384 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTUBE AND COTTAGE GAKDENER. 



[ Juao 3, 1SC9. 



introduced into tlie scented solution, and immediately set her 

 at liberty among the bees on a broodcomb. 



This should be done in the evening, just before dusk, because 

 the bees are then naturally more disposed to accept an offered 

 Btranger than earlier in the day ; and because the odour of the 

 scented syrup might attract robbers if fed either in the morn- 

 ing or at midday. 



The queen is to be dipped into the scented pyrup primarily 

 to impart the same smell as the bees have already acquired 

 from it; but likewise in order to tame and subdue her, so that 

 she may not run wildly about and try to escape when intro- 

 duced among the bees, but be as it were constrained to accept 

 the caresses and homage of her new subjects. 



"When introducing a queen she should not be seized or held 

 by her wings, but be grasped softly by the thoras with the 

 thumb and forefinger. A queen held by the wings is apt to 

 struggle and rush wildly among and over the bees when released, 

 and thus deporting herself as a stranger, she incurs the risk of 

 being regarded and treated as one by the bees, and may be 

 either mutilated or killed. 



If the bees are iu hivee opening at the top, the scented syrup 

 may be poured directly into the cells on one side of every par- 

 tially-empty comb, and their feeding and scenting may thus be 

 promptly effected, even while the operator is searching for the 

 queen intended to be removed. 



This process admits, of courpe, of variations and mqdifica- 

 tions, such as will readily suggest themselves to iutelligent 

 bee-keepers. 



LIGURIAN BEES. 



Would you ask Mr. Woodbury to give your readers a little 

 information on Ligurian bees, their cultivation, and rtie mode 

 of joining queens to black stocks? Many of us are, I do not 

 doubt, at this time anxiously looking out for the anival of their 

 majesties, the writer for one, and a lew instructions how to 

 proceed would be very welcome ; al^o a few hints on removing 

 the black queens and getting ready for the strangers, &c. I 

 have been referred to the numbers of " our Journal " for the 

 11th of April and 2Qd of May, 1867 ; but unfortunately I have 

 not them by me, nor can I now obtain them, as I find they are 

 out of print. I hope, therefore, i I Jam not asking too much in 

 begging that the articles on Ligurians which they contain, or 

 at any rate the substance of thena, may,be, repeated in an early 

 number. 



I had one very ffne Swarm dn thfe 24t^ nit. I fumigated 

 them, and with the help of two frifends, bee-keepers, had a look 

 for the queen, but could not find her. This is my first disap- 

 pointment this season, for I do not know how to manage when I 

 get the Ligurians. It was like looking for a pin in a pottle of 

 hay. I found the queen in one hive that I fumigated some time 

 ago, but there were twenty times the number this time to look 

 over, and I had to give it up in desptiir. I set a frame hive 

 made nearly to your directions, and the bees all went up, and 

 at half-past 11 p.m. I screwed on the bottom board, and placed 

 them in the house. They are all right, but the weather is like 

 winter here just now, and none of my bees are lively. I have 

 fed the swarm every night. My idea was to fumigate a swarm, 

 find the queen {I failed, I am sorry to say), and place her in 

 a wire cage in the hive, so that when the new queen came 

 there would be no trouble in getting at the old one. I think 

 the advantages would be greater than having to find her just 

 when she was wanted. She would lay no eggs, and the Ligurian 

 would have a fair start, and the bees no chance of raising a 

 queen for themselves. The bees, being used to the old queen 

 in the cage, would more readily take to the new one, and it 

 would not disturb the new combs. 



How would it do to operate on the second swarm, which 

 would be smaller than the first, and when the beea were recon- 

 ciled to the new queen to put the hive in the place of the first 

 swaru>? Or should I put the new queen in her cage in the hive 

 with her own bees, and put them in the place of a stiong stock 

 in the middle of a fine day, when they were in *' strong flight," 

 and then join the first convenient lot of bees to her in a week 

 or two ? Or should I let the bees in my swarm of the 24th 

 fill the frames and take them for the hive for the new queen, 

 and let them (the swarm) fill some more ? — T. B. H. 



[You were all wrong in fumigating or meddling with your 

 Bwarm ; and it is very fortunate that you could not discover the 

 queen, as the bees would have built none but drone combs 

 whilst sh6 was kept in confinement. Mr. Woodbury will give 

 the required information in an early number.] 



OUR LETTER BOX. 



Dorking Cqickens Dying of Scour and Crami- (J. N. C.).— Your 

 cbickens aro still eating something that is injurious to them, or lack 

 something necessary, since they die ; but we do not think the gall has 

 anything to do with it. Any oue conversant with the inside of a fowl will 

 tell you that all parts that are iu coutact with the gall bag acquire a deep 

 bottle-greeu colour, while the adjacent parts are more shghtly tinged. 

 If, however, as sometimes happens, there is either small rupture" or slight 

 exuialiou, thcu the whole of the intotines are coloured. Even then 

 death does not of necessity follow; a fo^\l will live many weeks. You may 

 test our idea of the bilo by trying some on i>>iper pr linen — you will find it 

 dry green. Put all your chickens under a course of cimphor, let all their 

 water be strongly impregnated with it, and give a pill of it every night 

 the size of a email pea to each chicken. If adults suffer, give them two. 



Fowls Unhealthy— Pooltry-hodse Floors {A Subscriber).— You will 

 never have healthy fowls if their houses have bricked floors. They canBe 

 cold, cramp, and paralysis ; but if you wiphed to make them worse cover 

 the bricks with sawdust. Fowls pick about in the morning on the floors 

 of their houses. As the gizzard of a fowl is in reality a mill acting with a 

 motion like that of opening and shuttiug a hand, it is necessary the mill 

 should be provided with stones. When they pick their food "from the 

 earth they get them, but when they pick among sawdust they do not. 

