\hh1 



GLEANINGS IN iiEE CULtUitE. 



Si 7 



to spare, and then 1 will offer it at iive cents 

 a package as other seeds are. If a dollar a 

 pound is not enough we are willing to pay 

 more ; hut the law of demand and supply 

 will soon lix the price about where it ou<^ht 

 to be. I am astonished to ku;)w tliat you 

 secured a peck of seed from lUO plants. We 

 probably hatl a good many more than 100 

 plants, but they were not transplauted so as 

 to give them ioom to grow, at the proper 

 time. We should be glad of reports in re- 

 gard to the seed, from others who have giv- 

 en it a test. Perhaps I may suggest to our 

 readers, that friend Morgan is the one who 

 made such astonishing progress in bee cul- 

 ture, in a short time, when he first started, 

 that for (juite a number of years we chris- 

 tened him the "ABC child who grew so 

 fast.'' By the way, did you have plants 

 that produced some white ami some colored 

 blossoms V Ours are variegated, so as to 

 make a very pretty appearance. 



Since the above was in type, we have 

 hunted up something fmther in regard to it, 

 from the introducer, Mr. Tyrrel : 



I am well satisfied with the product of the plants 

 1 had this season— so much so that I will plant five 

 or six acres next season. To-day, Oct. 4, bees are 

 working lively on melissa— the only plants that are 

 yielding nectar now. I sent a package of seed to 

 the Woodman Linseed-Oil Works, Omaha, to ascer- 

 tain if the seed was of any value for oil. Following 

 is an extract from a letter received from Mr. Clark 

 Woodman, president of the works: 



The sample of seed contained :J4 per cent of oil. 

 Flax seed contains about 38 per cent. In extract- 

 ing oil from Hax seed by hydraulic pressure, about 

 T per cent of oil is left in the cake. The oil appears 

 lo be a drying oil. 



From 3100 plants I procured a bushel of seed, and 

 was not careful to save all the seed. When we take 

 into consideration that melissa will pay to cultivate 

 for the honey alone, and that the seed is valuable 

 for oil, I think no one will dispute my word when 1 

 say it is, without doubt, the hext honey-plant in e.v- 

 Istence. A. C. Tyrkel. 



Madison, Neb., Oct. 4, 1887. 



Friend T., you say you got a bushel of 

 seed from 2100 plants, and our friend Mor- 

 gan has made tLie astounding yield of a peck 

 from only 100 plants. This latter report 

 would indicate that it gives a larger yield of 

 seed fo)- the number of plants than any of 

 om- grains, unless it be corn. Will friend 

 Morgan please tell us how much ground the 

 100 plants occupied V I presume ours were 

 very much too close together to do w^ell. 



FINE WIRE FOR SEPARATORS. 



BEES, COOKINO-STONES, HEADACHES, ETC. 



BN page 104 you ask for a report on the above. 

 1 gave them a pretty thorough trial, and the 

 ditticulty you mention 1 could not overcome. 

 In spite of all my efforts, some of the wires 

 would bend in and some out. Mr. Benedict 

 is right ; they were no hindrance to the bees, for in 

 a few instances where a single wire projected be- 

 yond the others thej'.iust bedded the wire in the 

 honey as if they never saw the wire. 



Ul.ME SECTIONS. 



In reply to your question on page 107, I, in 188:! 



tried Hi x 4?4 sections, of a width respectively IJ, 

 l?ii, l'/2, and Vi inches, or 10, 9, 8, and 7 to the foot, 

 100 or more of each kind without separators. 1 am 

 afraid no section without separators can be raised 

 to sell by the piece; for among my smallest, or 1!- 

 inch si/e, some were less than half a pound, and 

 some were nearly a pound. The average was !t..57 

 oz. I think you might be interested to read a full 

 account of the experiment on page 'Zlh o( A. li. J. 

 for 1884. My experience leads me to believe that 

 sections without separators will be more nearly 

 uniform in weight if about 1% inches in width, than 

 if larger or smaller. As nearly as I can estimate, 

 if 1 had used sections one inch wide they would 

 have averaged about % lb. each; and if, as you pro- 

 pose, we use sections six to the L. frame, one inch 

 in thickness or width, I think they would average 

 lOl-i oz. or more. 1 think if we could have sections 

 to retail for 10 cts. each by the piece it would be a 

 nice thing; but I think there are more difficulties in 

 the way than have yet come to the surface. 



WARMING AND VENTII..4TING DWELIjINGS. 



If Bro. Terry can tell us just how to warm and 

 ventilate our rooms he will solve a problem vastly 

 more important than a majority of those which 

 agitate our Solons at Washington. The manner in 

 which it is done, makes in some cases the difference 

 between life and death; in many, the difference be- 

 tween healthy happiness and a half-dead-and-alive 

 dragging around. If friend Terry's plan is carried 

 out in all its details it'will make a great improve- 

 ment in most cases. I want to emphasize the point 

 he makes about large stoves. Why is it that the 

 kitchen is often (generally, I think) the most com- 

 fortable room in the house? I'm glad it is; and one 

 reason is because there is a very large heating sur- 

 face to the cook-sto\'e; and another, that the air is 

 not so dry as in other rooms. I think if women re- 

 alized how their furniture and house-plants suffer 

 from dry atmosphere they would make some pro- 

 vision for making the air moist, even if they had to 

 hang up wet towels by the stove. But the size of 

 the stove is perhaps the most important factor; 

 and a little stove kept redhot, or nearly so, can never 

 be as healthy as a big stove kept at moderate heat. 

 Against base-burners, as generally used, my face is 

 set. The effect seems to have been to get every 

 thing as nearly air-tight as possible, and I don't 

 know of any way to get more headache to the 

 square inch for the same amount of money. No 

 wonder that sensible people are beginning to re- 

 volt, and that there is a tendency toward something 

 like the old-fashioned open fireplace of 50 or 100 

 years ago. I remember them in Western Pennsyl- 

 vania, where I could stand in the fireplace, at one 

 end, and look up with childish wonder directly into 

 the open sky. Of course, they had a voracious ap- 

 petite for fuel; but that mattered little, for the best 

 hickory and maple body-wood, cut in 4-foot lengths, 

 cost only $1.00 a cord, delivered. You might roast 

 one side and freeze the other, but there never was 

 any lack of ventilation. Friend Terry objects to 

 grates because of the expense, and prefers a very 

 large stove virtually occupying three rooms. This 

 is nice where the house, like his, is built for it. 

 Even then it doesn't give the ventilation of open 

 fires, and an item must be taken into account in 

 expense that is sometimes overlooked. It is, that a 

 room with an open fire at a certain temperature 

 will feel comfortable at several degrees less tem- 

 perature than a close room with a base-burn- 



