon cultivated 

 ground. Moreover, it is a biennial, dying root and branch the second 

 year, and it' cut so as to prevent its going to seed it is easily killed out. 

 Where cattle are allowed to run on the roadside, and have become 

 used to it, they will keep it eaten down so it will not become un- 

 sightly. But they must first learn to eat it. 



Although there is no plant that can be profitably cultivated in 

 good fields for honey alone, the farmer will do well to have an eye 

 to crops worth planting aside from the honey they yield, which will 

 at the same time give a harvest for the bees. But it must be re- 

 membered that to be of any service there must be a considerable 

 quantity of any given honey plant. The growth of lindens may be 

 encourag-ed in preference to trees that yield no honey. As a shade 

 tree along the roadside, the linden Is fine. Gooseberries and rasp- 

 berries are valuable honey plants. Buckwheat is so well known 

 as to be hardly worth mentioning. 



Of course there w ill always be more or less of the great standby, 

 white clover, and it is well to try other clovers. It is claimed that 

 there are strains of bees that do fair work on the second crop of 

 red clover, with its shorter flower tubes. Some effort is being made 

 to breed bees with tongues longer than the average, and if this is 

 succssful, we may yet save the tons of red clover honey that are 

 going to waste. 



Alsike clover is very valuable. One trouble is that it blooms at 

 about the same time as white clover, when it is not much needed. 

 If cut in June, just as it begins to blossom, it may be made to bloom 

 later, and thus prolong the harvest. 



Crimson clover is especially valuable because coming so early. 

 If yours happens to be one of the localities where it is profitable 

 as a forage crop, or rather where it succeeds well, you will have 

 an additional inducement to cultivate it on account of its honey. 



Sweet clover, or melilot, is a plant well worth your while to 

 experiment with. In some places it is highly valued as a forage 

 plant. It is a near relative to the much-vaunted alfalfa, and before 

 the plants are in blossom it may trouble you to tell one from the 

 other. While alfalfa yields tons upon tons of honey in the west, 

 it has never been reported as a honey-yielder in the east, even in 

 the few cases in which it has been successfully cultivated. But 

 sweet clover will flourish anywhere, and upon no other honey plant 

 can you more surely depend for a yearly yield of honey. Stock must 

 learn to eat it, and so they must alfalfa. It has been reported that 

 where the tw^o grew side by side, cows would prefer the sweet clover. 

 You may find that it will be easier to teach stock to eat dry sweet- 

 clover hay than to teach them to eat it in the green state. 



