980 
The RURAL NEW-YORKER 
ering of the body of the bee; for that substance is 
very similar to the sort that makes up the skeleton 
q,nd teeth of our own bodies. 
Some interesting experiments go to show that bees 
in the. Spring will not build up nearly as well on 
syrup as on honey. Moreover, bees will build up 
better, and travel longer distances on a mixture of 
powdered sugar and honey than they will on a mix¬ 
ture of invert sugar and powdered sugar. I will ex¬ 
plain that the invert sugar would be much the same 
as honey provided it contained 1 to 2 per cent of 
protein and nearly 4 per cent of the mineral ele¬ 
ments that I have named. 
Another very striking fact brought out in late 
years is that bees winter better, and come out better 
in the Spring, on a good well-ripened honey than on 
a granulated sugar syrup that does not contain 
either protein or the mineral elements referred to. 
and Crimson clover or Crimson clover alone will be 
very satisfactory. North of Trenton, Crimson clover 
will start well, but is usually thrown out by the 
frost in March. Dairymen in Central New Jersey 
quite frequently seed Crimson clover in the corn at 
last cultivation and use it for Fall pasture after the 
corn is taken out for the silo. In some parts of the 
Central West rye and rape are seeded in the corn. 
After these crops get a good growth, hogs or sheep 
are turned in to eat them down. 
On our own farm we find rye and vetch, or rye 
and Alsike clover, satisfactory as a cover crop. We 
sometimes add a pound of Cow-horn turnips to the 
acre. One bushel of rye with 12 lbs. of vetch seed 
or 5 lbs. of Alsike makes a good seeding for an acre. 
When using this cover crop it is better to give level 
cultivation and not “plow up” to the corn. We make 
two seedings—one for the rye, the other for the 
July 12, 1924 
bothersome in southern regions, but usually peppers 
in small numbers are left unsprayed. Tomatoes 
are troubled with blight, mosaic, leaf-spot, flea beet¬ 
les and many other pests. A spraying with Bor¬ 
deaux is helpful in keeping off flea beetles and in pre¬ 
venting some of the leaf-spots, but it has absolutely 
no effect upon mosaic. With cabbage, the maggot 
is a serious trouble in the seed bed or with early 
cabbage, but is no great factor with the main crop 
of late cabbage. The cabbage worm, however, is 
troublesome almost everywhere, and is so easily 
controlled that it will pay to try. Spraying with 
2 to 3 lbs. of lead arsenate to a barrel of water to 
which is added 2 or 3 lbs. of resin soap as a sticker 
should be applied soon after the plants are set, and 
the plants kept covered throughout the season. 
In case you intend to go into the truck business 
you should write your State experiment station or 
The Business Plant of a New York Dairy Farm. Fig. 397. 
Harvest Time on a Truck Farm. Fig. 399. 
The further fact that bees positively cannot raise 
their young without pollen from the flowers (pollen 
is a highly concentrated protein) goes to show how 
necessary this form of diet is for the growth and de¬ 
velopment of the young growing bees. When bees 
are fed on plain sugar syrup the queen’s eggs merely 
hatch and the larvae die, provided no pollen is avail¬ 
able. Just how much protein bees use after they 
have reached the adult period of life I do not know; 
but the very fact that they do discharge in their 
feces digested and undigested pollen grains goes to 
show that protein forms a part of their diet. 
E. E. BOOT. 
A Cover Crop in the Corn 
What would you advise to sow, when and how much 
to the acre, for a cover crop in the corn? I expect to put 
part of the field in potatoes and the rest in corn again 
next Spring. A . M . 
Quakertown, Pa. 
HIS reminds us that it is time to talk about 
“cover crops” once more. What we mean by a 
“cover crop” is something seeded at the last cultiva¬ 
tion of corn or potatoes, with the design of having 
such a crop grow through the Fall and Winter so 
it may be plowed under in the Spring as green ma¬ 
nure. Such a crop kills out many weeds by smoth¬ 
ering them. It covers the soil and, especially on 
hillsides or sloping fields, prevents washing of the 
soil. It also prevents loss of nitrogen. When ma¬ 
nure or green crops are plowed under they decay 
more or less rapidly, and the nitrogen they contain 
is changed to a soluble or available form. In a 
season like the present this change is most rapid 
later in the Summer, when the soil becomes well 
warmed up and is quite moist. Thus with a crop 
like corn most of these nitrates, or soluble forms of 
nitrogen, will not be produced in the soil until the 
corn crop is about finished. 'Ihey are most largely 
found in the soil during September, October and 
November. If the corn is cut and nothing grows on 
the land these valuable nitrates will be leached out 
of the soil and lost. Weeds and grass will take up 
some of this nitrogen, but they are mostly killed by 
the first heavy frost. A cover crop that will con¬ 
tinue to grow through the Fall until the soil is 
frozen will save most of this nitrogen and add large 
quantities of organic matter when it is finally 
plowed under. In a very dry season such a crop, 
growing in the corn, might take too much moisture, 
but in the average season the cover crop is a great 
help. 
