18G7.] 
AMKRTCAN AG-RICULTURIS' 
of no value at all for fecil. It is the decorticat¬ 
ed cottonseed cako" that we need. It is Valu¬ 
able feed, and atfords the richest manure, of any 
known vegetable food that has been investigated. 
A correspondent asks me how I plant and 
cultivate beans. Last year I turned over an old 
sod, harrowed it thoroughly, marked it out in 
rows 2 feet 5 inches apart, with a common 
wootlen marker, then drilled in the beans with 
the “ Corn and Bean Planter.” We finished 
the whole field of twelve acres in a day and a 
half. Of course it is not necessaiy to mark out 
the laud before planting. The drill will do its 
own marking, but I find it better to mark the 
land first, tis the drill can be guided so much 
Btraighter. The drill sows two rows at a time, 
and when the land is marketl in advance, the 
tubes, or “ hoes,” run in the marks, and you can 
see the least deviation. I set two men at it, one 
to drive the horse and the other to guide the 
drill. Too much pains cannot be taken to plant 
straight. A little extra labor in doing this will 
be saved five times over in the after culture. 
Of course this is equally true of corn, potatoes, 
and all other hoed crops. The drill drops five 
or six beans in a hill, about 14 Inches ai)art. I 
have no doubt the l)can3 would do just as well, 
and perhaps better, if dropped a single bean at 
a time, two inches or so apart. They do very 
well planted so in the garden, but having them 
in hills is more convenient in hoeing. I hoed 
mine only once last year, but kept the cultivator 
running frequently between the rows. This is 
the great point, and it is here where so many 
fail. It is said to rust the leaves if cultivated 
when the dew is on. This may or may not be 
so. I do not know. But I do know that fre¬ 
quent cultivation will make all the difference 
between a good crop and a poor one. One of 
my neighl>ors told a friend that “ there was the 
grandest field of beans he ever saw in his life 
on the north road.” “They are Mr. Harris’.” 
“Not they, he hasn’t got a field on his farm 
that will pnxluce such a crop as that.” But 
they teere my beans, and what is more, they 
were planted on the roughest and most neg¬ 
lected field on the farm—a field that had not 
been plowed for fifteen years, and produced 
little else than thistles and teasels. There was 
a great growth of beans, and it was caused by 
nothing hut frequent eiiltication. I do not know 
how often they were cultivated, but I think 
eight or nine times. At all events, not a weed 
was suffered to show its head between the rows. 
“ What is the best variety?” I have not had 
experience enough to tell. Hayward thinks the 
Marrow is the most profitable. It yields nearly 
or quite as well as the medium, and brings a 
higher price. The only objection to it is that 
the beans are apt to split open. 
I question whether there is anything gained 
by scalding seed-peas to kill the pea-bug. Of 
course it will kill the bugs, but whether the next 
crop will Ixj any more likely to escape, is some¬ 
what doubtful. Two yeai-s ago I got my seed- 
peas from Canada. A finer sample could not 
be desired, and there was not, apparently, a bug 
in the whole fifty bushels. I sowed them on 
twelve acres and had a splendid crop. But a 
more buggy lot of peas I never saw. We 
thrashed them rather late in the fall, but on a 
warm, sunny day, and the bugs, or more cor¬ 
rectly weevils, flew above the, stock and round 
the heads of the men by thousands. The partly 
dormant bugs might have been gathered from 
under the fanning mill by the bushel. 
This crop, as I have said, was grown from 
seed free from bugs. And it seems to me clear 
that simply destroying all the bugs there may be 
in the seed, will not insure a crop from their 
depredations as a consequence. 
I may mention that the next year I sowed 
these buggy peas, and they grew apparently as 
well as sound o^es. I presume they were as 
buggy as the previous crop, but I fed the peas 
to the pigs early in the fall, before the bugs 
were fully developed. This is really the only 
plan we can adopt, with safeU^, in this section. 
It is no use trying to raise peas for market, al¬ 
though I did sell a load or two to the coffee 
manufacturers in the city. They prefer, how¬ 
ever, to get sound peas from Canada, though for 
my own part, I think a certain proportion of 
bugs in the peas, after they were roasted and 
ground, would make about as good coffee as the 
sound peas. But then, you know, people have 
their prejudices, and it is well to humor them. 
One of my neighbors last year sowed his peas 
in June. They escaped the bug. But the crop 
was hardly worth harvesting. Better sow early, 
on rich land, raise a heavy crop, and feed them 
out very, early in the fall, to the pigs. Tliecrop 
will pay very well for this purpose, and a good 
smothering crop of peas leaves the land in good 
condition for wheat. And no crop that we raise 
makes richer manure than peas. 
Origin of Forced Drones. 
BT BIDWELL BROS., 8T. PAUB, MINN. 
[By Forced Drones, those are meant, which, 
being reared in worker cells, are of small size 
and lower vitality than those raised in drone 
cells. Worker bees are imperfectly developed 
females, and Fertile Workers are those which 
are sometimes found laying eggs. These eggs 
not having any impregnation, if they hatch, all 
produce drones. Forced queens are those reared 
in case of the loss of a queen from eggs or 
larvae which would have become worker bees, 
if hatched and fed in the usual way.— Ed.] 
