The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1872-02-20
OILED PAPER sAsnEs FOR Hor-BEp

OILED PAPER SAsHEs FOR HoT-BEDs.-
Make as many frames as you require to cover
your beds, of strips of an acknowledgements
pine; have the strips an inch and three quar-
tiers wide, and if you are not carpenter
enough to put them together with moltse
and tenon at the corners, halve them togeth-
er, using wrought nails which will go through
and just cench. The frames should be six
feet long and three wide, with a piece of the
same as the outside put across the middle of
the frame. This, if not mortised and tenoned
together, had better be merely fitted in be-
tween the sides, and nailed with long cut
nails; its use is more to keep the frames
apart than anything else. Now get good
stout Irvine; put in tacks all around the
frame, six inches apart; wind the Irvine
round the tacks from side to side, until the
frame is full that way; then go from tack to
tack, from end to end, but as you pass the
ball of Irvine down across the first twines,
take a turn each time round the cross strings /;
you will thus have a netting of six inches
square over the whole. This will be quite
strong enough, but you may put the strings
closer if you don't think it sufficient. When
you have finished make fast the Irvine, and
drive in all the tacks level with the surface of
the frame Get some strong white paper /:
old newspapers will do well if the paper is
thick; damp them little (only just damp
paste them together, and stick them over the
frame, wellpasting the wood frames first with
well-boiled, thick -four paste; be sure the
paste is thick and well boiled. Let the paper
come all around the edges of the frames !;
then put them by to dry. When dry, if the
work has been well done, the paper will be
smooth and as tight as drumhead. Don't
damp the paper too much in the first place.
or it will crack and break in the drying. Now
get some well-boiled linseed oil, get some dry
ers put into it and dissolved in it; then, with
paint brush go over the whole frames, wood,
paper, string and all; give them a good coat
on both sides, and put the frames by to dry /;
they will be dry in day or two, and will be
as serviceable as the best glass while they
last, which with care will be from two to
three years, and they can be freshly covered
or patched at any time. OF course dogs and
poultry must be kept off of them, and they
must be carefully used, but for service they
really are better than glass, as the plants
grown under them never scald with the SUM-
If thought better, the strings may be put on
both sides OF the paper but it is scarcely
necessary.
With these frames, on beds prepared as be-
fore mentioned, everything from turnip
plant to a melon can be raised in perfection:
and after the beds are done with for turnips
melons and cucumbers can be raised in any
quantity, with the advantage that as the cold
weather comes on in the fall, if the melons
are not fully ripe, they may be covered, and
thus the very latest be brought to full perfec-
ton. These sashes answer as well for hot
beds as for the cold frames. As they are very
light, they must be very properly weighted, in
windy weather or exposed situationS.-Cd1a-
ada Farmer.