1895 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



643 



finest honey that is produced in the world. In 

 Utah it grows on the arid i)iain, and furnishes 

 this beautiful honey by the carload, besides be- 

 ing next to alfalfa as a forage plant; and it also 

 performs the important office of taking the 

 alkali out of the "saleratu^ soil," as they call 

 it there, so that the ground eventually becomes 

 fitted for regular farm crops. Fourth, sweet 

 clover sends its roots down about as deep as 

 any clover known, into the very hard est soil, and 

 brings up its fertility, and it is never heaved 

 out by the fro^t. So far as I am informed, the 

 frost has never yet been able to budge a root of 

 it after it had made one season's growth. It 

 dies, root and branch, as soon as it bears a crop 

 of seed. I never heard of its being hard to eradi- 

 cate. 



OUR CRAIG AND OTHER POTATOES UP TO DATE. 



The early potatoes mentioned on page 641 are 

 now, Aug. 14, a perfect swamp of vines, and 

 the ground is bursting open with potatoes al- 

 ready the size of hens' eggs. How is that for 

 only about six weeks from the time of planting? 

 Our Craig potatoes are also making a perfect 

 swamp of dark-green foliage— no symptom of 

 blight, and no trouble from the severe drouth, 

 and not a bug on them anywhere. Prof. E. C. 

 Green, of the Ohio Experiment Station, who 

 has just been looking them over, says that, if 

 nothing hinders, there will certainly be 300 or 

 400 bushels per acre. Of course, an early frost 

 might cut short the yield somewhat. Mr. 

 Green said he doubted whether there was a 

 better field of two acres in the whole State of 

 Ohio. I certainly have seen nothing like it in 

 my travels. The whole two acres is now well 

 mulched with coarse stable manure. This 

 mulching holds the moisture from the rains we 

 have been having, so they are not likely to suf- 

 fer much, whether it rains or not; and I am 

 rejoiced to know that the Craig Seedling is 

 holding up bravely the reputation I gave it 

 from the record oif those ten hills last year. 

 Those who have the Craigs had better take 

 good care of them, and not be in a hurry to sell. 

 Some sort of price will be fixed on them later. 



CLOVER-MIDGE, OR SOMETHING ELSE; WHAT 

 THEY LOOK LIKE, ETC. 



In Gleanings for June l.-^ I noticed an edito- 

 rial on the clover-midge and its work on the 

 red clover, in which you said you had not as 

 yet noticed that the midge had attacked the 

 white or alsike clover, and said you would like 

 to hear from your readers. 



One year ago last spring I sowed, an eleven- 

 acre field to alsike clover. About four acres 

 along the north side of the field was gravelly 

 ground on which the clover died out during the 

 drouth of last summer. The rest of the field 

 had a nice stand of clover this spring; but. be- 

 ing short of corn ground. I concluded to plow 

 up all but about three acres in one corner of 

 the field, and put it in corn. I noticed, when I 

 was plowing, that the clover-leaves were all 

 full of holes, but I did not know at the time 

 what caused it. I marked out the field both 

 ways with a sled marker, and planted it with 

 a hand-planter. I commenced to plant early 

 in the morning, and I was surprised to find the 

 marker-marks almost green with worms on 

 that part of the field where there had been 

 clover. There were no worms where there had 

 been no clover. I counted 35 worms in one 

 mark, within a space of 7 feet. They evidently 

 had come to the top of the ground to feed on 

 the clover, as they disappeared again in the 

 ground when the sun got hot during the day. 



A few days after I had planted the corn I 

 pulled some pigeon-weed out of the clover on 



that part of the field which I had not plowed, 

 and I found the same kind of worms at work 

 on the under side of the clover-leaves, although 

 the leaves looked, as you said, as though they 

 had been riddled with shot. I do not think 

 that it has hurt it any for seed, as the heads 

 seem to be fairly well filled. The worms were 

 green in color, and all the way from )^ to ^ 

 inch in length. Were they what you term the 

 clover-midge? C. C. Welsh. 



Fostoria, Ohio, June 25. 



[Friend W., the green worms you speak of 

 are not what is known as clover-midge. Will 

 our Ohio experiment station please straighten 

 us out?— A. I. R.] 



HOW TO propagate AND GROW BASSWOODS, 

 ETC. 



Can you tell me how to propagate and gro^v 

 the basswood and Russian mulberry? 

 Gracy, Ky., July 31. J.G.Nance. 



Basswood-seeds must be gathered when fully 

 mature, and planted in good soil. Give them a 

 mulch of some kind, say forest-tree-leaves. I 

 suppose a mulch of any sort of grass would do 

 as well. They need to be planted as soon as 

 gathered, and left outdoors to freeze and thaw. 

 The plants will come up in the spring about 

 the time that weeds start. After this they can 

 be handled about like any other nursery stock. 

 As their natural home is the forest, however, 

 in more or less shade, a shading of slatted 

 shutters, or one made of lath or cotton cloth, 

 seems to be a benefit. They can erow quite 

 close together until they are a foot high, when 

 they should be transplanted in rows wide 

 enough apart to cultivate, and about six inches 

 apart in the row. The distance apart depends, 

 of course, on how long you let them stand. If 

 you are going to plant a basswood -orchard, I 

 would put the trees only 15 feet apart each 

 way. cutting out half of them when they get 

 large enough to make valuable timbpr. This 

 thing should be kept in mind with all sorts of 

 forest-trees: During our hot dry summers, 

 shading and mulching are always of benefit; 

 and. in fact. I have seen basswood? do better 

 right in a thicket of briers than when standing 

 out in a clean cultivated field. The briers and 

 brambles must, of course, take the moisture 

 and fertility from the ground; but they furnish 

 dense shade and mulch. A mulching of forest- 

 leaves is probably better than any thing else 

 you can give. I am not familiar with the culti- 

 vation of the mulberry: but I think likely the 

 above would applv to the mulberry also, except 

 that it is more of a cultivated tree than the 

 basswood. 



night-sotl; how to use it. 



Friend Boot.'— Please inform me how I can 

 best use the contents of privy-vaults instead of 

 artificial fertilizpr on celery grown after the 

 Nivens method, and only a short distance from 

 the house. I water with ho«e from tank a few 

 feet above. It should probably he deodorized, 

 and mixed, to make of even consistency. I 

 have some 4000 plants on some 65 square rods. 



Utica, III., July 1. Alfred Mottaz. 



Friend M.. your ideas are about right: but I 

 do not believe vour compost will be suitable for 

 celery by the Nivens or any other method until 

 it has had time to "ripen," as gardeners term 

 it. This stuff is too rank for most vegetables 

 unless composted with stable manure, muck, 

 weeds, or something of the sort, and allowed to 

 stand, say, six months or a ypar. Then it will 

 produce very good results. But the value of it, 

 I am inclined to think, has been somewhat 



