1904 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



1077 



milk comes in with the bread and baked ap- 

 ples like cranberries with turkey. And, by 

 the way, with the above menu I do not want 

 any turkey, nor meat of any kind; and tea 

 or coffee or any other hot drink — take it 

 away off somewhere. I do not want it 

 around. 



Now, to enjoy this bill of fare to its full- 

 est extent it may be necessary that you 

 should work hard out in the open air during 

 some cool November day. But I tell you it 

 is worth all it costs to get one into a mood 

 for saying inwardly, if not out loud, "Praise 

 God, from whom all blessings flow." 



By the way, the Northern Spy, although 

 a splendid apple for cooking, does not keep 

 very well. But just have a good lot in your 

 cellar, and then when you get tired reading 

 books and papers during the long winter 

 evenings go down and sort the apples over. 

 Pick out every one that shows the least dis- 

 position to rot. When rot first commences, 

 then the apples are in the very best condi- 

 tion for cooking, fully ripe, and easy to di- 

 gest. If you enjoy nice apples as much as I 

 do you will enjoy this work of sorting over. 

 You want a good clear light, a pair of specs 

 if you are as old as I am, and some nice 

 clean potato-boxes. Take every apple in 

 your hand, and look over and admire it. In 

 this way you will never lose an apple by de- 

 cay, and you will always have apples that 

 are fully ripe, for daily use. 



Now, do not get lazy, and push the apple- 

 sorting over on to the shoulders of the dear 

 wife. After you have sorted them as I have 

 directed she will do the rest, I will guarantee. 



INOCULATION OF SOILS WITH BACTERIA. 



One of our readers sends us a printed cir- 

 cular offering to send enough bacteria medi- 

 cine, or whatever is the proper name of it, 

 to inoculate an acre of soil for a great varie- 

 ty of different crops. You must tell wheth- 

 er you want to grow corn, cabbages, pota- 

 toes, etc., and then these people will send 

 you just the right kind of bacteria to in- 

 crease greatly the crop. Now, if the Agri- 

 cultural Department at Washington, or our 

 various experiment stations want to send 

 bacteria by mail free, to be tested, that is all 

 right. But do not give your dollars to any- 

 body or to any firm that says they can send 

 you exactly what you want for alfalfa, sweet 

 clover, or any thing else— certainly not till 

 our experiment stations have indorsed it and 

 the man who sends it out. 



CLOTH-COVERED GREENHOUSES. 

 I notice by the November issue of Coun- 

 try Life in America that greenhouses (or 

 perhaps cold-frames) covered with just cheap 

 cheese-cloth, are being used successfully in 

 many places, and that this cheap loose pro- 

 tection makes some vegetables mature two 

 or three weeks earlier. This matter is sim- 

 ply carrying along a little further the cloth- 

 covered frames mentioned in our book on to- 

 matoes; and from the experiments I saw 



conducted at our Ohio Experiment Station I 

 am satisfied this slight protection from the 

 hot sun will be of great benefit to many 

 things grown in the garden. It is so porous 

 that it permits rains, etc. The one pictured 

 in Country Life was worth more to me than 

 the whole price of the journal; and, by the 

 way, there is nothing handsomer in the way 

 of fine illustrations in any magazine in the 

 whole world, so far as I know. If you have 

 never seen it, you want at least a sample 

 copy. 



THE "farmers' CYCLOPEDIA OF AGRICUL- 

 TURE." 



There has just been issued from the press 

 of the O. Judd Co., New York, a cyclopedia 

 touching many phases of agriculture, wide 

 as that subject is. It takes up field crops, 

 garden crops, fruits and nuts, cattle and 

 dairy, live stock, poultry, fertilizers, drain- 

 age, soils, and irrigation. Under the head 

 of "Miscellaneous " are included many items 

 indirectly allied to the subject of agricul- 

 ture, and it is right hei-e that we find bees. 

 Six double-column pages discuss bee-plants, 

 hives, swarming, wintering, feeding, dis- 

 eases, and literature. The article is well 

 written, and, in general, is quite accurate, 

 but bears evidence hei'e and there of having 

 been prepared by one who has not had prac- 

 tical experience in handling bees themselves. 

 No doubt the two editors, Messrs. Wilcox 

 and Smith, are practical men on the general 

 subject of agiculture, on which they write, 

 but it seems to us that it would have been a 

 little better if they had called in a practical 

 bee-keeper who could write an article based 

 on his own personal knowledge. There is 

 one place in the article, for example, that 

 does not sound like one who is v/riting from 

 experience. The author says, regarding the 

 general subject of feeding bees up for the 

 winter, " In many cases it will be found de- 

 sirable to feed bees during the winter sea- 

 son for the purpose of bringing the colony 

 out in the spring in a more vigorous condi- 

 tion " (itahcs ours). And, again, appears 

 this: " In some experiments where extract- 

 ed honey was fed back after the honey sea- 

 son was over, it was found that this was 

 done with a profit of nearly six per cent." 



In the first quotation, one would gather 

 the impression that bees are fed during 

 mid-winter, which is not the case, at least in 

 the North, except in very rare instances 

 when sealed combs or cakes of candy are giv- 

 en. The second quotation follows just after 

 the first, and it seems to be out of place. 

 The illustrations of the bees themselves are 

 more like big flies than the insects that 

 gather honey. 



Still, this book is very instructive, and, 

 taking it all in all, it is an excellent digest 

 of a great subject, boiled down in a small 

 compass. The whole book seems to be clear 

 up to date, and no doubt it will make a very 

 convenient work of reference. It can be 

 obtained of the publishers. It is sold in 

 cloth at $3.50; half morocco, $4.50. 



