The Louisiana Democrat. [volume] (Alexandria, La.) 1845-1918, 1890-01-08
SOUTHERN AGRICULTURAL.
KINDRED INDUSTRIES.

Poultry and Fruit-Raising Kindred Indus
tries and Bookkeeping a Near Neigh
Dor.
Every farmer should be a poultry
keeper. Every farmer should be bee
keeper, and every farmer should raise
fruit These are kindred industries.
Poultry, bees and fruit harmonic to per-
lection. They work in-and-in, and are
quite as good as a cash deposit in bank.
The produce of the orchard, the produce
of the hen-house and the produce of the
beehive is ever in demand and can be
turned into cash most any time.
That poultry is benefit to an orchard
is generally admitted, and that an Or
chard is beneficial to fowls we know
from experience. The range of an
orchard is the best place in the world
for chickens to forage. The presence Of
the fowls in the grass or crops about the
fruit trees reduces the ravages of
damaging insects to minimum, and as
these pests have tendency to harbor
and multiply about orchard sites, they
afford an abundance of insect food for
the flock.
z: In the fall of the year the wind-falls,
and damaged fruit that drops to the
ground, is a source of green food to the
fowls, SO necessary to egg production.
In starting and maintaining a young Or
chard and in rejuvenating an old one,
| the droppings from the hen roost are of
| great value. Here the hen says to the
tree: "You helped me and now bene-
| fit you" Hardwood ashes, domestic
poultry guano and virgin forest soil or
leaf-mold mixed in proportion Of about
one-third each and applied about the
trees, mixing it with the loosened sur
face soil with a mulch of leaves or
| straw, causes a rapid growth and dark
foliage in young trees, and makes the
older ones bear more abundantly.
The most productive orchards are
those close by large apiaries. That bees
! assist in the fertilization of fruit bloom
is unquestioned. That the presence
of countless bees among the bios
SONS in the spring time in
sures fruit in season we fully
ton and experience, and that others can
offer similar testimony we do not doubt.
Thus the bees benefit the trees: but this
is not all. Think of the ''ocean of
sweets that would 60 to waste but for
that wonderfully intelligent and tire
less little insect that is ever on the
alert to add to its store of delicious nee
tar! Only tiny insect! One, two,
| three, dozen, hundred, a thousand
yes twenty to forty thousand of them in
one well-stocked colony.
Associate ten, twenty or fifty colonies
of these small but earnest workers on
our premises and we have millions OF
well-trained laborers who clothc and
feed themselves and asked of us no
compensation for their work. Yet they
work, and work with vim. They are
the very essence Of energy and activity.
They are never so happy or so peaceful
as when the harvest of bloom is ripe
and the honey flow at it's highest tide.
Then it is that they will part
with portion of their stores in
peace, and offer but little resistance to
our high-handed robbery of their store
houses. But beware of them when the
harvest is over and the laborers are
forced to idle away the sunny hours
about the hearthstone. Then there is a
viciousness and vigor about them in
the defense of their home and its con-
tents, that warns all intruders to be-
ware. Every one of them is a soldier
genuine home guard-armed to the
teeth, and in the twinkling of an eye
all of them are in the face of the enemy
at the first sound of his approach.
Some fruit-growers entertain the idea
that bees work injury to ripe grapes
and that for this reason bees should
never be allowed in the vicinity o.
vineyards. This opinion is not mooted
idea merely, but has been the cause o.
lawsuits. Especially is this true O
California, where there has been Sc
much conflict between bee-keepers and
| fruit-growers. During the blooming
period the bees are certainly bene
fetal to grapes; but as to whether
| they puncture the skin of ripening
| grapes and thus induce rot or evapora
| ton or not, we can not say positively
but from our observation in this respect
we are led to believe that in the ma jor
! ity of instances, where the ordinary
| honey bee is seen on grape clusters, the
fruit has been previously punctured by
larger insects, such as yellow-jacks
wasps, ETC., Or has been damaged by the
action of the wind in tossing the vines
about, thus cracking the skin and at.
tracing the vigilant bee. But allowing
that possibly bees do sometimes work &
little injury to the fruit of a vineyard
may not this small damage be more thar
offset by the increased prolificness O
the vines, occasioned by the presence
of the bees in working on the bloom
thus insuring superior fertilization:
The grape injury aside, bees are such
incalculable value to orchards in gen
eral, and such source of profit to the
intelligent keeper, that they should
have place among the kindred in
| dustries.-A. B. Greer, in Dixie Farmer
METHODS COMPARED.
| Farm Labor in Ohio vs. Farm Labor III