252 



GLEANIKGS IN BEE CULTURE 



well slarted, and al- 

 most no cultivation 

 (and no fertilizer) 

 since. When Wesley 

 dug up those three 

 roots I was astonish- 

 ed. The three were 

 about all I wanted to 

 carry; but I careless- 

 ly neglected to weigh 

 them.* They are good 

 nourishing food for 

 man or animals; and 

 as we have more on 

 that one bed (perhaps 

 100 feet long) than 

 the chickens can ever 

 use, I have been seri- 

 ously considering some 

 pigs to utilize the 

 crop. They can stay 



in the ground winter and summer until 

 you are ready to feed them. In our soft 

 sandy soil it is but a minute's work to 

 reach down and " yank " out a root like 

 those shown above. A drouth doesn't seem 

 to hurt them at all. You may recall I have 

 already printed extracts from a Govern- 

 ment bulletin in regard to cassava for pigs, 

 poultry, and other farm stock. 



Near the basket of dasheens you will 

 notice a small bundle of the bleached dash- 

 een shoots that we call " dasheen aspara- 

 gus." The other basket near the potatoes 

 contains leaves of the Giant rhubarb. 



* I am told indirectly I got the first premium on 

 cassava, altho almost every county exhibit has cas- 

 sava, more or less. 



THE WILD CACTUS OF TEXAS AND MEXICO, 

 AND SOMETHING ABOUT THE SPINELESS. 



We clip the following from The Times 

 Union : 



CACTUS IN TEXAS ; GOVERNMENT OFFICIAL SAYS 

 CATTLE ARE RAISED AND FINISHED ON IT THERE. 



J. M. Doyle, manager in charge of United States 



A. I. 



Root's exhibit of garden truck at the South Florida fair 

 held at Tampa in February. 



Winter turf oats, grown for poultry. 



demonstration work in Texas, writes from San An- 

 gelo, Tex., as follows to American Spineless Cactus 

 Inc., in answer to a query concerning the use of 

 cactus as a stock food: 



" All that territory from Beeville, Tex., on the 

 east of El Paso, Tex., and on thru New Mexico, 

 Arizona, almost to the eastern border of California, 

 and on a line east and west thru San Antonio, Tex., 

 on the north, to the Gulf of Mexico on the south, is, 

 as all the people throughout that territory will attest, 

 a wild-cactus-bearing country, and is used now 

 and has been for many years by the ranchmen to 

 feed their stock on, spines and all, and latterly, 

 with the aid of the pear-burner, to burn the spines 

 off. The cattle in nearly every ease are fed on the 

 wild cactus until it is finished and ready for the 

 market; and this has been going on for years; but, 

 as Mr. Dougherty well knows, it is more expensive 

 to feed the wild cactus on account of the sharp 

 spines than it would be to feed the spineless vari- 

 ety of cactus, and the wild cactus does not by any 

 means produce the tonnage per acre that the spine- 

 less variety does. 



" This is no secret. Any one can investigate and 

 see for himself if he only would. 



" This wild-cactus territory is many times larger 

 than Florida, and thousands of stock of all kinds, 

 but principally beef cattle, are fed on it the year 

 round in many sections of it, and in large portions 

 of this territory there is almost absolutely nothing 

 else that can be used for 

 'feed than this wild cactus. 

 " There is no question at 

 all as to the commercial 

 status of feeding cactus. 

 There is no feed in the 

 world that can match it 

 for economy and results 

 when the cost is consider- 

 ed." 



We have the wild 

 cactus of Mexico in 

 our garden by the side 

 of the sjaineless, and 

 they started to gxow 

 several weeks sooner 

 than the spineless. 

 They are now, Feb. 24, 



