market is short, the prices run up, and then “ it 
pays.” 
FOUL STOMACHS. 
Stock of every description, from overfeeding, 
want of chaogo of food, and from scanty feed, 
get out of order’, and the condition of the stom¬ 
ach is the first visible symptom. Charcoal is a 
corrector of all such incipient signs of disease, 
but in its usual state it is also the least palatable 
article that cau bo given to animals. In the 
North-west, whero corn is ho cheap as to bo 
freely used as fuel, we have charcoal in a very 
palatable form. All kinds of farm animals eat 
it readily, and given once a week, it maintains a 
eweetnesB of the stomaob of the most beneficial 
character. Tnoso who burn corn, always have a 
full supply of part-burned grain of corn in the 
ashes, which they use as a corrective; hut in 
the East, where corn is too costly for fuel, it 
will still pay to burn sufficient at times, to bo 
used as a corrective. Poultry and hogs eat it to 
the last morsel, and thrive well on it. 
WHEAT FOR FIOUR. 
Many farmers grow only wheat enough to 
supply bread to their families, finding stock 
raising inoro profitable. To such, especially iT 
they have a fancy for extra fine broad, there Is 
a difficulty. Soft wheat does not make the best 
bread, neither does hard whoat. Now for all 
such, a mixed crop would seem desirable, as the 
best flour iu all respects is made from the two 
kinds in about equal parts. The question then 
arises; what soft wheat ripens at the same time 
as some good hard variety ? The two could be 
mixed together, aud both bo ready for the 
sickle at the samo time. As this State only pro¬ 
duces spring wheat, that is the only kind hero 
in question. 
SWEET CORN. 
We are just getting iu our crop of sugar corn 
for feed. We grow about fifteen acres of it, and 
find it the very best food for milch cows, mules, 
hogs, and poultry. It is not oily or heating, 
like yellow corn, is more fattening, and we have 
not au animal on the place that will touch the 
yellow if the sweet corn is to be had. 
We plant April 25, begin to foed it greon to 
cows aud pigs by the first of July, have it ripe 
by August 1, and use it all the year round in 
preference to any othor. This crop is but little 
known to farmers, but is the most valuable one 
grown for home consumption. 
EARLY CUT HAY. 
Prairie hay is seldom cut before September in 
this State. Of course, it is fully ripe, and often 
too old lor milch cows, calves and young stock. 
This year it was convenient to cut about twenly- 
fivo tons in Juue, and although it Bottled and 
shrunk heavily, it is without exception the best 
hay for all purposes T ever saw,- and it proves to 
be so good that the loss in quantity is more 
than made up in quality. I havo also forty-five 
tons cut in the last of September and beginning 
of October, but it is not relished as well as the 
Juue out. It will probaly, however, bo very 
useful iu the spring for hard-working teams. 
- -4 « ♦ 
THOUGHTS FROM A FARM. 
LET THE FARM REMAIN UNXNOWN FOR THE PRESENT AND 
THE WRITER REMAIN IIICOCNITG. 
FARM SUPERINTENDENCE. 
Thinking over the old truth that “a man 
cannot serve two masters,” it would Room as ir 
no man should arrange his business so that the 
workmen would have more than one over them. 
The Uiinkei thinks if a man of means engages 
an agent to do business for him, there should 
bo no interference with this man in charge, bo- 
yond telling him what views the principal takes 
of the general management, and what arrange¬ 
ments ho desires to be carried out, and then let 
the business be done without any confusion and 
unpleasant consequences arising from two peo¬ 
ple giving orders on one estato. 
It is thought many gentlemen are brought to 
be disgusted with farming iu consequence of the 
number of men who endeavor to sponge upon 
them in the way of buying for them and per¬ 
suading them to buy. Forty years ago, when 
the writer was a young man, many men tried to 
impose on him by this means, but lie thought 
the whole fraternity were a set of leeches aud 
used his own judgment, and induing so could 
pick their flocks or herds tho same as he would 
any other. There is not tho least doubt about 
the miserable failure resulting from business 
conducted in accordance with the opinions of 
Tom, Dick aud Harry, or of the certainty of 
being robbed and cheated by drovers, for the 
cattle they have are almost always those sold by 
other people for some fault. 
Agriculture can never be profitably and 
easily conducted till markots are established on 
the sa ne plan as iu England. There any man 
can find what lie wants to buy, and there also 
any man can soil aught; but in the United States 
n man has to ride round a long way to find what 
he wants or go to city markets, a long way off, 
unless he does what is worse—orders or buys of 
THE R 
the drovers, who invariably take advantage of 
farmers by slicking out for extra pricos for the 
worst animals, which are less salable at the end 
of their journey, while those that are valuable 
they will toll you are bespoken or sold. 
