1922.] 



Bee-Keeping in Norfolk. 



913 



Cultivation after planting is devoted entirely to keeping the 

 land clean. About January the space between the rows is 

 forked by hand. This is termed locally " spitting in " and one 

 man will fork an acre in 12 days. During the spring the land is 

 hoed as required, generally at least twice, and one man will 

 hoe an acre in 6 days. Strawing down the plants is not usually 

 practised, but a few growers use bracken for this purpose if no 

 dung has been applied. 



Growers* Organisation. — The Cheddar Valley Fruit Growers' 

 Association was formed in 1912 and largely owes its inception to 

 the Agricultural Organisation Society. It is affiliated to the 

 National Federation of British Growers, and has a membership 

 of about 160. The Association has a strong marketing committee, 

 which meets nightly throughout the season and virtually decides 

 the markets to which the following day's crop shall be consigned. 

 It also gives valuable assistance to the Eailway Company by 

 indicating the probable number of railway vans required, and 

 their destinations. The question of a guarantee of the weight 

 of fruit in each chip (at present this is 4 lb. net) is being con- 

 sidered by the Association, which is also concerned with the 

 difficulty of obtaininoj adequate supplies of manure. It aiTanges 

 lectures for growers by the County Horticultural Superintendent 

 in the winter months : and it is drawing up a scheme to establish, 

 at its own expense, variety and manurial trials with strawberries, 

 with a view to exploring the possibilities of further local 

 ■development. 



^ * * * * * 



BEE-KEEPING IN NORFOLK. 



H. GOUDE, 



Horticulture Adviser to Norfolk County Council. 



Ix the initial stages of all industries, when they are struggling 

 i:o gain recognition, there is a time when the application of 

 advanced know^ledge and wase legislative assistance will lead 

 individual efforts to a collective and full realization of their aims. 

 Bee-keeping goes back to the dim ages, but modern apiculture 

 has developed improved methods and bees during the past few 

 years, and is just emerging from the infant stage of a re-birth 

 to take its place on the wide road of vigorous maturity with a 

 modicum of paternal fostering. 



D 



