SmiOT-^^SOCIETIES 



ReinqMatter TflAT Deserves 



To BE WIDELY KNOWN, 



Remedy for Bean-Weevil.— 



Mr. Lelong suggested the im- 

 mersion of the beans in a solu- 

 tion of blue-stone. Alex. Craw 

 suggested fumigation in a close 

 room with bisulphate of car- 

 bon as a safer and surer plan 

 to destroy the weevil than im- 

 mersion in a solution of blue-stone, which is likely to 

 have a detrimental effect upon the germs. — California 

 Entomological Society. 



Spraying Apple Trees. — Before a recent Ohio meeting 

 Mr. Ford exhibited photographs from the Ohio experi- 

 ment station, showing the effects of spraying apples. 

 Of two apple trees in close proximity, one was sprayed 

 at the proper season and one left unsprayed. When the 

 apples were ripe, looof them were promiscuously picked 

 from each tree, great care being taken to be perfectly 

 fair in the test. Of those picked from the sprayed tree, 

 85 were classed as perfect, 8 as second-class, and 7 as 

 third-class. Of those from the unsprayed tree, 4 were 

 perfect, 58 second-class, and 38 third-class. This ex- 

 periment would seem to show, beyond doubt, that 

 spraying of apple trees pays. 



Starting Melons.— In April I prepare my bed where 

 I intend to raise my crop of melons, without manure 

 heat. It lies undisturbed until the soil is of the right 

 temperature, not too wet. Then I plant the seed, about 

 May 8. When they are well up, and before they show 

 the third leaf, I transplant into hills under glass, four 

 plants to each hill, and 32 hills under each sash. When 

 they get so as to have four or five rough leaves, about 

 June 5, I transplant to the field, using rings of sheet-iron 

 to press down around each hill and hold the earth to- 

 gether, and then lift the hill, ring and all, on an eight- 

 tined dung-fork, and carry it to the field, where it is 

 easily planted without disturbing theroots of the plants ; 

 they hardly know that they have been moved. — Mr. 

 Frost, before a Boston Far??iers' Meeting. 



How Potato Yields May be Increased. — Why is the 

 average so low ? The following causes, next to inatten- 

 tion to insects and diseases, are among the chief ones : 

 (i) Planting in check rows instead of drills, and often 

 at greater distance than needed. The best width of the 

 rows, under average conditions, is three feet. This 

 gives all the space needed for cultivation. Thrifty- 

 growing vines will meet between the rows at midseason, 

 and thus keep the ground shaded, cool and moist, and 

 choke out weed-growth. If seed is planted 12 to 18 in- 

 ches apart in the rows, rather than in checks three feet 

 apart as usually done, the three or two plants to the 

 yard, respectively, will yield more than the one to the 

 yard. A common practice is to plant two seed-pieces of 

 three or four eyes each into each check row. Every 

 thrust of the knife into a seed-potato is a stab at the 



plant's vitality. Whole potatoes always give the largest 

 plants and consequently the largest yield of tuber. Cut- 

 ting seed dwarfs the plant. We are obliged to resort to 

 cutting, to some extent, in order to avoid the necessity 

 of using an excessive amount of seed, but we should not 

 carry the cutting practice to extremes, nor cut unneces- 

 sarily. Instead of planting two small pieces in a hill, 

 we should leave the two pieces together from the start, 

 and plant the one larger piece, thus obtaining stronger 

 stalks and fewer to the hill. (2) Insufficiency of seed. 

 I prefer a whole potato to a cut one for seed, for reasons 

 stated. By using large seed we can often grow crops 

 two or three times as large as those grown from very 

 small pieces. I have never found it profitable to plant 

 single eyes, no matter how rich the soil, nor how care- 

 fully prepared. When seed-potatoes are superabun- 

 dant in the spring, and often they are on hand almost as 

 an encumbrance, and fed to the cattle to " save them," 

 we can use them to good advantage as "food " for the 

 young plants. In such case I always plant whole pota- 

 toes. (3) Poor seed. A full crop can only be grown 

 from fresh, plump seed-tubers that have not spent much 

 of their energys in bearing a crop ot foot-long, spind- 

 ling sprouts in cellar or pit. ' ' Poorness " may also be in- 

 bred. The vitality of any strain is severly injured by 

 continued close cutting. Most growers misuse and 

 weaken their potatoes in just this systematic way, and 

 then comj.lain that theirpotatoes "run out." We should 

 take more pains with our seed-potatoes, and grow them 

 separately and on a different plan from table potatoes. 

 Why not grow our potatoes from seed invariably from 

 whole tubers, and thus keep the original vigor of the 

 strain or variety intact ? When planting for table or 

 market, we may safely cut the seed for once in the 

 ordinary way without seriously diminishing the yield. 

 The best of our newer varieties, coming more directly 

 from the true seed, and being not yet weakened by in- 

 judicious treatment, usually have greater vigor, and 

 consequently yield heavier crops than the older sorts 

 that have been made to suffer under the merciless hand 

 of man. (4) The common practice of ridging up the 

 rows into great mountains with deep valleys between, 

 especially in wet seasons or on wet soils. In a dry season , 

 the ground, with its greater surface under the ridge 

 system, dries out much faster than ground kept reason- 

 ably level, and under the protection of a few inches of 

 well-stirred soil that does not allow capillary action to 

 extend clear up to the outer surface. Cultivation is 

 more convenient and can be continued longer on level 

 ground than on excessively ridged land. With proper 

 attention to these details, and avoidance of the mistakes 

 pointed out, the potato crop can be made quite a different 

 thing from what it has been in the past. — T. Greiner, 

 before a IVelland County [Catiada) Farmers'' Institute. 



Rotation in the garden ; safe but not always neces, 

 sary. — Good land for any class of plants can be kept 

 in condition to grow them as long as the cultivator 

 proves himself smarter than the insects and fungi. It 

 is said that cabbages cannot be grown on the same 

 land two years in succession, but they are. Peter 



