June 2, 1870. ] 



JOURNAL OF HOBTICTJLTtJRE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



399 



friend and fellow member, Mr. T. Hallam, to supply your 

 readers with the accompanying sketches, showing the method 



in which I construct the roosts in my pen, as it is greatly 

 praised and adopted by many of my friends. I find that 

 generally, in this country, only the triangular roosts are UBed, 

 but in my opinion it is rather awkward for the birds to fly to 

 them ; they are far more difficult to construct, not so easy to 

 clean, and rather obscure the birds while roosting, besides the 

 danger of stiff wings, which in most cases originate from the 

 birds bruising their joints repeatedly while flying on the same 

 roosts. 



My plan is thus explained : — I take a strip of wood about 

 half an inch thick, i inches wide, 

 as long as the pen allows. I cnt a 

 broomstick into lengths of about 

 5 inches, and I screw these lengths 

 from the baok of the strip to the 

 centre of its front, at distances ac- 

 cording to the size of the Pigeons 

 kept, say from 12 to 16 inches apart ; 

 then I nail at the bottom of the 

 strip containing the roosts, a board 

 about 8 inches or more wide, slant- 

 ing downwards, which shelters at 

 once all the under roosts, and then 

 by one long scrape to each of the 

 slanting boards, I clean them 

 thoroughly. The strip, with roosts, 

 is secured to the brick wall by nails 

 between each, or every alternate 

 roost ; and the weight of the slant- 

 ing board is secured, as shown in 

 the section of my plan, by a long 

 holdfast, which is first driven into 

 the wall by marking its place before 

 nailing the roosts ; and then, by 

 driving a screw through the holdfast 

 into the slanting board underneath, 

 all is complete. In the section the engraver has given the 

 roosts too triangular an appearance. 



I originated these roosts and have used them for years, and I 

 find them far preferable to the triangles. A pen may be fitted 

 with as many rows as room will allow, and then one can see 

 his birds all before him like disciplined lines of soldiers. — 

 H. Note, Birmingham. 



MICE IN A PIGEON LOFT. 

 I notice that you have a further inquiry as to the means of 

 getting rid of these pests, and I believe a great many fanciers 

 are annoyed by them. Last week I paid a visit to my friend, 

 the Rev. W. S. Shaw, of Bath, who breeds piize Fantails and 

 other Pigeons, and was much struck with the plan he had 

 adopted for " doing the mice." He had swung from the 

 ceiling a piece of wood the size of a small door or shutter, in 

 this way — At each of the four corners he had attached a stout 

 string of copper wire, and these wires were fastened at the other 



ends into the woodwork of the roof. Thus a table without legs 

 was supported, firmly enough for the birds to alight on. Strings 

 or rope would not have done, as the table would have moved 

 too easily, and the mice would have travelled down the ropes. 

 Mice are Blondins as to ropes, but scarcely so as to a single wire. 

 Then, on this table was placed an old tea-tray, and on the tea- 

 tray the hopper. Thus not a single pea rolled for the ex- 

 pectant mice below. This struck me as the best plan I had 

 ever seen, for mice who are awake at all hours, especially 

 night hours, eat or defile large quantities of food, and for the 

 sake of the young Pigeons the food must be left in the loft 

 during the night for the early morning feeding ; hence, fanciera 

 are at the mercy of an ever-increasing horde of well-fed mice, 

 but this plan thoroughly " does " them. — Wiltshire Bectob. 



BEES IN A CHIMNEY. 



A swam alighted in a chimney, and a fire was lighted in a 

 room whose fluewas supposed to communicate with the chimney, 

 but beyond filling the house with volumes of smoke, no other 

 effect was attained. Can you suggest any other method ? The 

 bees are far down in the chimney. Now I suppose this mis- 

 fortune was caused by two things ; one, the hive not being 

 properly protected from the heat and light, and the other the 

 hive not being placed on the floorboard directly the bees had 

 ascended. Be so good as to tell me if I am right, that I may 

 know how to act another time. 



I wish also to know if a glass hive would not be better if a 

 woollen cover were made to fit over it in addition to the Wood- 

 bury outside wooden cover. Does it disturb the bees much to 

 lift it off to look at them ? How am I to know which are drone 

 cells in a piece of honeycomb ? What is the usual price of a 

 first swarm, and is it late for them now ? Would there be any 

 chance, if a swarm were hived now, of being able to put on a 

 super this year ? How wide ought to be the piece of board 

 on which the floorboards stand, to be safe for the hives to stand 

 on without fastening ? — Apis. 



[The following method was successfully adopted by a corre- 

 spondent under similar circumstances : — " A rope with a light 

 weight attached was let down very gently from the top of the 

 flue in which the bees had settled, and when this made its 

 appearance at the bottom of the chimney, a bundle of fresh 

 grass, well damped, and as nearly as possible the size of the flue, 

 was attached to it, and the whole was then drawn gently to the 

 top of the chimney, upon which an empty hive had been already 

 properly placed, into this the bees at once ascended, and were 

 removed to their destination without further difficulty." You 

 are probably right in respect to the original cause of the mis- 

 fortune. A thick woollen cover would certainly be a very desir- 

 able addition, and after the combs are well advanced you will 

 not find the bees much disturbed by being examined. Drone 

 cells can readily be distinguished from worker cells by their 

 larger size. First swarms vary in price from 10s. to 21«. in 

 different localities. It is still not very late for them, and one 

 may yet work a super. A hive should not be trusted on a 

 stand less than 13 or 11 inches wide.] 



A FAVOURITE BESOM OF BEES. 



A man who professes to understand bees hived a swarm for 

 me in 1868. He dressed the hive with beer, sugar, and lettuce, 

 and hived the bees from a raspberry stake, saying they were all 

 right. About two hours afterwards they all came out from the 

 hive, and whirled round and round for about a quarter of a 

 mile, about 20 feet high all the time. I and the man who hived 

 them followed them. They settled upon an old vicarage chim- 

 ney, where there are and have been beeB for some years ; after 

 a time they all entered, and there I believe they still remain. 

 I had no more swarms that year, so I kept the old stock through 

 another winter. 



Last year (1869), they swarmed again about the bth of May, 

 flew in the same direction, and settled upon a larch tree within 

 a few yards of the old chimney ; the same man hived them, 

 and I brought them home quite safe at night. I had another 

 swarm from the old hive in the latter part of the same month ; 

 the same man hived them, but they all got up in the same way 

 as the first swarm, and flew to the old chimney, where they 

 settled and entered as before ; so I took the old stock last 

 autumn. I saved one swarm, wlich issued on the 15th of this 

 month (May, 1870). They settled in two lots, but after a short 

 time united, flying about in the air a short time, and then 



