262 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
[July, 
pleasant to be able to speak of them in other 
aspects. The relation of plants to insects is a 
subject just now engaging the attention of 
naturalists, and there is much about it to interest 
every one who grows plants of any kind. 
Most flowers offer nectar and pleasant odor 
to attract insects, and we know that some, es¬ 
pecially the bees, are very busy in availing 
themselves of the sweets thus set before them. 
Does the plant offer this treat of sweets to the 
insects out of pure benevolence, so to speak? 
Not at all. This feast of nectar is offered to 
the insects as a compensation, if they will in 
turn do something for the plant. What this 
something is, w T e can only briefly indicate, but 
we can state sufficient to show that the relations 
between plants and insects are more compli¬ 
cated and more important than is generally 
supposed. It is within the knowledge of every 
intelligent person that plants have stamens and 
pistils; that the stamens produce a fine powder 
—pollen—which fertilizes the pistil, and that 
this contact between the pollen and pistil must 
take place before the pistil will develop into a 
fruit or seed-pod. It is -well known to orchard- 
ists that a violent and long-continued rain-storm 
at blossoming time will seriously injure the fruit 
crop, as the pollen is washed away by the rain, 
and is prevented from performing its proper 
office. In some cases, as in the willows, pop¬ 
lars, the hop, etc., flowers with stamens only 
and flowers with pistils only are borne upon 
separate plants. These plants may be fertil¬ 
ized by the wind, which carries the pollen from 
one tree to another, or by insects which convey 
the pollen adhering to their bodies from one 
plant to another. Other cases show stamens 
and pistils in separate flowers but on the same 
plant. The squash, melon, and all of that 
family are familiar illustrations of flowers of 
this kind. Every one who has worked in a 
garden knows the male (staminate) flowers and 
the female (pistillate) flowers of these plants, 
and have seen the insects, “ as busy as a bee in 
a pumpkin-blow,” going from one flower to an¬ 
other, getting as dustjr as millers in the staminate 
blooms, and then going to the pistillate ones, 
where, in their greedy search for nectar, they are 
sure to rub some of the pollen upon the pistil. 
In these cases we ca.n understand the use that 
insects are to plants in the matter of fertiliza¬ 
tion. But the greater number of plants present 
us with stamens and pistils in the same flower. 
The pistil stands in the center, surrounded by a 
few or a countless number of stamens all ready 
to fertilize it—only they don’t as a general thing 
do it. One would think that the flower was so 
thoroughly arranged for self-fertilization that 
insect aid would not be welcomed, much less 
needed. This most interesting subject was first 
prominently brought forward by the great 
naturalist, Darwin. In the American Agricul¬ 
turist for I860, Prof. Asa Gray gave an admira¬ 
ble series of articles, illustrating them by refer¬ 
ence to American plants. We are glad to 
know that the matter has again been popularly 
presented by Prof. Gray in a charming little 
book called “How Plants Behave,” which, 
though intended for young people, presents in 
an attractive style the results of.the most care¬ 
ful observers, and can be commended to maturer 
minds as well. We have not space to explain 
the curious relations of insects to those plants 
which have perfect flowers— i. e., containing 
stamens and pistils in the same flower—but 
must refer the reader to the articles and the 
work just named. This very frequent provision 
that a pistil shall not be fertilized by the pollen 
of the same flower, but that the pollen of an¬ 
other flower shall he brought to it by means of 
insects, has an object, and that object is one 
which every farmer will understand—to prevent 
close breeding. Were in-and-in breeding carried 
on continuously in plants the result would be 
the same as with animals—certain individual 
peculiarities would be perpetuated, and become 
fixed, to the detriment of the general vjplfare of 
the species as a whole. A curious instance of 
injury resulting to an insect while it is working 
for the good of a plant is given in another article 
entitled “What Ails the Bees’ Legs?” 
. ■ ■ « ■q -^ ern -- 
A Good Eotation for Farm-Gardening. 
It is now becoming a very important part of 
the business of farming in the vicinity of large 
towns to raise vegetables for sale in their mar¬ 
kets, and the system pursued by those who are 
exclusively market-gardeners near the great 
cities, where land is very costly, is not the best 
adapted for the different conditions of farm¬ 
gardening. In the country, rents are lower, 
and manure is either higher, or more difficult to 
get, or more needed for other uses. 
This points to the use of clover as a fertilizer. 
Almost any garden crop grows best on a well- 
tilled clover lea, and cabbages are especially 
benefited by it, while they are also the sheet- 
anchor of the market-gardener. Late cabbages 
are rather uncertain, and must sometimes be 
used for fodder for want of a market (though 
even then they are a profitable crop), but early 
cabbages hardly ever come amiss. A manufac¬ 
turing population may be depended on to use a 
dozen heads per week of Jersey Wakefields for 
each family of six or eight persons, and the 
market is rarely overstocked, inasmuch as this 
crop requires special treatment, that can not be 
given, by the acre together, by common farmers 
who raise late cabbages without difficulty. 
