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GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



June 15. 



function could ill afford to wait for the full 

 moon to do its valuable work. Such a gener- 

 alization as this ought never to be made until 

 a person has observed over and over. Of 

 course, full moon and other conditions favor- 

 able to nectar secretion may for several suc- 

 cessive seasons be coincident. Your corres- 

 pondent says, " I do not believe a particle of 

 nectar is deposited in the day time, but is, as 

 I have stated, deposited at the base of the 

 blossom, and is carried off by various agencies 

 during the day ; and in many plants having 

 but a small reservoir and few nectaries is ex- 

 hausted early in the day, and no more is de- 

 posited until night comes." My observation 

 has shown quite the reverse of this to be gen- 

 erally true. I have often seen even buck- 

 wheat yielding freely of nectar in the afternoon. 

 Your correspondent speaks as though the nec- 

 tar is secreted for the formation of the fruit 

 and seed germ. I did not suppose this was at 

 all true. It is secreted only to attract the in- 

 sects. True, we have failure of the crop to 

 fruit when nectar is not secreted. In this case 

 the failure comes from lack of cross-pollina- 

 tion. What your correspondent say s in regard 

 to the nectar being secreted and reserved for 

 the development of the seeds I suppose was 

 entirely contrary to the real truth in the mat- 

 ter. I do not think that the seed germ is 

 nourished at all by the nectar. 



Dear Mr. Editor, this matter is of suflBcient 

 importance to warrant a few words regarding 

 vegetable physiology. We know that plants 

 need no digestion, for their food is wholly gas- 

 eous or in solution ; and digestion is wholly 

 for the purpose of changing food into a con- 

 dition whereby it can be absorbed. The food 

 of plants comes wholly from the earth or else 

 from the atmosphere. From the earth come 

 the water and the mineral elements, the most 

 important of which are nitrogen in combined 

 form, potash, and phosphoric acid. Lime and 

 some other elements are also necessary, and 

 are usually in our soils in sufficient quantities. 

 We have to add the four elements, water, ni- 

 trogen, potash, and phosphoric acid unless 

 they are already in the soil in sufficient quan- 

 tities. The plant also gets carbon dioxide 

 from the air, which is taken in through the 

 stomata (the breathing-mouths) mostly on the 

 under side of the leaves. It is generally 

 thought that the leaves take in much water 

 from the air. This is probably not true. On 

 the other hand, an amount of water surpris- 

 ingly large is constantly passing off from the 

 leaves. A damp foggy morning revives the 

 plant in times of drouth, as it lessens the 

 amount of evaporation. In plants as in all 

 animals, all the work is done in the cells, by 

 the protoplasm, or substance which makes up 

 the entire cell except the walls. This proto- 

 plasm consists of proteids, substances like the 

 white of an egg, which are always present 

 where work is done, either in plant or animal. 

 These cells have the power to take suitable 

 material into their substance whenever it is 

 present as a gas or liquid. Thus the cells are 

 constantly taking water, and the elements 

 mentioned above, through the minute micro- 

 scopic root hairs, modifying these and passing 



them on through the outer cells of the sap 

 wood to all parts of the plant, even to the very 

 topmost leaves. The leaves also take in car- 

 bon dioxide from the air, which, with the 

 crude sap from below, forms the material from 

 which they produce the elaborated sap. In 

 the leaf- cells, also in the green layer of the 

 bark, there is, as one component of the proto- 

 plasm, the green matter, or chlorophyll. This 

 has the power to form, from the carbon diox- 

 ide and water, the sugar of the sap, which, as 

 we all know, is quite soluble. It is possible 

 that these leaf-cells may also have the power 

 of forming this sugar from the proteids of 

 their own substance. We know that the liv- 

 er-cells of the animal, while they form gl-co- 

 gen, or liver starch, much more rapidly from 

 carbo-hydrates as sugar and starch, can also 

 form it wholly from proteids. We know, also, 

 that the plant cell and the animal cell are as- 

 tonishingly alike in their function and in the 

 products which they produce, and the meth- 

 ods of their work. The sugar in this elabo- 

 rated sap is borne along through the cells, as 

 already described, and carried to places of de- 

 posit, and transformed and stored as insolu- 

 ble starch. It is also carried to the cells, and 

 transformed into cellulose, which forms the 

 walls of the cells and all woody tissue. This 

 same elaborated sap is carried to the flowers, 

 and the glands at their base secrete from it 

 elements which attract the bee and other in- 

 sects. The path of this sap is in the cambium 

 layer, which is made up of the inner bark and 

 very outermost part of the sap wood. The 

 cells of the plant, like all tissue, either ani- 

 mal or vegetable, are constantly taking ele- 

 ments from the sap and building themselves 

 up. They are also constantly wearing out by 

 work just as the cells of our own body are be- 

 ing torn down by their own efforts. Thus the 

 plant, like the animal, must have food or it 

 starves. We lay a board on the grass. We 

 soon find the grass blades devoid of green, and 

 we know that the pallor means ill health. 

 The chlorophyll has been used up by work ; 

 and as it can be produced only in sunlight 

 from the carbon dioxide and water, the plants 

 pale and die. The same is true of all cells, if 

 any of the necessary food is withheld. The 

 water of the plant, like the oxygen which 

 we get through our lungs, is so immediately 

 important that, without it, the plant soon 

 withers and dies. We see, then, how necessa- 

 ry it is that our plants have sufficient water. 

 Our soils, too, are often deficient in the three 

 necessary mineral elements already mentioned, 

 and thus the provident farmer sees to it that 

 these elements, if not already sufficiently 

 abundent in the soil, are generously supplied. 

 There is one other element of all soils that 

 must be in quite large proportion for soils to 

 be productive. I refer to the decaying organ- 

 ic matter known as humus. There are two 

 ways of supplying this substance — either by 

 use of stable manure or by plowing under 

 green crops. By the latter method, we may 

 also, if we use leguminous plants, furnish the 

 combined nitrogen, which is the most expen- 

 sive of the three mineral elements used in soil 

 fertilization. Indeed, nitrogen costs about 



