Minnesota Plant Life. 1 1 1 



Tlie refrigerator cars and cold-storage warehouses which are 

 such important features of modern civiHzation, making it pos- 

 sible for Minnesota dressed beef and dairy products to be 

 shipped even across the waters of the Atlantic, are purely de- 

 vices for limiting the growth of putrifactive bacteria by keep- 

 ing the temperature below a point where they can develop. 



Bacteria in tobacco-curing. In the general group of putri- 

 factive fermentive processes should be mentioned one or two 

 which are not precisely like the others. For example, the "fla- 

 vor" of tobacco and cigars is largely due to certain waste prod- 

 ucts of bacteria grown upon the tobacco while it is being cured. 

 The difference between a "good" cigar and a "bad" cigar lies 

 principally in the curing of the tobacco from which it is manu- 

 factured, and that is an operation in which bacteria take part. 

 A technical method has even been devised by which the Havana 

 bacteria have been cultivated, and it has already been applied 

 upon a small scale to tobacco-curing in Germany. As a result 

 of this process German tobacco, not at all the best, was con- 

 verted into qualities which could not be detected by experienced 

 smokers from the genuine Havana. 



Tanning and retting bacteria. The tanning of hides is an- 

 other industry which is dependent upon the action of bacteria, 

 and likewise the separation of hemp and flax fibres in the vats 

 where they are macerated. 



Bacteria in the dairy. None of these processes is so im- 

 portant to Minnesotans as those of yet another line of industry 

 in which bacteria play a necessary and extraordinary part. I 

 mean the dairy industries, for the successful production of the 

 best butter and cheese is as essentially dependent as is brewing 

 upon the proper control of bacteria. Even the "June flavor" 

 of butter has been artificially produced by careful control of its 

 bacterial content, while in one word, the difference between the 

 various brands of cheese, with few exceptions, lies in their bac- 

 terial flora. Edam, Neufchatel, Gorgonzola, Camembert and 

 Roquefort cheeses — distinct from each other in consistency, 

 flavor, and odor — largely depend for these qualities upon sep- 

 arate kinds of bacteria, which easily appear in the "natural 

 home" of each kind of cheese, because under such conditions of 

 climate and soil they may be produced in cheese without artifi- 



