838 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



July 1 



near's pen had won with 1531 eggs for the twelve months. The 

 pen entered by Mr. Padman laid during the same period 1528 

 eggs, the difference between ttleni being only three eggs. This 

 remarkable result broke the previous world's record, and it is 

 quite noteworthy that the former record was established in 

 Western Australia with 1494 eggs. Previous to the close of 

 the competition two Victorian poultry-breeders purchased the two 

 leading pens, Messrs. Rogen and Andrews securing the now first- 

 prize winners, and Mrs. A. J. Duncan purchasing those that are 

 now second. Practically there is nothing between the merits of 

 the respective pens, and the purchasers may be congratulated on 

 their spirited efforts to secure high-class laying strains. Both 

 pens consist of six White Leghorn hens. 



The competition was held under the auspices of the Utility 

 Poultry Club, of South Australia, and under government super- 

 vision. 



Perhaps I should have said we have hens here 

 in America that have gone considerably higher 

 than 255 eggs in one year ; but there is no rec- 

 ord — at least I suppose so — of a whole pen of six 

 hens making any thing like the above. The re- 

 sult is of more value than one might at first 

 think ; for this woman who selected these fowls 

 and entered them for competition had already 

 demonstrated that each one of the six was a good 

 layer; and as the experiment was under the super- 

 vision of the government, there certainly can be 

 no mistake about it. Please note that not only 

 has Australia beaten the world, but that it was 

 done by a woman. 



HIGH-PRESSURE 

 GARDENING 



By A. I. Root 



GROWING ALFALFA AND SWEET CLOVER WITH IN- 

 OCULATED SOIL. 



I visited our Ohio Experiment Station a few 

 days ago, mainly to look over their experiments 

 with alfalfa and inoculated soil. There were 

 several plots of alfalfa devoted to this matter of 

 inoculating soil with nitrogen bacteria. The 

 evidence was exceedingly plain that the inoculat- 

 ed soil produced a market benefit in every in- 

 stance; but the pure cultures furnished by the 

 government, and those from other sources, show- 

 ed no result whatever. While there is a possi- 

 bility that this latter process of introducing the 

 nitrogen-gathering nodules may be a success, 

 their efforts at Wooster do not show any benefit 

 whatever. When we come, however, to bring- 

 ing in soil where either alfalfa or sweet clover has 

 been plainly showing nitrogen nodules, a very 

 marked improvement is apparent at a glance. 

 Prof. Williams, who has the matter in charge, 

 informed me that some time ago he put out two 

 little plots of alfalfa, as much alike as it was pos- 

 sible to make them, except that on one plot they 

 mixed into the soil some dirt taken from the side 

 of the road where sweet clover had been growing 

 quite luxuriantly. He said the alfalfa was al- 

 most twice as tall where the inoculated soil was 

 used. Prof. Green remarked in regard to this, 

 and some other experiments with sweet clover, 

 something like this-. 



" It is really astonishing that some farmers 

 should complain about seeing sweet clover in 

 fence-corners or along the highways when it is 

 really one of the best friends the farmer has. It 

 takes root, and grows in ground too poor to 

 grow any other plant; but after it has taken ni- 



trogen from the air, and made the soil fertile 

 where it grew, it drops out of the way and lets 

 other plants come in and grow that could not 

 have grown on the soil had not the clover first 

 taken root and made the soil fit for other things. " 

 Now, in summing up, every farmer (and I 

 might almost say every bee-keeper on the face of 

 the earth) should grow at least a little patch of 

 alfalfa if it can be made to grow on your soil; 

 and the very shortest and quickest method of 

 getting alfalfa started is to encourage sweet clo- 

 ver first. If you already have sweet clover, you 

 are so much ahead. If you haven't, by all 

 means get it started and give it a trial on the 

 poorest and most unfertile soil you have on your 

 place. The way some people have complained 

 about sweet clover would almost remind us of 

 what the good Book tells us about entertaining 

 strangers, as we may, by so doing, entertain an- 

 gels unawares. 



SWEET CLOVER — SOMETHING MORE ABOUT IT. 



The following is from Hoard's Dairyman: 



what is the inclosed plant ? It grows on the roadside to about 

 three feet in height, and the roots are covered with nodules like 

 clover. Is it of the alfalfa family .' J. M. G. 



Oak Grove, Md. 



To the above the editor replies as follows: 



The specimen inclosed appears to be the plant commonly 

 called sweet clover. Its botanical name is Melilotus alba. It 

 can not be said to belong to the alfalfa family, but it serves as a 

 host for the same species of bacteria that the alfalfa plant re- 

 quires. Soil from a locality where sweet clover grows is often 

 used for inoculating a field for alfalfa. 



The important and the principal point in the 

 above is the last sentence. If it is true that soil 

 taken from a locality where sweet clover grows 

 luxuriantly can be used for inoculating a field 

 for alfalfa, then sweet clover assumes an impor- 

 tance in agriculture that we have not heretofore 

 given it credit for. 



Below is something that seems to come from 

 the same writer we quoted on p. 710, last issue. 

 We clip it from the Kansas Farmer: 



Many of our hills that have been worn out and washed away 

 by having cotton planted on them (or the past sixty years are 

 now in sweet clover, and they are making money for their own- 

 ers. If Mr. Grimes ever succeeds in making it a penitentiary of- 

 fense to grow melilotus I am afraid we Southerners who live in 

 the lime belt will be tempted to secede again. So here is hop- 

 ing the national legislators will curb the trusts but not the sweet 

 clover. 



The editor of the Kansas Farmer speaks in re- 

 gard to the above as follows: 



A few years' growth of sweet clover on gumbo land in Kansas 

 will make first-class corn and alfalfa land of it. Alfalfa is no- 

 where in comparison as an improver of soil. 



Since the above was dictated I have received 

 the following from Hon. Charles E. Bessey, of 

 the University of Lincoln, Nebraska: 



Mr. A. I. Root: — I am very much obliged to you for the letter 

 which you wrote me on May 29 in regard to sweet clover; and I 

 am glad to know that you back me up in what I said rather mild- 

 ly in my short note in the Breeders' Gazette. I realized that a 

 good many men are quite " touchy " about sweet clover, and 

 that is why 1 put it as mildly as 1 did. ' I think that, in a few 

 years, we shall be able to push the matter and restore sweet clo 

 ver to its proper place. I have never thought it a bad weed at all. 

 I do not understand why people have taken such a great prejudice 

 to it. Charles E. Bessev. 



Lincoln, Neb., June 4, 1908. 



It would be strange indeed if our experiment 

 stations and professors of agriculture were mak- 

 ing a mistake, or were not well posted in regard 

 to the value of sweet clover. 