We have tried about everything—rye and wheat, 
various kinds of clover, vetch, turnips and rape, and 
have decided that for our latitude rye with some 
legume added gives best satisfaction. Bye is one of 
the toughest of plants, and will grow with almost 
any kind of seeding. It is one of the best nurse 
crops for smaller seeds. South of Philadelphia rye 
cover seed, but rye and vetch seed may be mixed 
together. The best time for seeding is at the last 
cultivation which, with us, usually comes the last 
of August. We seed by hand, walking through the 
rows, or ride a horse through the corn, using a 
Cahoon broadcast seeder to scatter the seed evenly. 
With this method some of the seed will stick on the 
corn blades, but most of it will reach the ground. 
It is covered by using a light cultivator with the 
teeth set so as to give only a light working. If this 
cultivator is run only one way it will pay to scratch 
a heavy rake between the hills so as to cover the 
entire field. It will help to wire a piece of plank 
or joist to the cultivator so it will scrape or drag 
behind. This smoothes down the surface and fully 
covers the seed. It is not a hard job. The seed, of 
course, costs some money, but the gain in plant food 
and organic matter far offsets any expense. 
Spraying Tomatoes, Cabbages & Peppers 
What shall I use to spray on tomatoes, cabbages and 
peppers? G . T. 
Belleville, N. J. 
HERE are numerous diseases and insects at¬ 
tacking tomatoes, cabbages and peppers, but in 
the average garden or planting of small acreage it 
is not worth while to enter into any extensive spray¬ 
ing practices for their control. Taking one season 
with another returns do not warrant the expense. 
There is an anthracnose on peppers that becomes 
Starting Early in the Poultry Business. Fig. 398 
the United States Department of Agriculture for cir¬ 
culars treating of the various insect and disease 
problems affecting the truck you want to grow. Then 
you should thoroughly familiarize yourself with 
these problems and go into it intensively. But for 
the average small home garden or small planting it 
will not pay to make too extensive an effort to 
spray, other than we have indicated. h. b. t. 
Ants Herding Plant Lice 
VERY year the old story of the ants and plant 
lice is worked out in our orchards. The other 
day we saw a case where one apple tree in an or¬ 
chard seemed badly afflicted. Many of the leaves 
were dead, others were curled and rapidly turning 
brown. At the base of the tree around the trunk 
were several large ant hills, and the tree itself was 
alive with these insects.. They were running up 
the trunk and spreading out through the branches. 
A piece of tangle-foot had been wound around the 
trunk of the tree to keep the ants back, and many 
of them were stuck to the band. There were plenty 
more of them, however, to run safely over. The 
owner of this tree concluded that the ants were 
doing the damage, but a close observation showed 
millions of plant lice, scattered all over the tree. 
The ants were seen at work herding or caring for 
these lice. There could be no question about it. 
►Such a situation is often seen by fruit growers, and 
most of them clearly understand it. The ants them¬ 
selves do not seriously injure the trees. They are, 
however, very fond of a sweet substance which is 
secreted by the plant lice, and instinct teaches them 
to care for the plant lice, as a a good dairyman 
would take care of his cows, as the lice provided food 
for the ants. Thus we may see them actually herd¬ 
ing or protecting the plant lice, and even carrying 
them from one point to another, as a man would 
drive cows to a new pasture. Thus the ants and 
the plant lice work together, and in the case men¬ 
tioned the ant hill at the base of the tree was really 
the headquarters for the attack upon its leaves. It 
is a mistake to suppose that the ants themselves 
really injure the trees. They work indirectly through 
the plant lice, as here stated. The ants may usually 
be killed by punching a hole into their nest or hill, 
and pouring into it about half a pint of bisulphide 
of carbon, then covering the whole thing with a 
blanket. In a case such as this tree, where thou¬ 
sands of ants are away from the hill, several appli¬ 
cations w i ould be needed. The plant lice can gen¬ 
erally be destroyed by dusting with a fine dust of 
tobacco or spraying with a tobacco extract, such as 
Black Leaf 40. 
Well, anyway, great things are promised for the lob¬ 
ster crop this year. 
