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GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



May 15. 



Let us now turn in 

 the sin of disorder. 



all together and flght against 

 A. I. Root. 



Several times of late I have been wondering 

 what a farmer or anybody else ought to do with 

 discarded machinery. A few days ago I saw 

 an article in the Ohio Farmer on this very sub- 

 ject. By the way, if you live in Ohio you cer- 

 tainly ought to take the Ohio Farmer; and I 

 do think it would be a pretty good idea to take 

 it, even if you do not live in Ohio. Old ma- 

 chinery should be put away under shelter, be- 

 cause it frequently furnishes us material for 

 something that would otherwise cost a good 

 deal of money. A writer in the Ohio Farmer 

 told hoAv he made a lot of things out of an old 

 mowing-machine. 



Friend Terry's tool-house, especially the up- 

 stairs part of it, did not look quite as tidy as 



THE WAY TEKRY BURIES HIS SEED POTATOES. 

 Cross-section of my seed-potato pile when finished for winter. P, 

 potatoes; S, S, straw; E, E, where we took jearth for covering; A, 

 surface of ground. 



every thing does outdoors. In fact, I do not 

 know that there is any special need of keeping 

 things just so in a loft in the tool-house. When 

 the weather is good it would not pay to stop 

 too long to put things to rights. Let it be un- 

 til we have a real bad stormy day, and then fix 

 it up. By the way, Mrs. Root has a short cut 

 for making things look tidy when she has not 

 got ready to make them so. Maybe she will 

 scold if I tell it, but I will take the chances. 

 Well, when I want to hunt over the pockets of 

 my old clothing, for missing things, and I some- 

 times remonstrate because I find said room " as 

 dark as a pocket." Her excuse is, that she had 

 not yet had time to slick it up, and so she 

 closed the blinds to prevent anybody from see- 

 ing the disorder. It is a quick way of tidying a 

 room up — make it dark. 



I need not tell you that nothing on friend 

 Terry's whole farm suffers from being out in 

 the weather. All buildings, and finished wood- 

 work that must be kept outdoors, are kept con- 

 stantly painted. I thought I had got him once, 

 for there was a stack of straw right out in the 

 weather, in the middle of the field. How do 

 you think it turned out? Why, it was a heap 

 of buried potatoes. He buries his potatoes out 

 in the lot, just as the ground begins to freeze so 

 as to make a crust. He puts on some straw, 

 and then a little dirt, and lets this dirt freeze 

 hard. Of course, the outside covering is straw, 

 to keep the sun from the frozen earth. Along 

 in May, the first covering of the earth may get 

 thawed through: but with the second, as he 

 has it fixed, I have no doubt it could easily be 

 kept frozen solid until June. The consequence 

 is, he has a cold-storage pit just as good as or 

 better than any of the high-priced patent ones. 

 Above is a picture of it. The potatoes are in- 



cased in frozen earth, from the time he puts 

 them up until they are planted. In fact, we 

 put our hands down through the straw and felt 

 the frozen earth when I was there. His straw- 

 berries were not yet uncovered. I told him 

 mine had wintered so well under the snow that 

 I hardly thought his could be better; but when 

 I uncovered a row or two I had to give up. 

 They had commenced to grow under the straw. 

 The mulch was just enough to protect from 

 alternate freezing and thawing, and yet if you 

 look carefully you could now and then catch a 

 glimpse of the green leaves down through the 

 straw. Another thing, the plants were very 

 nicely thinned out. The matted rows were all 

 covered, and yet in no place were the plants 

 nearer than six or seven inches. I asked what 

 they did with the surplus, and Robert showed 

 me a great pile of dried-up 

 plants up against the fence. If 

 one were selling plants, these 

 might have been planted out, 

 and would doubtless have been 

 worth considerable. But friend 

 Terry does not believe in dab- 

 bling in every thing. He could 

 never get his work done, and 

 take things easy if he did so. 

 His clover-fields are just like 

 the strawberries. There was an 

 even, heavy growth all over 

 all his fields. There were no 

 bare spots, and hardly any rank 

 spots. Then there was a beau- 

 tiful soft rich mulch all over 

 the ground. Why, it almost 

 seemed like woods dirt down be- 

 tween the clover-plants. This 

 is a part of his plan— mowing 

 ofl' the tops of the clover, and 

 weeds (if there were any), and 

 letting them drop down, besides 

 using the straw as a mulch over 

 the wheat to some extent. 



While down near the road I happened to look 

 toward that strip of new fence. It was oak 

 posts and oak boards — good sound oak too. 

 Terry thinks such a fence suits him better, and 

 costs him less, all things considered, than wire 

 or hedge, or any thing else. I expressed some 

 surprise that he had got it so perfectly straight. 

 He remarked that it was Robert's work, and 

 that it was the first piece of fence of that kind 

 that the boy had ever built. He told his father 

 he feared he should not do it as it ought to be; 

 but his father showed him how to set the 

 stakes, and line them exactly, before he com- 

 menced setting the fence-posts; and by taking 

 a little pains the boy ran the fence right over 

 quite a hill, and still made it as straight as a 

 string. 



We wanted to get into the barn, but it was 

 locked. My friend, did you ever find a barn- 

 door locked, and the key carried off so you could 

 not get in when you wanted to? Friend Terry 

 keeps his buildings locked, but he does not have 

 any keys to bother with. A combination lock, 

 made on purpose for barndoors, and something 

 that costs less than a dollar, is what he uses. 

 The door was opened quicker than you could 

 take a key out of your pocket, and all the fami- 

 ly knew the combination. A stranger would 

 find it harder to get the door open than with 

 almost any padlock made. These locks are 

 made by the Miller Lock Co., Kent, O. I told 

 Mr. Calvert that we certainly must have some, 

 and offer them for sale. Perhaps we may have 

 a notice of them in this number. If you say I 

 am advertising things in the reading-columns, 

 I reply that there are certain things that ought 

 to be advertised in the reading-columns, and this 

 is one of the things. 