-YOBMER. 
EGGS LAID BY QUEEN BEES. 
Mn. Doolittle said, in his letter on bees, in 
the Bubal of Dec. 1st, 1877A queen will 
lay about 700.000 eggs during her life time, and 
usually lives four or five years ; but under the 
present system of management we coax the 
queens to lay all theso eggs iu two or three 
yoars.” Aud he claims that his great success in 
obtaining box honey ie owing to his thus " coax¬ 
ing” tho queen bee to lay "700,000" eggB in 
two or three years. 
Let us see if this can be done. He uses a hive 
with frames 10% inches square inside, and nine 
frames to a hive. This gives 1,980 square inches 
of comb, by rating tho combs as 10% inches 
square, which is all that they should be, practi¬ 
cally. Now, it is right to estimalo the space iu 
which eggs aro laid at one-half tho superficial 
area of the combs, at the hight or laying, or 990 
square inches ; and as laying averages, not over 
luilj of this space, or 495 inches will be occupied 
with brood at one time. It takes twenly-ono 
days for the brood lo mature from the egg, aud 
a full square inch of comb contains twenty-live 
cells, so that a queen produces, at most, only 
18,250 bees in twenty-one days; and the lime 
devoted to layiug, in a season, is mostly from 
about April 15th to August 1st, or time enough 
to produce five broods, each of 13,250 bees, or, 
in all, 00,250; and I claim that this number is 
as much as queens cau be made to average, with 
all the “coaxing” that cau bo devised. Bees 
aro produced, more or less, from January to No¬ 
vember, but as each generation is not of full 
numbers, the above estimate is a liberal one. 
Now, according to Mr. Doolittle, that a 
queen Jays •* 700,000 ” eggs in four or live years, 
she would have to lay about 175,000 a year, as 
queens seldom lay much after the fourth year ; 
and, on his " coaxing” plan, about 250,000 the 
first and second years, at least, as she must, 
under a high " coaxing” pressure, fall off con¬ 
siderably the third year. This great production 
of eggs I claim to bo irnpoxttihU- for any queen 
to lay, under any circumstances, and particularly 
so in the bivo that Mr. Doolittle uses. A good- 
sized swarm consists of 12,000 to 15,000 bees, 
and the heat average cannot exceed two such 
swarms. Then, allowing that as many more 
bees are reared in a season that remain in tho 
hive till they die, we have 00,000 bees as the 
utmost average limit of annual laying, and about 
210.000 during the life of a queen. 
Mr. Doolittle has Bent me, at my request, a 
statement of the number of hives that he had 
each year, from 1873 to 1877, with the yearly 
product of honey, as follows: 
IS7S, 29 hives .. 
1871, SO ” .. 
1875, 48 “ .. 
1878, to " .. 
1877 , 07 » .. 
.... 2.153 lbs. honey. 
. .. 3,881 “ *> 
.... 4,878 “ 
.... 3,350 ” “ 
.. .11,177 *' 
According to this statement, he has averaged 
about 100 lbs. of honey per hive (mostly box 
honey), for five years, or a cash iucome of about 
$25 per hive yearly ! 
lint there is another side to this matter. It 
appears that Mr. Doolittle has been in the 
habit of counting la " practically” only his best 
families of bees. For instance, he admits that 
iu Juno, 1877, he had 80 hives of bees, but 
" practically ” only 07. Then lie puts dowu his 
Lees in 1S76 at 65 families, while he wrote to tLo 
Bee-Keepers' Magazine, as per Juue No. of that 
year, that ho had 99 families ! 
But I'll drop the subject now. admitting that 
even if Mr. Doolittle did select only his best 
families to count "practically," he stands in 
the foremost rank of successful bee-keepers. 
T. B. Miner. 
1! onto logint I, 
THE PRIZE PLUM ORCHARD OF MICHI¬ 
GAN. 
PROF. W. J. BEAL. 
This orchard belongs to J. G. Ram?dell, 
Traverse City, and contains 700 trees, set twelve 
and a half by sixteen feet. Two hundred of 
these have been planted six years. Two hun¬ 
dred havo been planted four years; and three 
hundred have been planted three years. They 
aro all on plum stock. Yerj' little pruning has 
beeu done. Some hoed crops have been planted 
aud once a crop of buckwheat on a part of the 
orchard lato iu tho season. Tho buckwheat ap¬ 
peared to injure the trees. For a part of the 
time, about some of the trees, Mr. Ramsdell had 
sown half a bushel of hard-wood unleached 
ashes to a tree. These havo produced an excel¬ 
lent effect in the color of the leaves, the growth 
of the tree, and very likely added to the quality 
of the fruit. This spring tho ground was har¬ 
rowed once, and then the weeds were sl¬ 
owed to grow except under tho trees, where the 
ground was kept cleau to make it easy to pick 
up the injured plums, as they fell. The owner 
usually cultivates quite late iu autumn to aid iu 
killing tho climbing cut worms which are very an. 
ncying oiKbis farm. To prevent worms climb¬ 
ing any of his young fruit trees, and eating off 
the buds, be places a circle of tin like a bottom¬ 
less cup about tho trunk. Each ond of the strip 
of tin has a lock at tho end, by which the ends 
may be locked into each other like two hands. 
