1897 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



255 



very pleasant visit from Mr. L. B. Pierce, the 

 well-known agricultural writer, and he says 

 the Logan berries at friend Gault's were about 

 the prettiest berries he ever saw in his life, and 

 thinks the plant is destined to be an acquisi- 

 t(ion. 



SWEET CLOVER. 



In Bulletin No. 70. from our Ohio Experiment 

 Station, subject "Forage Crops," we find the 

 following: 



As a forap'e crop for feeding or for hay, we have 

 not found it of any special value, our cows and 

 horses having refu^^ed to eat it eltlier green or dried. 



This to me is simply astounding. I can un- 

 derstand why cows and horses should be suspi- 

 cious of it when it is offered tht-ni for the first 

 time; but I can not understand how any cow or 

 horse should refuse to eat it after having once 

 had a taste of it when it is young and tender, 

 say a foot or two in height. Inasmuch as the 

 Srate of Ohio once called sweet clover a '' nox- 

 ious weed." this becomes an important matter. 

 Our horses will eagerly grab for sweet clover in 

 preference to any other green stuff that can be 

 given them: and they will eat it cured as hay, 

 and grab for the dried branches that have 

 riDen^d seed. In my travels I have watched 

 anxiously to see if I could find a bit of sweet 

 clover in any field where horses and cattle were 

 pastured, but I have never found it. I have 

 also watched to see if I could find it along the 

 roadside where horses or cattle were permitted 

 to feed, and I have never seen that. I wish our 

 readers would give us quite a lot of postal -card 

 experiences. I say " postal- card." because if 

 you write a long letter we can not publish a 

 large number of them. We want reports from 

 different localities. Let us settle this question 

 if we can: Is sweet clover of value, both green 

 and dry, as feed for stock, or is it not? 



YELLOWCANDCWHITEfSWEET CLOVER. 



Of late we are having quite a few inquiries 

 for both kinds of sweet clover— that is, some- 

 body wants a package of the kind producing 

 yellow and also a package of the other kind 

 producing white blossoms. Now. my experi- 

 enre is that the color of the blossom indicates 

 no difference at all in the plant A great many 

 times I have seen among the sweet clover a sin- 

 gle stalk producing yellow flowers instead of 

 white, but I have always regarde'1 this as a 

 sort of sport or accident, as it were. If I am 

 wrong I shall be glad to be corrected. So far 

 as I know it is one and the same plant that 

 produces the white or vellow blossom. We find 

 this peculiarity in other plants. In a row of 

 red-pepper plants there will freqppntly be one 

 producing yellow papers, and vice versa. 



POTATO-TOPS fFOR MULCHING^! STRAWBERRIES. 



Once more I can say. as I said a year ago. 

 that the best mulching I have ever got hold of 

 for str!\ wherries is potato-tops— especially the 

 tops of tlie new Craig, because tliere are so 

 many of them and they are so long. First, nil 

 of our strawberries covered with potato-tops 

 are bright and green. Not a leaf is frosted or 

 rotted or wilted, and not a plant is pulled out 

 of the eround. You can look down through 

 the tops and see them as green and fresh as 

 they were last fall. Second, although the 

 potato-tops are so light and loose, they are 

 never blown off by the wind. Third, there are 

 absolutelv no weed seeds atnong them. Where 

 we used strawy manure, with the ereat amount 

 of wet warm weather we had durinar the past 

 season, the strawberrv leaves are more or less 

 molded and rotted. Of course, the plants are 

 alive, and are going to start; but they will not 

 compare with those under the potato-vine 



mulching. Again, where we use straw or 

 strawy manure, there will be more or less weed 

 seeds or seeds of grain, and the latter is about 

 as bad. Finally, the berries will grow rigiit up 

 through the potato-vines, which, by fruiting 

 time, will become packed down so as to be the 

 nicest thing in the world to keep the fruit out 

 of the din. Now, remember, when you dig 

 your potatoes, carefully remove the vines and 

 stack them up out of the way until your straw- 

 berries are frozen up the first time, then spread 

 your potato-tops along over the plants so as to 

 lie up from eight inches to a foot high. You 

 can see the plants down through the bfds by 

 looking closel',and the plants can look out 

 and see the stars all winter long. The vines 

 hold the snow, and they shade the ground suf- 

 ficiently to prevent the injurious alternate 

 freezing and thawing. Tomato-vines seem to 

 answer much the same purpose; but they are 

 almost too coarse, and do not lie in place as 

 well. Besides, they are not as plentiful. 



Oh, dear me! I almost forgot to say that you 

 must keen your potatoes absolutely /ree from 

 weeds. Weeds that have gone to seed, mixed 

 in with the potato-vines, would not, of course, 

 be allowable under any circumstances. 



Since the above was in print I fin l I am not 

 entirely original in my discovery. We clip the 

 following from Ficfe's Magazine for March, in 

 regard to mulching strawberries: 

 ELWe always lilcecl tlie plan of tlie old farmer who 

 grew potatoes largely, and who every year drew 

 and spread a good-sized load of potato-tni s over his 

 strawberry patch. The potato top is richer in put- 

 ash than much l)arnyard manure. anii the winter's 

 freezing and thawing reduces its bulk into fine 

 mold. It lias no weed sseds, which is more than 

 can be said of most stable manure. It protects the 

 plants just when it is most needed, which is 

 through the coldest weather, disappearing when 

 spring opens, and when the plants require all the 

 sunshine they can get. 



the^wayoinwhichIthryImanagk to'" breed 



UP".'SUGAR'fBEETS SoPaS'-'TOcGRtItHOSE 



SHOWING THE'lARGEST AMOUNT 



Ol^rsuGAR. 



We extract the following from Bulletin No. 

 7.5. on beet-sugar production, from the Ohio 

 Experiment Station: 



m Plugs are taken from roots having the desired 

 form and size in such a WHy as not to injure them 

 seriously, and tlie juice of the-je plugs is ansih zed 

 to detf-rmine the sugar. Those which are satisfac- 

 tory arf> plante'i the following spring to produce 

 seed. The seed thus secured is planted and the 

 beets resulting are agnin analyzed, as lieforo, and 

 on'y the be-t chosen. This process Is repeated for 

 several years, when, finally, h11 of the seed frown is 

 turned over to the farmers for producing beets to 

 be consumed hy the factory. The beet roots so 

 CHrefully selected for seed are called "mother 

 heels." Mllli"ns of dollars, literally, have been ex- 

 pended in scientifif' studies of tlie beet root, with 

 the wonderful results above note.l. All of Vns care 

 and selection resnlls in milking the beet- root one of 

 the most artificial of phi nts. and it responds imme- 

 diately to abuse byyielditig less sugar, or. under 

 good r-ulture, liy holding its sugar content up to the 

 high standard set for it. 



nin the time of Napoleon Bonaparte they 

 thought they had accomplished considerable 

 when they had beet juice that was 6 per cent 

 suear; "now whole fields of beets are grown 

 which carry 14 per centof sugar in the juice; 

 while single specimens have yielded 20 and 25 

 per centof sugar." It was by breedins up in 

 this way that the Kleinwanzleben mode] siignr 

 beet has been produced. The sugar beet belt, 

 as it may be called, that is specially adapted to 

 the growing of sutrar beets runs throtieh Wis- 

 consin and along throngh Northern Ohio south 

 of Lake Erie. This belt is practically 100 miles 



