730 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Oct. 1. 



Carmans No. 3 right alongside. The Sir Wal- 

 ter Raleigh is very much like the Carman. 

 None of us can tell one from the other, if they 

 get mixed. I believe both are seedlings of 

 the old Rural New-Yorker. 



By the way, when one really makes it his 

 study and business, how he can can learn to 

 know potatoes at sight ! When we were dig- 

 ging, there was once in a while a hill among 

 the Carmans with a long potato unlike any we 

 have in our grounds. I had first thought it 

 was a volunteer that came up in the row; but 

 we found too many of them. I finally carried 

 one to Frank, and asked him if he could tell 

 what kind of potato that was. He said, al- 

 most at once, "Why, that looks like a Monroe 

 Seedling." And then I remembered that my 

 cousin in Tallmadge, who sold me the Car- 

 man No. 3, grows Monroe Seedlings almost 

 exclusively, and these few had gotten in 

 among the Carmans, and were not noticed at 

 planting-time. I went to all the five pickers, 

 showed them a sample of the Monroe, and 

 had them watch carefully, and throw them 

 out as they picked them up. We are doing 

 this with all our potatoes for seed, in order 

 that we may not have even an occasional po- 

 tato not true to name among those we send 

 out. 



Before night we had put away in the cellar, 

 all carefully labeled, over 300 bushels. But 

 the big team was tired, and the men and boys 

 were tired too, I assure you; and /was tired. 

 Any good elevated digger makes pretty hard 

 work for two horses, especially if the potatoes 

 go down in the ground pretty well. Mrs. 

 Root has complained so much about potatoes 

 being "greened" by getting sunburned that 

 I planted them extra deep this season; and as 

 we do very little hilling up, a large amount of 

 dirt had to be elevated in order to get all the 

 potatoes and not cut any of them. There is 

 quite a difference in varieties in regard to this 

 fashion of going down deep in the ground. 

 For instance, the Queen of the Valley would 

 frequently produce a long potato, and grow it 

 standing on end. Now, unless the digger 

 went very deep it would cut off the lower end 

 of a big potato. The Bliss Triumph, Early 

 Ohio, and most of the extra earlies, are very 

 much easier to dig than the heavy-yielding 

 large late potatoes. Two good stout horses, 

 however, will work the Dowden digger very 

 well if you let them stop and rest occasionally 

 while the potatoes are being picked up. 



bush|uma beans. 

 Where there was a hill of potatoes missing, 

 we had the boys put in a hill of beans. We 

 had some Best of All that were three years 

 old that we were afraid would not grow, so we 

 tried them among the potatoes. Well, every 

 one of them grew — at least it seemed so — and 

 they grew so luxuriantly that they were much 

 like so many weeds among the potatoes. 

 Where only a single hill is missing I shall 

 hereafter not plant any thing. If two hills 

 fail side by side, I do not know but it might 

 do to put in one hill of beans. Well, besides 

 the Best of All beans we put in a few hills of 

 Burpee's bush lima, and they did exactly as 



they did before on this same creek-bottom 

 land. They produced a tremendous amount 

 of foliage, and some blossoms, but not a bean. 

 On our yellow clay upland we get big crops of 

 bush limas without fail ; but we can not get 

 limas of any kind on the creek bottom — 

 " nothing but leaves." 



By the way, we have this season tested an 

 improved bush lima sent out by T. W. Wood 

 & Sons, of Richmond, Va.; and I am pleased 

 to report that they are quite a little larger 

 than the old original Henderson bush lima, 

 fully as prolific, and considerably earlier than 

 the Burpee; and I do not know but they are 

 just as good in quality as the latter. In size 

 they are about half way between the little 

 bush lima and the Burpee. They ought to 

 take the place entirely of the small bush lima. 



"swarming" the grapevines. 



In the new edition of the ABC book it 

 will be found my grapevine project for shade 

 has been ruled out. Ernest objected to the 

 vines as being in the way. Our apiarist, Mr. 

 Wardell, also objected, and Ernest submitted 

 the matter to some of the great lights — Dr. 

 Miller and others ( I wonder if the doctor will 

 get mad at this); and they all decided that, 

 although grapevines are a very fine thing to 

 have in their proper place, they did not want 

 them around and over the hives. But I am 

 considerably like the noted woman; I have 

 " my own opinion still; " that is, I do think a 

 grapevine apiary is a beautiful thing, and a 

 good thing for one who has a garden, and, say, 

 a dozen or more colonies of bees ; and what I 

 am getting at just now is that our 500 vines, 

 planted about 25 years ago, are still growing, 

 almost every one of them, and bearing im- 

 mense crops year after year without any entire 

 failure, and hardly a poor crop; and they have 

 the least attention of any thing that I know 

 of in the way of gardening or fruit-growing — 

 no cultivation whatever. The vines are sim- 

 ply trimmed a little each winter, and tied up. 

 Of course, Concord grapes do not bring much 

 money; but even at the very low price of 1% 

 cts. per lb. we are getting quite a little income 

 from our grapes. We advertised them once 

 in our county paper ; and, as an inducement 

 to buy largely, we offered 50 lbs. or more for 

 \% cts. per lb.; and only 1 cent per lb. where 

 the parties came and picked them themselves. 

 One notice in the paper has sold something 

 like a ton of grapes. I just had the boy 

 weigh the crop on one vine, and it weighed 

 16>£ lbs. This would be about 25 cts. for each 

 vine, and they stand only 8 feet apart each 

 way. This would be 680 vines to the acre, 

 representing a crop worth $170. 



What a wonderful thing that Concord grape- 

 vine is, any way ! Great bunches of beauti- 

 ful luscious fruit with so little effort, and al- 

 ways a crop ! May be the number of dead 

 bees around the hives has had something to 

 do w T ith making them bear, and perhaps keep- 

 ing the grass down with a lawn-mower has 

 furnished some fertility in the way of mulch, 

 for we never carry any of the grass off from 

 the yard. When the Rural New- Yorker call- 

 ed for a donation for Mr. Bull, the old gentle- 