The lower edge of the tin is pressed into the 
soil and the rest projects two inched or more 
above. The worms cannot climb the tin and 
they do not know enough to dig under. The 
trunks are clean, sound, and handsome. There 
are a few borers which are hunted with a wire 
and knife. They ar<? cut outer punched to death. 
To keep away ciuculios. the fallen fruit is daily 
picked up and destroyed. IIo has tried the chip 
piocess, but does not think it worth u-ing on 
liis faun. He runs a hopper-shaped canvas un¬ 
der the trees and jars them with a forked stick 
placed here and there on the main branches. 
The jarring is begun as soon as he finds insects, 
and continued as long as he finds enough to 
amount to anything. There is no other orchard 
in the vicinity. He jars only once in about 
three days. The owner thinks that next year, 
the ourculio may be kept in check, simply by 
picking up the fallen frnit. The insects work 
the worst on the thin-skinned plums, but would 
doubtless destroy all alike if there was no chance 
for a choice. Of varieties, he has most of Wash¬ 
ington and likes it best; next comes Jefferson. 
If now planting a hundred treeB, he would set 
twenty Washington, twenty Jefferson, ten Law¬ 
rence s Favorite, seventeen Bradshaw, seventeen 
Smith’s Orleans, sixteen Lombard, thus select¬ 
ing about equal quantities of yellow and purple 
varieties. From the two hundred oldest trees, 
ho took, three years ago, about fifty bushels, the 
next year seventy-five bushels, this year the 
estimate was one hundred and fifty bushels on 
these two hundred trees. The average price at 
Traverso City,has been four dollars a bushel. The 
soil is generally sand and gravel, somewhat un¬ 
even on account of the hills and rolling surface. 
The sand abounds in small particles of lime; 
oven the gravel contains a large per cent of lime¬ 
stone pebbles. Near one of the best trees, we 
dug dowu font- feet, aud found a redish compact 
sand soon after leaving the surface. It is gen¬ 
erally thought that clay on heavy 6oil is best for 
plums. Perhaps in the Traverse county with a 
climate so cougenisl to the plum, a clay soil is 
uot so important as iu warmer latitudes. Time 
alone will tell whether trees will thrive and boar 
to a good old age in this soil. There ia cer¬ 
tainly now every indication of health and proper 
growth, such as wc should look for in trees ex¬ 
pected to last for many a year. On another 
farm, not far away we saw three sound plum 
trees which wo were told had been standing sev¬ 
enteen years. 
Ijorficuliund, 
LICE ON WINDOW PLANTS, 
WILLIAM FALCONER. 
Orfen flies are extremely troublesomo to 
most soft-wooded plauts.as Pelargoniums, Pinks, 
Primroses, Heliotropes, and the like, as well as 
to the young and growing points and dower- 
buds of Roses, Bonvardias, Fuchsias, Ac., and 
how to effectually rid ourselves of this pest, ia a 
desideratum. I commend simplicity aud ener¬ 
getic application—washing with soap and water 
and a sponge. Gardeners fumigate their green¬ 
houses with tobacco trash to kill green-fly, and 
amateurs sometimes try it too, and scorch their 
plants ; hence I advise ladies and others having 
a few w’indow plants, not to fumigate them. 
Neither use whale-oil soap nor any other prepa¬ 
ration whatever, becauso it will do little or no 
good but, perhaps, much evil. Take the fly-in¬ 
fested plant to the sink, lay it on its side, so I hat 
the pot may rest on the wood-work and tho crops 
or plant be over tho sink; then plaoj a basm of 
clean water softened by common soap, under 
the crops, and with a sponge and plenty of 
water, remove every intruder. Turn the plant 
over and over, till it is certain not a lly is left, 
aud if this washing bo done carefully, calmly 
and earnestly, only tho work of & minute, it 
is thoroughly effective andiu uo way deleterious 
to the plant. Now that the plant is clean, place 
it aside, away from the unclean, and take the 
rest, one by one, and wash them in the same way. 
Don’t turn on the water aud hold the plant 
1 under tho tap; that ia a clumsy, injurious, and 
1 ineffectual plan. Neither use your hands as if a 
. cat went a-fishing—afraid to wet your fingers ; 
i but roll up your sleeves and go to work with an 
r energy worthy the cause, and in ten minutes you 
. will accomplish as much and better work than 
. you can iu an hour by either the tap or olean- 
i fingered policy. 
