T30 



Gleanings in Bee Culture 



elastic. In winter time, three or four folds 

 of paper could be used to keep the bees warm. 

 These hives would do well for indoor obser- 

 vation, or in a bee-house. 



A KEVERSIBLE FEAME. 



The sides of the frame shown are so made 

 as to be self-spacing. They are not intend- 

 ed to stand on the floor of the hive, as the 

 bees would then fasten them down; but they 

 could stand on metal runners, and these 

 runners would not interfere with ordinary 

 hanging frames — that is, special hives would 

 not have to be made for these frames, as the 

 ordinary hives would answer both for rever- 

 sible and hanging frames. 



High Street, Wiltshire, Pewsey, Eng. 



[This form of standing self-spacing frame 

 is quite old. It has been shown a couple of 

 times in these columns, but has never been 

 very popular. We regard a full closed-end 

 frame as warmer and better. — Ed.] 



HOW TO SECURE A STAND OF SWEET CLO- 

 VER. 



BY FRANK COVBBDALE. 



PLAN NO. 1. 



Sweet clover must be sown on land well 

 supplied with humus or lime, or both, as it 

 will not grow well on ground badly worn, 

 nor in soil that is strongly acid or sour. In 

 order to start sweet clover on such land, 

 plow the ground to a fair depth; pulverize, 

 and top-dress heavily with manure. Then 

 sow the seed and harrow in the manure and 

 seed together. A light application of lime 

 would be of great benefit; but a good catch 

 can be secured without the lime. 



PLAN NO. 2. 



Another way to secure a stand is to plow 

 a field that has been seeded for at least two 

 seasons to timothy, clover, or both. While 

 it is better to plow in the fall, the spring 

 will do. Before seeding, work the ground 

 just as you would for corn; sow the seed, and 

 cover, using a common harrow, and your 

 success will be sure. Many have old hog- 

 pastures that are overgrown with bluegrass. 

 Those fields, when broken up, make very ex- 

 cellent ground for sweet clover. Sow one- 

 half of such fields to sweet clover, and note 

 what nice green succulent feed the pigs will 

 have all summer long, when the bluegrass 

 is dead and of no use to the pigs. 



PLAN NO. 3. 



Any field that has grown fifty or sixty 

 bushels of corn an acre can be sown to Early 

 Champion oats, barley, or wheat, and still 

 make possible a stand of clover. Sow 1>^ 

 bushels of oats and one-fourth less of either 

 barley or wheat, taking care that the ground 

 is fairly smooth. This nurse crop will work 

 well provided there is not a severe drouth to 

 spoil the clover. This seldom happens in 

 the corn belt. The clover should be well up 

 in the grain at harvest time. If the grain 

 is cut high from the ground it will be better 

 for the clover. Often a fine cutting of hay 

 will be secured later in the fall, about Oct. 

 1, or a fine pasture for stock. There is much 

 to recommend this plan. 



COMMENTS. 



The seed can be sown any time between 

 early spring and the last week of July; but 

 as it makes such a strong growth the first 

 summer, seeding should be done when con- 

 venient in April or May, using 20 lbs. of 

 hulled seed per acre. The seed should be 

 hulled. If unhulled seed is sown, about one- 

 third of it fails to germinate the first season, 

 and doesn't come up until another year. 

 Then, again, the unhulled seed often results 

 in uneven growth, too thin in some parts of 

 the field and fair in others. The sower 

 should bear in mind that proper elements 

 of the soil are necessary at first, because of 

 the lack of sweet-clover Ijacteria in the fields. 

 Just the right conditions are required to 

 start the nodules on the sweet-clover roots, 

 which in time burst and multiply and fill 

 the soil. 



Do not make the mistake of trying to 

 grow two or three crops of corn and then 

 sow to sweet clover, as the land has not yet 

 a sui^ply of the bacteria required to grow it. 

 After it has been growing on the land for a 

 few years, and the bacteria are started, you 

 will notice how much better it thrives. 

 Many hundreds and perhaps thousands of 

 bushels of this seed have been thrown away 

 because it was not sown on the right kind 

 of ground. The bluff deposits of the Missou- 

 ri River basin seem to grow sweet clover at 

 once under any conditions, and in all of the 

 more recently settled parts of the United 

 States it appears to have much less trouble 

 in getting a stand. Sweet clover succeeds 

 on lands so filled with alkali that nothing 

 else grows well. 



Delmar, Iowa. 



BLACKS VS. ITALIANS. 



BY H. D. TENNENT. 



W. C. Mollet, page 100, Feb. 15, com- 

 plains of the excessive swarming of the 

 Italians in his locality, and suggests that it 

 is in some way due to the kind and quanti- 

 ty of honey-plants. Having had a similar 

 experience here, I would suggest that it is 

 not so much a matter of honey-plants as of 

 an over-supply of early pollen which marks 

 this difference between the blacks and Ital- 

 ians. 



