1902 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



569 



fall flow of any of my eleven colonies. Her 

 bees g-ave me 40 lbs. of extracted honey, 

 and I did not touch the brood-nest, but left 

 it full of honey. Mr. Moore said she was a 

 daughter of a red-clover queen he got from 

 you. I shall requeen with her daughters 

 this year. D. E. Andrews. 



Bloomington, Ind., May 31. 



[The mother of this stock was the red- 

 clover queen that was killed by spraj'ing 

 poison. — Ed.] 



DARK VERSUS BRIGHT YELLOW. 



My leather-colored bees have made me 

 over 100 lbs. of section honey. My golden 

 Italians are doing good work, but can't 

 stay with the other strain of bees. My 

 leather-colored bees cap their honey white 

 and that makes it look nice. 



H. C. Triesch, Jr. 



Dyer, Ark., June 3. 



DOCTORING WITHOUT MEDICINE. ALSO 

 SOMETHING INCIDENTALLY IN RE- 

 GARD TO POTATO-GROWING IN 

 NORTHERN MICHIGAN. 



There! it just occurs to me that I should 

 have put the potato business first and the 

 "doctoring" last, but I i'nsist, however, 

 that the latter is the more important, even 

 if it does occupy only a few lines at the end 

 of my story; so, "here goes." 



I came here and am here to grow potatoes 

 and to get strong and well. There I am, 

 once more, with the cart before the horse; 

 but I think we will drive on, any way, for 

 we must " get a going. " That is just what 

 I said to the boys when the middle of June 

 came along and our biggest field was not 

 3'et ready to plant. Oh, yes! we have had 

 potatoes up and looking beautiful ever since 

 along in April, and I have been fitting new 

 ground and planting almost every day. In 

 fact, we have beautiful new Early Michi- 

 gans, as big as hen's eggs, 7iow this 24th 

 day of June; and the thrifty luxuriant hills 

 all round our "cabin" are now pushing 

 the soft mellow ground up because of their 

 luscious treasures underneath. Yes, "lus- 

 cious " is the word; for the potatoes grown 

 here, as Mrs. Root cooks them, prompt me 

 to thank God for them as often as I do the 

 strawberries, or oftener, for we have the 

 former the year round. 



Well, I told the boys that big field must 

 be ptished. We don't own any horses up 

 here, but depend on hiring, and everybody 

 this spring seems "rushed" like ourselves. 

 Who wouldn't be, with the prices thej' have 

 been getting for a year past? Well, our 

 ground was finall}' ready to drag as soon 

 as the stones were picked off. I was al- 



most tempted to let the stones lie until 

 after planting, but they would very much 

 interfere with dragging and planting both; 

 and, besides, I had a chance to get one 

 horse, but couldn't get two, that day. We 

 had, the day before, been over the field and 

 pitched the stones in small heaps a rod or 

 two apart. I objected to this, because it 

 made twice handling; but my boys said it 

 was the way the best farmers up here 

 did. I don't like to borrow tools, even a 

 stoneboat; so I had the carpenter who built 

 our barn — haven't I told you before we have 

 a nice little barn? Well, we have, and it 

 is a Shawver "plank-frame." Shawver 

 named it " Our barn in the woods," com- 

 panion to the "cabin in the woods " — see? 

 The barn cost ever so much more monej' 

 than the cabin; but it is neat, handy, and 

 pretty. I am going to give you a photo of 

 it soon; but we were talking about stone- 

 boats. Now, this carpenter made me a 

 very pretty light stoneboat; and he made 

 the place to fasten the chain at the back 

 end. I thought at first this was so we 

 could "back up;" but who ever heard of 

 backing up a stoneboat? He explained: 



"Mr. Root, you thought this stoneboat 

 prett}' light, and so it is, if you should try 

 to hitch the chain on the front end; but the 

 better way is to hitch to the last board on 

 the back end, pass your chain up under the 

 boat, and then up through the front board, 

 and your boat won't be pulling to pieces, 

 even if it is light." 



Isn't that a bright idea? Make one on 

 that plan, and see if j'ou don't consider the 

 idea worth what Gleanings costs a whole 

 year. You can inake it so light, and do it 

 safelj'^, that it can be used to pull your plow 

 and harrow in out of the wet, move barrels 

 of potatoes, or any thing else, all over the 

 farm, and yet it caiPt pull to pieces, for the 

 chain takes all the strain. 



Well, we got our horse on the light stone- 

 boat; but as we could have the horse onl3' 

 one day, I went along to see if I couldn't 

 invent some short cuts. First, the boys 

 would stop the boat so far from the stone- 

 pile it took unnecessary time to load. Thej' 

 gave, as an excuse, that the stones were 

 scattering, being pitched together; and if 

 they went too close, some would be covered 

 by the boat. I went ahead and cleared the 

 scattering stones from one side ; then we 

 drove up quite close, and three of us moved 

 the stones just over the side of the boat very 

 quickly. Next I found that the boy who 

 drove the horse generally threw on the last 

 few stones. I stopped this bj^ telling him 

 to pick up his lines and start his horse 

 while myself and the other boy put the last 

 stones on the boat, sometimes when it had 

 even commenced to move. This made a big 

 difference, but it didn't give the boj's any 

 time to "tell stories." It wasn't hard on 

 the horse, because he stood still all the time 

 we were loading and unloading, any way; 

 but I will own up the bo3's did get pretty 

 tired, all three (?) of them. Then I dis- 

 covered that this light boat could be turned 