: SCALE. 
If the plants be infested with ecale, the sponge 
i will erase them from the leaves, and a sharp- 
sided piece of wood or the back of a knife may be 
used to scrape them off tho stems and branches, 
aud a sharp-point ed —with the point a little dull, 
so as not to scratch—stick to fetch the tenacious 
vermin out of crevices iu the balk and else¬ 
where, leaf-axils, and about buds. Use tho 
sponge after the scraper. If there be auy big 
brown scales that look dry, and from which, when 
you displace them, a shower of duet or "meal" 
( e ggs) i3 scattered, be sure to remove these with 
the fingers so carefully as not to drop or dissem- 
inato au egg, and squeeze all out of existence 
between your fiDgor and thnmb. 
THRIPS 
aro little black insects that auek the life-blood 
of plants, and do more mischief iu a week than 
the same number of any other " lice" will do in 
a monlh. They breed innumerably and in little 
colonies on the under sides of the leaves. The 
young ones are green and yellowish-green. Gar¬ 
deners fumigate them to death, or dip the in¬ 
fested plants in water impregnated with whale- 
oil soap and tobacco-water. If tho mixture bo 
not too strong and tne plants be syringed with 
or dipped in clean water immediately afterwards, 
the cure is good, and no evil is done; but if the 
mixture bo too strong, then the leaves suffer as 
if they were seared or blighted. Therefore, for 
Window plants, I must recommend for thrips 
what I do for green-fly—washing with soap and 
water and sponge. At the sink this washing is 
good enough, but in the grton-house it wren't 
do, as many thrips would escape to propagate 
their species and perpetuate their work. Conse¬ 
quently, I would recommend iu the case of 
greenhouses, where dipping or fumigating is not 
practiced, to bruise to death with tho fingerd 
every thrip that can be seen aud wash after bruis¬ 
ing. When fully matured, they are such hard 
little customers that the sponge won't kill tho 
half of them. 
MEALY BUGS 
are known at a glance, and th9 washing method 
ii the cure for them also. But I must advise 
that all their nests of eggs be squeezed between 
tbe fingers, so that none esoape. Mealy bu rr s 
often secrete themselves about the leaf-axils, 
flower-head3, growing-points, or any interstice 
that may occur between the root and apex ; and 
if-there be any stakes or strings need, bugs will 
be there if they be anywhere. Then the stakes 
aud tiers should be removed and replaced by 
new ones. The sponge cannot unearth the bugs 
when they get into crevices and between flower 
leaves and " down the throat” of sorno growing 
leaves, aud then a bug-brush is necessary. A 
piece or slick like a pencil, with some hair wired 
to it iu brush-fashion, is all that is necessary. A 
little paint-brush is not of much account—the 
hair is too soft. We want something stiff, like 
tho hair of au old sweeping or hand-brush, to 
ferret the vermin out of their holes. Tobacco 
smoke has no effect on them. Diluted kerosene 
or alcohol is certain death to those ic reaches 
and in the case of Cactuses, Ac., where neither 
sponge uor brush can sometimes reach the in¬ 
vaders, these liquids may be beneficially used; 
but for anything else, I denounce their adoption 
as slow work, aud in unpractiood hands, also 
most dangerous work. 
BED SPIDERS 
are moat minute and destructive insects that in¬ 
crease multitudinously, and voraciously attack 
Abutilons, Roses. Smilax, and some other plants, 
and are usually the result of faffing health or a 
dry atmosphere. The cure is repeated spoug- 
iugs; and the proven Cion is occasional spong- 
mgs, frequent ayringiugs, and vigorous plant- 
growth. Gardeners employ powder - sulphur 
painted on tho hot water pipes or on boards, 
slates, or walls facing tho sun—but inside the 
greeu-house, of course—to he lp to destroy this 
pest, but woe to plants and insects alike, if the 
pipes get much more than rmJk-warm. 
Now, supposing all our plants are newly-wash¬ 
ed and perfectly clean ; let tbe pots be washed 
too, and auy "greeu stuff" on tho surfaceof the 
earth they contain bo removed, and drooping 
branches neatly staked and tied ; then, after 
washing the window-sill or stand, replace our 
plauts iu position, and we shall be pleased with 
our hour or half-hour's work. 
Cambridge Botanical Gardens. 
-*- 4-4 ---- 
GARDEN EXPERIMENTS. 
I am especially interested in the Rural ex¬ 
periments as I have experimented considerably 
myself. Of a great variety ot beans I Lave de¬ 
cided that the white-seeded German wax and the 