After some years’ experimenting, we have set¬ 
tled on the following plan as best adapted to 
our circumstances: 
Our field is divided into three equal parts, 
and is planted on a tliree-year course. The 
diagram is copied from the one actually in use 
as a memorandum. 
First Section, 
First Tear. 
Second Section. 
First Tear. 
Third Section, 
First Tear. 
All in clover, 
sowed early on 
land plowed 
in the fall after 
celery is re¬ 
moved. 
14 in early cab¬ 
bage, followed 
by horseradish 
14 spring spin¬ 
ach, followed 
by late celery. 
14 in early cab¬ 
bage, followed 
by fall spinach 
14 winter spin¬ 
ach, followed 
by earlycelery. 
First Section, 
Second Tear. 
Second Section, 
Second Tear. 
Third Section. 
Second Tear. 
Two halves in 
early cabbage. 
Two halves in 
spinach and 
celery. 
All in clover. 
horseradish, 
and spinach. 
First Section, 
Third Tear. 
Second Section. 
Third Tear. 
Third Section, 
Third Tear. 
Two halves in 
spinach and 
celery. 
All iu clover. 
Two halves in 
early cabbage. 
horseradish, 
and spinach. 
The fourth 3'ear repeats the first year; the 
fifth year repeats the second year, etc. 
On land in good garden condition the clover 
will need no other manure than a couple of 
bushels of plaster sown over the leaves of the 
young plants when wet with the detv. It will 
produce an abundant supply of green food for 
soiling or other use, amply repaying the cost of 
production and rent of laud. In November it ' 
, m n , .1 n T 1. ....- .. _ --yp . m- ' 
should be covered ■with a Uary dressing of the 
beat manure, and at the earliest possible mo¬ 
ment iu the spring it should lie plowed ami 
very thoroughly harrowed. The post ing sLioald 
Iks thallav), and if the Sand U hard txrlow. the 
Bubsoilcr should ho used. On such land, a good 
crop of eiiily CabUige h a moral ceitaiuty, ami 
wLh the subsequent horseradish crop on one 
half the field, the return should pay a hand¬ 
some profit oa lire first and second year* uie of 
the ground. 
The subsequent crops may he varied accord¬ 
ing to the market. Spinach is almost always 
profitable. Whether celery is so or not will de¬ 
pend on one’s facilities for selling it. It may 
be well to substitute early beets or parsnips for 
the early celery, and transplanted mangolds, or 
ruta-bagas, or Lane’s sugar-beet for the late 
celery. Whatever change is made, the land 
should be cleared and plowed for clover in the 
fall, so that we may have the full season’s 
growth of this to prepare the field for the sine 
qua non of successful gardening—a crop of 
early cabbage. 
Of course, the land must be well manured 
the second year. Bonedust or “Phospliatic 
Blood Guano,” at the rate of 500 lbs. to the 
acre, will always pay on the cabbage land, be¬ 
fore the last harrowing, no matter how much 
other manure has been used. 1,000 lbs. or 1,500 
lbs. to the acre might enable us to get along 
without other manure. 
Cold-Frame Cabbage Plants. 
BY PETEIl HENDERSON. 
An article in the June number of the Agri¬ 
culturist, by a writer who gives no name, and, 
worse than that, no location , was written evi¬ 
dently with the desire to do good, but the advice, 
if followedj will most certainly do a great deal 
of harm iu the latitude of New York, or even 
further north. He complains that by sowing on 
the 20th of September last v r ear, his cabbages 
were too small to “prick out,” and that iu con¬ 
sequence he lost all those that were not so 
treated ; and now advises to sow' from the first 
to the fifth of September. If any of the early 
cabbages were sown in accordance with his 
advice in this locality, in nine years out of ten, 
three fourths of them would run to seed. This 
was the very ground upon which the Philadel¬ 
phia market-gardener who sued Mr. Dreer for 
damages in having sold him bad seed got de¬ 
feated. It was proved that he had sowed his 
seed upon the 5tli of September, instead of the 
15th, and numbers of experienced gardeners 
testified in court that no other result than a 
failure could be expected; besides, it was fur¬ 
ther corroborated by dozens of others who had 
bought the same seed of Mr. Dreer, that their 
crops had not run to seed when sown at the 
proper time. It may seem to the uninitiated in 
such matters, that a few days earlier or later in 
sowing could not be of material importance; 
but all experienced market-gardeners know it 
to he a fact beyond question, so that here no 
one ever begins to sow his seed before the 10th, 
and the great majority uniformly sow on the , 
15tli. My own plan is to sow twice, on the 12th ** 
and on the lGth of September, and I should far 
rather risk even the 25th than the 5th. Much 
depends on the condition of the ground. It 
ought to be mellowed aud enriched to the high¬ 
est possible point by plowing aud harrowing, 
or digging and raking, and well mixed with a 
heavy dressing of thoroughly-rotted stable ma¬ 
nure, in quantity when spread sufficient to cover 
