1867. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Ill 



also be cramped and unhealthy, ai:id if the 

 limbs cross each other and are ill-shapen they 

 can never be reduced to a well-lbrmed tree. 

 Select smooth and stocky trunks, and avoid 

 those in which the graft has tailed to unite well 

 with the stock, as such trees are lialjle, sooner 

 or later, to be destroyed by violent Avinds. 

 Dwarf pears are particularly liable to this iivuit, 

 and there are three very popular varieties which, 

 for this reason, ought never to be grown as 

 dwarfs. They are the Bartlett, Flemish Beau- 

 ty and Sheldon. 



The principal object sought in planting dwarf 

 trees is early hearing, and as the Bartlett 

 fruits upon pear stock in three or four years 

 from planting, there seems to be no necessity 

 for growing it upon quince. The other two 

 sorts spoken of are more tardy in coming into 

 bearing, and are greatly improved, both in size 

 and flavor, by dwarfing. These should be 

 double worked upon quince ; or, in other 

 words, a variety should be grafted into quince 

 Avhich unites readily with it, and then, after an 

 interval of one or two years, the desired sort 

 should be grafted into this. Such trees pos- 

 sess a degree of hardihood and a development 

 of fibrous roots which other trees do not. 



Above all things, do not buy trees oi & care- 

 less nurseryman. Let his intentions be ever 

 so good, if he neglects in budding to set the 

 proper marks against the different sorts, and 

 also to make a legible entry upon his memo- 

 randum-book to be referred to when field marks 

 become indistinct : or if he is not careful, in 

 putting up his orders, to keep the sorts distinct 

 and to have each particular tree bear its appropri- 

 ate label, he does not deserve your patronage, 

 however excellent may be his trees otherwise. 

 An 'apothecary is accountable for failing to put 

 the proper hxbel upon the article he sells, and it is 

 generally admitted to be a Avise and necessary 

 requirement. Perhaps it would not be un- 

 just to place the nurseryman under the same 

 obligation, for next to having swallowed an 

 unwholesome drug, what greater disappoint- 

 ment than to have carefully nursed a supposed 

 Doyenne du Comice for many years, only to see 

 it bring forth a worthless Catillac ? Or like my 

 unfortunate neighbor, to pay fancy prices for 

 lona and Adirondack grape vines, in anticipa- 

 tion of the honor of being first to exhibit speci- 

 mens of the fruit at the annual fair, and after 

 careful cultivation for threes-ears, during Avhich 

 time others had obtained a good start with 

 geiuiine vines, to find that all this care had 

 been Avasted upon the unpresuming Hartford 

 Prolific? G. A. A. 



Worcester, Mass., Dec, 186G. 



July, and after flying some time returned to 

 the hive, and in eiglit days more sAvarmed 

 again, but neither the old nor iicav swarm did 

 Avell afterwards. In reply to "C' I Avould say, 

 that in all probability Avhen the bees first came 

 from the hive, the old queen, in attempting to 

 flyAvith the SAvarm, dropped to the ground, 

 owing to some defect in her Avings, and Avas 

 neither able to rise nor return to the hive. 

 The swarm circled round awhile and finding no 

 queen, came back and Avas obliged to stop till 

 a ncAV queen Avas hatched. That jour bees 

 did not do Avell was owing to the poor season 

 for honey-making, throughout Ncav England. 

 It Avould have been better for your bees if they 

 had not SAvarmed, for one strong swarm is Avorth 

 any number of weak ones. Your old SAvarra 

 died out OAving to the fact that their new queen 

 never became fertile, or she, too, Avas lost Avhen 

 she left the hive to meet the drones. The re- 

 maining bees in the hive died of old age ; for 

 the life of no Avorker bee is longer than eight 

 months, and if they lose their queen and have 

 no eggs to make another, or you have no queen 

 to give them in that time, the swarm ceases to 

 exist. 



I have one hundred and fifty sAvarms on the 

 Sacramento River in California, and I never 

 alloAv them to SAvarm. I find that division is 

 much the best way for me to pursue. I lose 

 no swarms and keep them strong all the time. 



There will probably be a great loss of bees 

 in NcAv England, this winter and spring, unless 

 considerable attention is paid to them. They 

 should be continually fed from the last of Feb- 

 ruary till they are able to supply themselves 

 from other sources. After they commence 

 breeding they Avill consume honey much faster 

 than through the months of December and Jan- 

 uarj'. I am noAv Avintering through a small 

 colony of Italian bees, containing about one 

 pint of bees, and I find no trouble in keeping 

 them all right thus far, through this cold sea- 

 son, but I manage them entirely different from 

 most bee keepers in this section of country. 

 S. W. Greene. 



Salisburij, N. E., Jan. 7, 1867. 



For the New England Farmer. 

 "WHY THE BEES WERE LOST. 



I notice, in the Farmer of January 5th, a 

 communication over the signature of "C," in- 

 quiring for information about a hive of bees he 

 had last spring which swarmed on the 8th of 



Tomatoes a Protection against Borers. 

 — Mr. H. J. Foster, of Quincy, Mass., informs 

 us that he has an apple orchard Avhich has been 

 badly infested by the borer. Tavo or three 

 sears ago Avhile going over the orchard in the 

 fall and removing from ten to fifteen young 

 borers from most of the trees, he noticed that 

 invariably there were no signs of their Avork to 

 be discovered whercA'er a chance plant of the 

 tomato had sprung up from seed in soil or ma- 

 nure. Acting on this discovery, he has since 

 planted tomatoes extensively about his apple 

 trees and quince bushes, and finds it a complete 

 protection, as the beetle Avhich deposits her 

 eggs during the summer months upon the bark 

 of the tree near the ground, shuns every tree 

 near Avhich a tomato plant is groAving. 



