344 MINNESOTA.STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
Every flower that blooms has become “a manifestation of a beautiful, 
divine scheme, an ever-present witness and prophet of divine care.” 
Do we know the flowers we meet every day in summer? The homely, 
common roadside weed is as full of riddles as any conservatory orchids. 
Observe the size, shape, position of stamen and its relation to the other 
half, the pistil, and ask why these bright, decided lines point to the nectary, 
or those spots or hairs happened to grow just there. Also why such variety 
of color, shape and odor? All these are eloquent sermons, could we only 
understand. If the nectar is hidden in a deep cup, or sac, it is quite safe 
to predict that the plant has adapted itself to an insect with a long tongue, 
as the sphinx moth. If you have patience to watch you will doubtless find 
this true, and you will know why your honey bee seeks the white, and 
_ the bumble bee the red clover. Gibson tells us that, “Some years ago the 
grangers of Australia determined to introduce our red clover into that 
country. They imported American seed, and the resultant crop was lux- 
uriant in foliage and bloom, but there was no seed. Why? Because the 
American bumble bee was not consulted in the transaction. The plant re- 
fused to be reconciled to the divorce from its animal counterpart. When 
the bees were transported the clover flourished in fruition as well as bloom.” 
He also relates that while studying this most interesting subject he 
found a group of a certain plant with only staminate blossoms. For some 
time he looked in vain for the pistillate blossom and at length discovered it, 
far across a swamp, a thousand feet distant, with the pollen grains upon 
the stigma, ‘doubtless a welcome message brought from the isolated affinity 
afar, by some winged sponsor, to whom the peculiar fragrance offers special 
attraction.” Thus we see that “botany and entomology must henceforth 
go hand in hand.” 
A Californian writes in the last Popular Science of ‘ ‘Bees in Relation to 
Agriculture.” He thinks that fruit men are not appreciative enough of the 
value they receive from bees. That as oranges, apples, lemons, olives, some 
pears, cherries and plums would not produce half a crop but for the in- 
sects, beekeepers should be encouraged to locate in the vicinity of fruit 
farms. 
“So we may learn that even among insects and flowers those who do 
most for others receive most in return,’ and “that the forces of nature, 
whether mechanical or intelligent, are one and all the voice of the Great 
Creator, speaking to us of His nature and His will.” 
High Feeding for Plants.—Interesting experiments have been carried 
on in plant feeding by G. M. Sherman, of Hampden Co., Mass. His plan, 
in brief, is to supply liquid fertilizers by means of a porous jar buried a foot 
or more beneath the surface and filled from time to time through a tube 
projecting above the ground. 
The roots of the plant or tree collect around the porous jar and absorb 
the fertilizers. Patent has been applied for. Mr. Sherman’s experiments 
have been mostly confined to rose bushes, which in many cases appear to 
have made enormous growth, shoots extending several inches per day in 
some cases. 
