416 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



May 



secure early a very few packets. We prize them, 

 but might divide " for gold." 



A. W. Livingston's Sons. 

 Columbus, Ohio, May 3, 1889. 



Some years ago I purchased half a peck of 

 what is called Dreer's Improved lima bean. 

 The beans were excellent, and they were 

 packed so close in the pods that they 

 squeezed the ends of many of the beans so 

 as to be square, unlike an ordinary lima 

 bean. In flavor they equaled if not excel- 

 led, any thing in the way of lima beans we 

 have had on our table. I dropped them be- 

 cause I thought they did not yield as many 

 bushels per acre as the common limas. 

 Well, when I first saw Kumerle 's lima bean 

 they struck me at once as being remarkably 

 like Dreer's Improved lima ; and now it 

 transpires that they are a sport from the 

 latter. Those who have seen them growing 

 say they grow about two feet high. I 

 should think they would be liable to be 

 blown over during fierce storms of wind and 

 rain. We will give you a photograph of the 

 plant in a few months, nothing preventing. 

 Those who have not a paper of Henderson's 

 Improved lima bean will have to send in 

 their orders now very soon, for we shall 

 have them all in the ground that are not 

 sold, certainly as soon as June first. 



Just one thing more in regard to Ku- 

 merle's lima bean : If the seed is now worth 

 its iveight in yold, we can not well afford to 

 wait till 1890 to get a new crop. As Glean- 

 tnus makes its way to localities where the 

 sun shines at midnight, possibly it reaches 

 some one who could take the beans as soon 

 as they ripen here, plant them, and get a 

 new crop ready to plant by the first of next 

 June. Perhaps friend Doppleton, away 

 down in Cuba, could manage it. If any one 

 else whose eyes rest on these pages lives 

 where lima beans may be raised in the win- 

 ter time, will he please communicate with 

 us? 



.Later.— Well, we have got them at last. 

 Six packets of the Kumerle lima beans- 

 each packet containing 25 beans. But to get 

 them we were obliged to balance them with 

 gold coin, and the 1 50 beans cost us just 

 $78.00, or a little over 50 cts. a bean. Never 

 mind. If it is not wrong to "count chick- 

 ens before they are hatched," we might 

 speculate that each bean should raise us 50 

 more beans.* Then in the fall I should 

 have, from my 150, 7500, which will proba- 

 bly give one bean to each subscriber, who 

 cares about bush lima beans, for the year 

 1890. Now, some of you may think that this 

 is awful, to pay S78.00 for a handful of 

 beans ; but there is something I rather like 

 about it. Along in my talks about what to 

 do, I told you a gardener or fruit-raiser had 

 a perfect right to get all he could for his 

 product. If he can produce strawberries 

 under glass so as to have them when nobody 

 else has any, he has a right to have a dollar 

 a quart if he can get it. And in the same 

 way, if you can produce a crop of any thing 

 when everybody else fails, it is perfectly right 

 that you should have just as much as any- 

 body will pay you for it; and if you have 



* If they give Kid or more, f shan't complain. 



sole control of some new and valuable vari- 

 ety of vegetable, for which there is universal 

 want and demand, I am glad to see 50 cents 

 —yes, or even a dollar— offered for a single 

 seed. There are doubtless more of these 

 Kumerle beans in the hands of seedsmen ; 

 but very likely they are not to be bought— 

 no, not even for their weight in gold. 



Later.— Here comes a bush lima bean 

 from Nebraska : 



Friend Root:— I see you are very much interested 

 in bush lima beans, so I will send you a sample of 

 some from Nebraska. How do they compare with 

 Henderson's, Landreth's, and other bush limas? 

 Please let me know what you think of these Ne- 

 braska limas. If you desire, I wili tell you all I 

 know about them. S. H. Beaver. 



Tamora, Neb., May 6, 1889. 



Why, friend B., your sample of beans 

 looks exactly like Henderson's, only they 

 are considerably larger. If some one had 

 picked the very largest beans they could 

 find, out of a good lot, they would be exact- 

 ly like those sent, as near as I can tell. By 

 all means tell us all you know about them, 

 and tell us how many beans you can get 

 hold of. 



May 9. — We have been having the most 

 beautiful May weather for four or five days. 

 The sun rises away up in the north, and 

 pours its genial rays from half-past five in 

 the morning until seven at night. I do not 

 know that 1 ever enjoyed any thing in the 

 line of God's gifts more than I have the 

 sunshine and the open air this morning. 

 The apple-trees are in their bloom, and the 

 bees were tumbling before their hives with 

 great loads of apple honey, before the sun 

 was up. I do not know that I ever noticed 

 this before. It is, perhaps, owing to the 

 fact that we have had no dew for four or 

 five nights now in succession ; but as the 

 ground was soaking wet before this warm 

 spell came on, nothing seems to mind the 

 scorching rays, even at noonday, unless it 

 is our newly transplanted cabbage and cel- 

 ery plants from the seed-bed to the plant- 

 garden. We have to water them and shade 

 them, or else they would soon ''go dead." 

 Well, 1 have been down in the creek bot- 

 tom, planting our novelties. You see, we 

 sent for almost all of the novelties adver- 

 tised in the catalogues. Then it is a nice 

 little task, I tell you, to plant them careful- 

 ly, and label them. We think it is almost 

 as important to tell whom the seed came 

 from as to tell what it is ; and we also want 

 the stake at the head of each row to tell 

 what the seedsman claimed for it. For in- 

 stance, Burpee has a new black wax bean. 

 The seeds were twice as large as our old 

 black wax. He claims that they are a great 

 deal earlier, have larger pods, and are more 

 productive. Now, when the beans begin to 

 get ready to gather, I do not want to be 

 obliged to lug a great lot of catalogues 

 down into the field to see what the introduc- 

 er claimed for them when we made our se- 

 lection of seeds last winter. Well, Burpee 

 has fixed it all nicely for us. His seeds are 

 put in paper so stout that it is almost like 

 cloth ; and all he claims for the contents is 

 plainly printed on this same stout paper ; 