 They are ] relty much in the condition a miller would be if his nether 

 millstone were uiade of iudianrubber—with this JaVrence.that theindian- 

 rubber would not inci'case in balk, v/hile the sawdust swells, and neither 

 grinds itself nor allows anything else to do it. Have the bricks removed ; 

 or, if that may not be done, cover them 6 or 7 inches deep with loose 

 earth, road grit, or gravel. Remove all sawdust. Every fowl should be 

 purged with a tablo-spoonf ul of castor oil to got rid of the sawdu>t, and it 

 would be well afterwards to give Baily's pills for a few nights. Give them 

 ground oats for a time, and then harleymoal. Do not confine yourself to 

 whole corn. 



Young Pjgeons Dvino in the Nest (E. Boifwednane). Yon do not 



feed on sufficiently g'iod food; barley does for common Pigeons and 

 others when not breeding ; soaked bread is unsuitable. Feed on peas and 

 Indian corn. Perhaps some of your youog birds died on account of the 

 cold weather, their pureuts being tou long ofi~ the nest ; also, if Pigeons 

 are bad feeders, they are apt to give thoir young merely watc, or much 

 water and not sufficient solid food, or only good food to one, and then the 

 other dies. Almost all young Pigeons ar"o easily enough, reared by hand 

 after they are a fortuight old, by giving them soak«d peas or beana 

 morning and night. No young birds are so easily reared. 



Nightingales (.i t^onstant Header)^— " These birds favour the south- 

 east and south-west portions of England, although instances are recorded 

 of them having been heard north of the Trent. Occa.^ionally they Tisit 

 Derbyshire. Yarrell asserts uiwn authority tbat the Nightingale has 

 been heard five miles north of the ciiyof York, and on the uurth-west 

 side of England, Carlisle. It has even bec-n stated that iu thi^ early part 

 of the summer of 1826— a remarkably warm season, 'that the Nightingales 

 had arrived in Calder Wood, Mid Lothian.' Afriendof mine (Mr. Atkin- 

 son, Worcester), a lover of the Nightiu'-jalo and Woodlark, and Kingfisher 

 also, has kept many of the two form-^r (one letter to me Stating lie had 

 then nine Nightingales), caught in Worcestershire after being reared by 

 the old ones, and they have generally proved sufficiently learned in their 

 soDg without being tutored further. I would not advise the rearing in 

 the nest young Nightingales. They require much more attention than 

 other birds. Many writers state they require su h and suoh food, very 

 diflicult to procure. I know for a fact that Nightingales have been well 

 kept on ecrapod beef mixed with tho yo!k of egg bard boiled, with a very 

 little water to it. This food is soon prepa^^ed, but it must be made fresh 

 every morning, or it will soon sour. Be very particular also that the pot 

 (earthen the best), in which the food is placed be clean. It should he 

 washed out every day. There are other kinds of fuod which may be 

 given to Nightingales, if conveniently obtained— viz., ants' eggs, meal 

 worms, bu locks' liver or heart. I have known tliem do well on German 

 paste (a good receipt for which I havf), mixed with hard boiled and 

 a little scraped beef now and then. Wasp grubs may also be given. 

 When a cuke has been secured, before the grubs are too far changed, I 

 would 1 Ihem in an oven by slightly hoiking them head downwards. 

 Then keep the cake of grubs on a sieve in an airy situation, to prevent 

 them sweating, or they will be useless for the Nightingale's appetite. I 

 would advise keeping the birds from live food as much as possible, for 

 this reason— that it might not bo conveni-^nt fo have a supply of it; 

 and however natural it may bo, still it has the effect oi drawing them off 

 the prepared fond, of which they will sometimes starve rather than par- 

 take.— G. J. E., Derby." 



WaiTE-LEGGED GOLDFINCHES (.4. Pcti/fr).— " Goldfinches' legs become 

 changed from dark to light through the birds being moulted in the Louse. 

 It is quite true, no doulit, that you have bred from a dark-legg<-d Gold- 

 finch. It is not the first instance I have heard of by scores, but it is no 

 proof whatever that the bird is a one-year-old specimen. Some fnnciers 

 imagine, because they have bred from a dark-legged bird caught the 

 previous aiitt:nin, that it must be bat a yoarliug. Not one in twenty 

 young Gol<3fiuches will be up to the breeding mark the first season. As 

 their legs remiiu black in their wild and natural state, and as some 

 imagine they are all young birds with black or dark legs, pray what be- 

 comes of the two or three-year-old birds? — G. J. Baknksbv, Derby. ^' 



Bird Organ {E. Y.). — A bird organ can be purchased at most of the 

 German houses where clocks and musical instruments are sold. There 

 is one in Holborn. The price of one is from I5s. and upwards. We have 

 no confidence in thorn for teaching young birds to sing a tune, although 

 we beheve the Bullfinch is taught to pipe a time by tho constant use of 

 one of the organs. 



POULTRY MARKET.— June 2. 



We ha\e complaints younp things do not grow, and that cold nights 

 are doing miBcuief among them. The numbers, howe7er,,lncrcase, and 

 prices iall a little. There is no trade. 



B. d B. d 



Large Fowls 4 to 4 6 



Smaller do 3 6 4 



Chickens 2 2 6 



Goslings 6 7 



Dncklings 2 2 C 



s. d s. d 



Partridges 8 to 



Grouse 



Pigeons 9 10 



Rabbits IB 16 



Wiiddo 8 8 



