9G3 
[September, 
AMERICAN AGRIC ULTURIST. 
not been overrated. 'I'he queens are larger an l- 
more prolific. The workers, when bred in comb 
of their own building, are longer, and their honey- 
sacks larger. They are less sensitive to cold, 
and more industrious. In all my handling of 
them, (and I have done so pretty freely, lifting 
the combs, and examining them almost daily,) I 
have never known one to offer to sting.—A 
queen that I received in June, and introduced to 
a strong stock ofbees, in eleven days filled thir¬ 
teen sheets of comb with brood and eggs. There 
is at present scarcely a black bee in the hive, 
so rapid has been the change. Although I have 
taken from it large quantities of worker brood 
and sealed drones, the hive is still overflowing. 
Allow me to suggest to you an idea, that may 
be of importance. These bees come from the 
Italian Alps, where they have received little or 
no attention. They are in a state of nature, sus¬ 
ceptible, in my opinion, of great improvement, 
(at least as far as form and color goes,) by cul¬ 
ture and careful breeding. In order to do this, 
they should be allowed to build their own comb, 
as soon as may be, and the largest and best 
colored queens be selected to breed from—avoid¬ 
ing breeding in-and-in as much as possible. 
I have received a letter from a friend, stating 
that one of his queens is quite dark ; and he 
seems troubled about it. A little knowledge, if 
not a dangerous thing, is sometimes an uncom¬ 
fortable one. Every one at all familiar with the 
common black bees, knows very well, that their 
queens vary much in color, and I see no reason 
why the Italians should not do the same within 
certain limits, and still be true to the race. 
Those who are anxious to have high colored 
queens, must resort to careful breeding...!” 
Hints on Sowing Wheat. 
The diminished ravages of insects, and the 
promise of remunerating prices as the country 
recovers from its financial depression, will doubt¬ 
less lead to much greater attention to wheat 
growing. The prospect is, that more ground will 
be sown to wheat this month than in any former 
September since our country was settled. A few 
hints to those about to sow wheat may be useful. 
Prepare the ground well. If man and team la¬ 
bor be not abundant, better concentrate your ef¬ 
forts upon twenty acres, than to ‘run over’ twen¬ 
ty five. The yield from the smaller area well pre¬ 
pared, will be quite as great as upon the larger 
one poorly tilled, and you will save the seeding 
and harvesting of the extra five acres. A thor¬ 
ough pulverizing of the surface with the plow and 
harrow, and with the roller if needed, is of great 
advantage to wheat. One good plowing, turning 
the surface deeply under, is desirable, whether 
for Summer fallow or corn land. Let the after 
plowing and harrowing be shallow, to avoid dis¬ 
turbing sods, stubble, and weeds turned under. 
All soils liable to standing water in Win¬ 
ter or Spring, should be thrown into ridge lands 
twelve to twenty feet wide—the wetter the land, 
the nearer should be the ridges and furrows. 
When all is complete, the dead furrows should 
be deeply and thoroughly cleaned out with plow 
and hoe, so that all surplus water will flow off. 
This is a most important point. It is the alter¬ 
nate thawing and freezing of water-soaked soils 
that produces winter-killing. Water expands and 
contracts greatly at every change of temperature, 
and thus breaks and tears the roots of Winter 
crops, sometimes killing the plants entirely, and 
always injuring them more or less. On well 
drained land, wheat is never winter-killed, and 
seldom fails to start off vigorously in Spring. 
Sow the largest, plumpest seeds. On this point 
see remarks under manures, last month, page 
228. If possible, run seed wheat over a coarse 
screen that will take out all small kernels, and 
foul stuff. It is better to always sow wheat with 
a drilling machine. If sown broadcast, take the 
greatest care to distribute the kernels evenly. 
Half a bushel of seed, sown uniformly over the 
ground, and covered uniformly, will produce more 
than two bushels sown hap-hazard. One seed, 
with plenty of room to receive air and sun-light, 
will produce more and better grain than three or 
four seeds planted side by side. 
Sow wheat early. Nature sows her seed as it 
falls from the previous crop. Reason, and uni¬ 
versal experience are in favor of putting the seed 
into the ground as early as possible after the 
previous crop is secured. This enables the plants 
to become well established, and thus be better 
able to withstand Winter. Early wheat also 
gets ahead of many of the insect tribes. 
Manure seldom fails to pay its cost and a hun¬ 
dred per cent interest—that is on all soils not 
already fully supplied with organic matters. It 
will not, of course, pay to buy manures for new 
land where there is already an accumulation of 
vegetable matter. Lime or ashes generally show 
good effects on this class of soils. On older 
fields, plaster, Peruvian guano, and bone saw¬ 
dust, are valuable, where stable manure is 
scarce. We do not believe it pays to buy the 
mineral manures so industriously pushed upon 
wheat growers. 
- r -o~.-—» - 
For the American Agriculturist. 
Shall we Sow Wheat ? 