We found the origin of, and gained ability to 
recognize fertile workers, in trying to answer a 
question often put to us, much in this way: 
“ Why do my bees, having reared forced queens, 
which were all removed before they commenced 
to lay, or lost in their flight to meet the drones, 
refuse again to rear queens, though worker eggs 
and larvae be repeatedly given them, and de¬ 
stroy queen cells or kill queens, but persist in 
rearing drones in worker and drone cells?” 
On removing a queen from a hive to induce 
the bees to replace the queen by rearing others 
from worker eggs or larvae—as they will, several, 
—sometimes many common worker bees com¬ 
mence to consume large quantities of honey 
and pollen for the purpose of secreting jelly, to 
feed the selected worker larvae to convert them 
into queens. This food, we suppose, developes 
their dormant ovaries, so that they may there¬ 
after lay eggs. At first they are noticeable from 
their singvdar and uneasy motions, and are con¬ 
tinually eating. We have often, in cool weather, 
separated the honey and pollen from these bees, 
by intervening empty combs, and always found 
these particular bees first at the stores. After 
several days, they have the appearance of rob¬ 
ber bees—a black color, which in time has an 
oily look. We once tried to see if a high tem¬ 
perature gave robber bees their dark, greasy ap¬ 
pearance, and allowed a stock of bees to steal 
or rob a pail of honey, first placing a thermom¬ 
eter in their hive; in 20 minutes the temper¬ 
ature arose from G4® to 108°. We had often^ 
observed the bees to take on that color, in hot, 
close w'eather, and confined a swarm on a 
hot noon-day, and the temperature arose to-lSl®, 
melting the combs with the great heat, the bees 
all becoming of this dark color and greasy lustre. 
One of our hottest days last sumfter indicated 
a temperature of 128® in the sun, and the brown 
of nearly all bees in close locations turned black. 
When bees lose their young queens, they feed 
and caress the bees above described, and they, 
after some days, commence to lay eggs in worker, 
drone, and queen cells, often 10 to 15 eggs in a 
cell, laying more when the ■weather is cool than 
when it is hot. When one egg in a cell hatches, 
the remainder are consumed by the nursing 
bees. As drone larva) are fed similar food to 
that fed to workers, drones mature in worker 
cells; yet these do not attain more than two- 
thirds the size of natural drones; while the 
larva) from eggs laid in queen cells, doubtless 
from a difference in food, die before maturity. 
Unfecundated queens—those forced queens rear¬ 
ed early or late in the season, and not meeting 
the drones or having met this kind of small 
drones, and the seed becoming exhausted, are 
worse than fertile 'U'orkers, as they are more 
prolific, and more frequently lay in worker cells. 
Although forced drones are apparently able 
to fulfill the office of male bees as well as forced 
queens that of a queen, they ought equally to be 
avoided as causing the degeneration of the stock. 
[The Messrs. Bidvvell answer the question 
proposed in their first paragraph, but do not tell 
what to do in such a case. We suppose the cure 
is simply to introduce an impregnated queen, 
kill the fertile workers, or break up the colony.] 
--- I — ^ —— - 
Culture of the Castor Oil Bean. 
BY S. B. STE-VTART, CLEAR CREEK LANDING, ILL. 
[Although we are not familiar with the cul- 
ture of the castor oil beau, except as an orna¬ 
mental plant, wm have no doubt it might be 
profitably cultivated in parts of the Union 
where now it is unknown. The geographical 
limits of its profitable employment as a farm 
crop, are, we should judge, nearly coincident 
with those of the Sweet potato, or the larger 
varieties of Dent corn. The following commu¬ 
nication to the Agriculturist will be read with 
interest, and, though so late in the season, may 
form the basis of experiments, with a view 
to planting more largely another year.—E d.] 
“I plant what "we call the Florida Beans; they 
are smaller than the Spanish Beans, and do bet¬ 
ter in this latitude ^ then, there is more oil to the 
bushel, (so say the oil factory men). They can 
be raised about 100 miles north of us, with suc¬ 
cess. A fair crop here is from 16 to 20 bushels 
per acre; 100 miles north, 10 to 12 bushels per 
acre. The soil is prepared first, the same as 
for corn, then lay your ground off both ways, 
seven /eet apart each way, plant as soon as 
the frost is out of the ground and it will do to 
plow. Before planting, soak the beans say 
from 12 to 20 hours in wmrm water—about as 
warm as the hand will bear when beans are 
first put in—plant and cover same as corn, drop¬ 
ping two beans in each hill. They require about 
a week lontrer to come up than coin, and when 
the plants first come out of the ground, they are 
red Castor beans are usually planted here on 
our’poorest soil; still, a much better yield can be 
had from rich land. Our object in planting on 
poor soil is, that a crop raised on a piece of land 
one year, is equal in its effects to a crop of 
clover plowed in towards enriching, or “bringing 
land to,” as it is often termed. Plow or use a 
cultivator iflie latter is the best,) when the pla(tt3 
