DeSoto times., 1890-01-16
SOUTHERN AGRICULTURAL.
KINDRED INDUSTRIES.

Poultry and Fruit Raising kindred indus
tries and Bookkeeping "a Near Neigh
bur.
Every farmer should be poultry
keeper. Every farmer should be bee
keeper, and every farmer should rais'
fruit These are kindred industries
Poultry, bees and fruit harmonize to per
fection. They work in-and-in, and are
quite as good as cash deposit in bank
The produce OF the orchard, the produce
of the hen-house and the produce of tht
beehive is ever in demand and can bt
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 a tendency to harbor
and multiply about orchard sites, they
afford an abundance of insect food for
the flock
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 reproduction.
In starting and maintaining young or
chard and in reiuyenating 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 l bene-
fit you.n Hardwood ashes, domestic
poultry guano and virgin forest soil or
lcaf-mold mixed in proportion of about
one-third each and applied about tho
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 unQucstioned. That the presence
of countless bees among the bios
SONS in the spring time in
surcs fruit in season we fully
believe. Indeed, it is our obscrva-
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 20 to waste but for
that wonderfully Intelligent and tire
less little insect that is ever on tho
alert to add to its store of delicious nee
tar. Only 4 tiny insect, One, two,
three, dozen, a hundred, thousand
yes twenty to forty thousand of them in
one wcll-stoclcd colony.
Associate ten, twenty or fifty colonies
of these small but earnest workers on
our premises and we have millions of
well-traincd laborcrs who clotho and
feed themselves and asked of US no
compensation for their work. Yet they
work. and work with a vim. They are
the very essence Of energy and activity.
They are never so happy or so peaceful
as whom the harvest of bloom is ripe
and the honey flow at its highest tide.
Thnn it. is that thnv. will mart
with a portion OF their stores IN
peace, and offer but little resistance to
our high-handcd 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 hrarthstone. Then there is a
viciousness and yigor 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
a genuine home ruard-armcd to the
teeth. and in the twinklinr of an eve
all Of them are in the face of the enemy
at tho first sound of his approach.
Some fruit-growprs entertain the idea
that bees work injury to ripe grapes
and that for this reason bees should
never be allowed in the vicinity of
VINEYARDS, Thisoninion is not a mOoted
idea merely. but has been the cause of
lawsuits Esnccia1Iv is this true of
California vhnro thoro has bccn 60
mrcl ronnirt bc4woon hno-l,ennars and |
frri+-rrowers Dnrinr tho hloominr
noriod tho bacs arc certainly bene- |
Hcia1 to rronne, but "a to Whether
they puncture the skin OF rlpenlng |