174 



GLEANINCJS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Mar. 1. 



SPECIAL DEPARTMENT FOR A. I. ROOT, AND HIS 

 FRIENDS WHO LOVE TO RAISE CROPS. 



Our tru'iids will IK itico that the gardening- depart- 

 iricm. is very much larger lor this issue. Well, it 

 came about in this way : y()me<if on r older leadei'swili 

 lemember that I liiive always been in the habit of 

 becoming especially talkative in the month of Feb- 

 ruary. Aiiorher thing, quite a lot of queries lor this 

 department have been accumulating under a special 

 weia-htof mine; and to give us room, the printers 

 have kindly put in eight extra pages tor this issue. 

 If there is any thing in any of my talks that you do 

 not care to read about, you can just skij) pa.st it and 

 take the regular Gleaning.s matter. 



THE NEW METHOD OF RAISING ONIONS. 



The principal expense of this new method of 

 raising onions is the labor of transplanting. I 

 quote the following from the new book on on- 

 ion culture: 



To plant one acre, we have to Si-t 130,000 plants, as 

 already stated. I can get boys, that, with some 

 practice, will set from 300U to 3o;iU plants a day, and 

 nimble-flngered persons, used to garden work, will 

 easily set 4000. The job of planting an acre is there- 

 fore equivalent to probably not less than 30 or 40 

 days' work, and in some cases this estimate may be 

 considerably exceeded, but the amount of $50.00 

 should be more than enough to pay foi' the whole 

 job. 



Now, when I read the above it occurred to 

 me that it did not cost us much more than 

 Jidlf the above amount, and perhaps our ap- 

 pliances have something to do 

 with it. For some years we have 

 used a tool for making the holes, 

 which is really a long-handled 

 dibble. Whenever a high-tem- 

 pered hoe snaps off fi'om the 

 handle, we take the handle and 

 shank and grind the latter down 

 to a sharp point. This makes a 

 dibble like the one shown in the 

 cut. Well, although a jnan 

 would space the holes very well 

 by his eye, our small Ixjys could 

 not well be intrusted with this 

 work, even if they wanted to do 

 it ever so bad. Tliey would get 

 some of the lioh^s two inches 

 apart, and some six inches: 

 therefore I devLsed the spacer 

 shown in the cut. 



A is the dibble, made of a hoe- 

 handle. The point, being steel, 

 is kept free from rust, and svill 

 readily fi-ee itself from dirt, pro- 

 viding the operator rolls it in his 

 hand before he undertakes to 

 withdraw it from the earth. This will be very 

 quickly learned after a few trials. D is a hol- 

 low point made of galvanized iron. It is at- 

 tached to a loose ferule encircling A by a stout 

 bent wire. By bending this wire you can make 

 the holes as far apart or as near together as 

 you choose. The point B goes a little below 

 the point A. Let V represent a hole in the 

 ground, which is made with A. Now our boy 

 sets B in this hole. This lets A drop down 

 through the ferule; and by giving it a slight 

 roll as it comes out, it leaves a hole like C, and 

 lifts out B. Then he can go on almost as fast 

 as he can walk, and have the holes as accurate 

 IS if made by machinery. Every little while 

 somebody suggests a wheel with cones on the 

 -ire, so as to piick holes as the wheel rolls over. 

 I have such a wheel that cost me several dol- 

 'ars. Of course, it will make marks in good 

 •*oil plain enough to show you where the holes 

 •ome; but it does not make a good hole to take 

 a plant. Another objection is. that it makes .so 



much travel over the ground. When our 

 giound is in nice condition, we do not want it 

 stamped down by boys and men running over it 

 a great number of times. The implement 

 shown in the cut suits me best. Three boys 

 will plant onions with a rapidity that will sur- 

 prise you, and do it so well that every onion 

 will grow, even if some of the boys are quite 

 small. One goes along and pricks the holes. 

 Another caiTies the basket and drops the 

 onions, taken from the greenhouse, one in each 

 hole. The last one straddles tiie row, going 

 along on his knees, and lirms the dirt about 

 each onion. As soon as they get through. I 

 would run the wheel-hoe or rake through the 

 rows to mellow u\) tlie ground where they have 

 stamped it with their feet and knees. After 

 that, the wheel-hoe will do all the work, or 

 nearly all, until your crop is ready to gather. 

 The onions are so much ahead of the weeds 

 that the weeds seem to be discouraged, and 

 evidently think it is not worth while to try to 

 overtake them. 



FIXING THE BOUNDARIES OF YOVU PREMISES. 



In these modern days of no fences, it becomes 

 desirable, manyl times, to know just where the 

 line runs between your neighbor and yourself. 

 Without fences, you know we can have growing 

 crops clear up to the line or on the line; and as 

 we expect to work our land by horse power, of 

 course, not only is any sort of fence an obstruction 

 in the way of cultivating, but even a stake gets 

 in the way. or is knocked down, etc., unless, 

 indeed, we put in a great heavy post. But this 

 is expensive, and is in the way, besides. Now. I 

 will tell you what our men are putting down for 

 corners and boundary landmarks ai'ound my 

 high-priced lot across the way. We had some 

 rustless iron gas-pipe, an inch in diameter, that 

 had burst by freezing. I know we were very 

 foolish to let it freeze and burst; but as soon as 

 it happened I began to wonder whether it could 

 be utilized in some way so as to be worth almost 

 as much as it was before. Well, we cut it up 

 into lengtlis of 2 and 3 feet. Then we united 

 the :3-foot pieces to a 3-foot piece by means of 

 an ordinary coupling. On all of otir corners a 

 3-foot piece was driven into the ground just 

 level with the surface. Then a .'.'-foot piece was 

 screwed into it by hand. Now, in plowing or 

 cultivating, tlie ;.'-foot piece can be screwed 

 out until the horses are out of the way. Then 

 take a spade and lind the lower part, then screw 

 in the ;i-foot piece again. On our east boundary, 

 along by the railway, we have put one oi these 

 iron posts every .50 feet. A 3- foot piece of poul- 

 try-netting can be run on these pieces, if need 

 be, and this will make a sufficient barricade to 

 protect the crops to some extent; and yet when 

 it comes in the way of cultivating, just slip the 

 poultry-netting off the posts, and lay it back out 

 of the way. How many times does a surveyor 

 have to be summoned, and expensive surveys 

 made, to find the corner of a loti A piece of 

 ru.stless or galvanized iron tubing driven into 

 the ground three feet will make a landmark 

 that will stand for hundreds of years; and with 

 this r.'-foot piece screwed into the tube it can be 

 easily fotind at any time. If somebody should 

 drive over it and break it off. it would probably 

 result only in splitting the coupling, and a new 

 coupling could be purchased for three or four 

 cents. In view of the many troubles and quar- 

 rels that have resulted in n^gard to boundary 

 lines, will it notjjay you, my friend, toputdown 

 such a landmark on every corner of your prem- 

 ises? Even after the surveys are made, as sur- 

 veyors do not all do their work just alike, a 

 corner is apt to be located at a ditTerent spot 

 (unless very plainly marked) from where it was 

 oj'iginally. This leaves the way open for still 