This question is asked by those living where, 
they say : “ Once as large and as fine crops of 
this grain were raised here as could be found, 
but of late years the yield has been so poor 
as to scarcely pay for harvesting, and hun¬ 
dreds of acres formerly devoted to wheat, are 
now sown with rye.” Several causes are as¬ 
signed for this failure. Some are of opinion that 
wheat can be grown only upon virgin soils ; that 
in a few years the fertility, or those elements ne¬ 
cessary for this special grain, are exhausted, and 
we must look to the newer land of the West for 
wheat, the most important of breadstuff's. Others 
say insects, particularly the midge, have taken 
possession, and render useless all attempts to se¬ 
cure a paying crop. The abundant yield gener¬ 
ally obtained by those who ventured a trial last 
Fall, has attracted attention to the subject, and 
awakened a desire to venture again. 
It may be safely laid down as a general princi¬ 
ple in agriculture, that influences unfavorable to 
the production of a crop that has at one period 
flourished well, may be overcome by proper ap¬ 
plication of skill. Doubtless the virgin soils 
of which correspondents write so regretfully 
and with such fond recollections of the good 
old times when thirty bushels of wheat was a 
sure thing, have deteriorated from their former 
productiveness. Under the too prevalent system 
of farming pursued in past years, the only won¬ 
der is that they should have held out so long. 
From time immemorial these lands had been re¬ 
ceiving a yearly dressing of leaves from the for¬ 
ests that waved above them, where the thick 
growth prevented much ripening of seed and 
consequent exhaustion of the soil, which was thus 
year by year receiving more than it gave out, 
and accumulating the rich stores of plant-food 
which have since been transformed to golden 
harvests, and removed to the barn and the market. 
Seed-bearing is from its very nature most ex¬ 
haustive of fertility. The seed is the condensed 
nutriment stored for the wants of the young 
plants that are to succeed it—and when year 
after year we remove from three quarters of a 
tun to a tun of wheat, we take away so much of 
what may be termed the very essence of fertili¬ 
ty in the land. Had a proper system of manuring 
been kept up year by year, the wheat crop need 
never have failed from this cause. As it is, not 
one, nor three, nor scarcely seven years will 
suffice to bring up the soil to the strength neces¬ 
sary to give those “good old-fashio.ned crops of 
wheat, we read of.” For we have not only to ap¬ 
ply the raw material, but it must be thoroughly 
■w orked over and over, and completely incorpor¬ 
ated \\ itli the soil, making it one homogeneous, 
fertile mass, before the wheat roots can feel at 
home. Until this, the original state before crop¬ 
ping, exists, they must go hunting around among 
the exhausted particles for now and then a rich 
deposit, and be alternately starved and surfeited. 
Were it possible to sift together one foot in depth 
of the surface soil and the requisite quantity of 
finely divided manure, we should see from ground 
so prepared, a crop that would make even old 
wheat-growers laugh for joy. This we can do 
gradually year by year. We may well begin by 
subsoiling and draining, lowering the water line, 
giving the roots a chance to enter new pasture 
ground still fertile, and then by thorough manur¬ 
ing and cultivating the surface, restore exhausted 
fertility there. The renovation of worn out wheat 
fields must date principally from the increase of 
the manure heap ; for full particulars, inquire at 
the muck deposits and the waste leakage of the 
barn yard. 
But the wheat flies, those almost microscopic 
insects, which by their formidable numbers have 
fairly driven us from the field-can their ravages 
be prevented 1 Thanks to the researches of 
entomology, and the experiments of observing 
agriculturists, we have learned to circumvent 
them. Wheat brought to early maturity, suffers 
comparatively little from their attacks. The in¬ 
sect deposits its eggs about the time wheat or¬ 
dinarily is coming into bloom, and the larva; 
hatch out in time to feed upon the young kernel 
before it hardens. By hastening the blooming 
period a week or ten days, the grain will be suf¬ 
ficiently advanced,in most instances, to resist the 
efforts of the midge to obtain sustenance, and the 
danger will be averled. We need then early va¬ 
rieties of wheat. Recent experiments show that 
wheat brought from the South retains its early 
ripening propensity for two or three years at 
least. Several sorts have naturally an early 
ripening period. The Mediterranean, White 
Mediterranean, Early May, and Dayton are all 
well spoken of; the first named variety has for 
years been a favorite, though not equal in quality 
to some others. The Soules variety ifseed could 
be obtained from Southern districts would be 
likely to do well. 
Early sowing on land properly drained and ma¬ 
nured, will tend to insure earlier maturity of any 
sort, and if in addition to this, care were exer¬ 
cised to select seed year by year from the earliest 
ripening portions of the field, there is little doubt 
that wheat could he put out of danger of the 
midge. In this latitude I advise putting in the 
crops early in September, and South as far as 
40° every thing should be completed before the 
first of October. Believing then that the two 
great obstacles to successful wheat growing may 
be removed, I say let its culture be undertaken 
again ; but not unless the producer is willing to 
take the pains necessary to insure success. 
Genesee. 
