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214 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
net of honey are fed enough to make that. This, I find, as a rule, will last 
them to some timein May. I do not bother with packing cushions, paper,bur- 
lap, or anything else; nothing but the honeyboard over the frames is shoved 
forward so a little crack or opening is made, about one-sixteenth inch the 
whole width of the hive, for a little upward ventilation. This is done when 
the bees are put in the cellar. The entrances are left open the whole width 
while in the cellar. In this way I have had good success wintering my bees 
for the past twenty years. There are many other minor points in the man- 
agement of bees to get the best results, but this essay would get too long to 
mention them all here. 
TOMATOES IN THE HOME GARDEN. 
REV. T. H. YOUNGMAN, MITCHELL, S. D. 
(Read before the State Horticultural Society at Parker, S. D., Jan. 17, 1900.) 
For South Dakota, where land is cheap and seasons short, the prime 
necessity is an early kind of tomato. We can afford to sacrifice, if need be, 
quantity and quality in the interest of earliness. One ripe tomato is of more 
value than two that are not ripe. With this in mind, I set myself the task, 
fifteen years ago, of increasing the earliness of an early tomato by saving 
the seed from the first ripe tomato, and am continuing the effort, in hope of 
getting ripe tomatoes in my garden, without the help of a greenhouse, for 
the 4th of July. 
The kind selected, the next thing is plants. I have always grown my 
own plants. I sow in a box, six inches wide, three inches deep and as long 
as the window is wide. Sow the seeds thinly, so that the plants will not 
come up in bunches. Put a toothpick against those that are first to break 
the ground. The quickest to start will be the first to ripen, providing you 
change them around every day; otherwise if there is but little sunshine the 
plants will come up first on the side furtherest away from the window. The 
reason is manifest, this being the warmest side of the box. 
As soon as the plants begin to show the second leaf, I transplant these 
that I have marked with the toothpick for my pedigree, early stock. I never 
knew the others to overtake these. There will be a difference of from one- 
to two weeks in the time of maturity of fruit from the same box and seed. 
I am very careful to air my plants so that they will not grow long and 
slim. I have had fruit set when the plant was not over a foot high, and have 
seen them in full bloom when the plant was not over seven inches high. 
For earliness, I prefer the poorest soil there is in my garden, providing 
always that it is where the plants will get the morning sun and be protected 
from the northwest winds. 
I pull off the leaves up to the last pair, close to the bottom, make a cut 
in the soil and a perpendicular hole at one end of the cut, or trench; put the 
root into this hole, and bend the plants into the trench; cover with soil, and 
firm it with my feet. You will think you have lost your great stocky plants, 
but you have not. Roots will start at every joint that is covered with soil 
and be feeders to the blossom you left out. The roots are to a plant what 
the base of supply is to an army. 
There is special advantage in the manner of planting, if your plants have 
been grown in a greenhouse, or crowded. In this case, they are so tender, 
