Farming Notes.

Manawatu Standard, Volume X, Issue 30, 3 July 1885, Page 2

Farming Notes.

A correspondent at' Kai Iwi writes ng as follows :— As the question of fertQiging red. plover; without, the aid/ Loftliij ;hunible bee is. a-mattet^jof considerable' interest to farmers, I will make a few remarks ohj^the .subject. reading a short arfiele m this journal last summer, to. the effect-that red clover; -seed had be.en grown to periectip.n r in : 'ai« :i Wangaehu*district,iny attention jras at* .; tracteH' tb What appeared ai *firsik Wbie great quantities of small beetles flying near the ground* and the fowls picking them up and enjoying a-feast on thtmV ; Pinding-the/n .: verjff thick, over, aftljba aoine thyme bn^kea, I^knelt^flfwn^loF ob* seryfe their mdvementsrl^iw that they werd about the size o£~and- very much th« same^h'aiißl.ias' the mb^quitp^-giossy ' ; black over th» shoulders*' and ;j ioaylj'but ther^ were a good many larger m size, of a bright bripk-red; colour} these were probably of a different ,, sex. They^darted their long trunks into the flowers with grea^ rapidity, and evidenfly fed on the ; ' nectar. I afterward obseryedm them other parts of the district feeding-ontheclover and other flowers, and thought here we havefthe secret of the red clover geed riper(mg all at once. lam aprettyclos^ observer, but never saw these inserts bet .fQre.fnqrcan I gqeqa where, fcheycamt from^ any more ttan I can account for the sudden appearance of thebright.eyeß •or silver-eyes m 1861, and the ericketi which appeared m -1872. Tne. slender bodies and long trunks of these insects seem to fit; them exactly for entering and fertilising 4 such flowers as^^the re 3 clovar, which the honey bee cannot get at, and I think it very probable that they have solved this : for ; our farmers; - Perhaps 'ebinWof bur entomologists' may give us an account of these new-comers next summer. .. ;<,■■< :