452 



JOUBNAIi OF HORTICULTUEE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



[ December 10, 1868. 



good management. Another statement our friend makes is 

 this, that the waste of eggs in a large hive is greater than in a 

 small one, a statement so extraordinary and extravagant that 

 I fancy it will be difficult to find another person, either north 

 or south of the Tweed, who will believe it. 



Again, he would have us believe that the Stewarton hive is 

 large enough to hold some honey and pollen, and 03,000 cells 

 for brood — that is to say "3000 eggs per day." In my 

 advocacy of large hives I have never gone so far as this " Lan- 

 arkshire Bee-keeper." If he will satisfy me that there are 

 deposited 3000 eggs in empty cells every day in a Stewarton 

 hive, and 3000 bees produced every day, or room for them, I 

 shall never again condemn this hive on account of its small- 

 ness. With an eye of honest scrutiny I cannot understand 

 what induces this gentlemen to go beyond the bounds of reason 

 and possibility in his commendation of the Stewarton hive. 

 Evidently he manages bees on the non-swarming system, 

 ■whereas we go strongly for the swarming system of manage- 

 ment where profit and a continuance of success are aimed at. 



Will the reader just notice what happens where large hives 

 are well managed and allowed to swarm ? Very often each hive 

 yields two swarms, but in a run of years three swarms from 

 two hives will be about the average. In a moderately favour- 

 able year for prosperity the two stock hives and their three 

 swarms will have 40,000 bees each at the end of the season — 

 200,000 altogether. In the case of large hives each swarm is 

 more populous than a smaller hive managed on the non- 

 swarming system ; very well, now suppose we take the honey 

 from three of these five hives, and put their bees — 120,000 in 

 number — into the two selected for stock, what do we obtain ? 

 Two hives more than double the strength of those which have 

 had no additions of bees. Such hives are neither cold in 

 spring, nor are the bees slow to cover their combs. In 1867 I 

 had only twelve swarms in September to divide amongst twenty- 

 four hives, from these I had twenty swarms in May ; and in 

 June, 18C8, one of the largest bee-keepers in Lancashire told me 

 that no honey could be obtained here if hives were allowed to 

 swarm, yet my swarms yield twice as much honey as his that 

 are not allowed to swarm. 



1 am quite sure if my readers will adopt larger hives and 

 manage them well, they will have no sympathy with the 

 "Lanarkshire Bee-keeper," when he expresses his detesta- 

 tion of large hives. I have both large and small hives in my 

 garden ; the small ones help me to increase the number of my 

 hives, the large ones yield me profit. By-and-by I shall be 

 able to work in an apiary every way excellent, and then the 

 small castaways will bo occasionally used for supers. 



I am of opinion that if this advocate of the Stewarton hive 

 had been in Manchester in the months of September and 

 October last, to witness a number of Irishmen hawking, day 

 after day, great dishes of pure honeycomb in large cakes, 

 12 inches square, cut out of large hives, he would hesitate 

 before he again ventured to speak publicly of his detesting 

 the use of large hives. Much of this comb brought from 

 Ireland could not be surpassed for excellence, and generally 

 reaUsed Is. 'Jd. per lb. 



The " Lanarkshire Bee-keeper " says, if I would adopt and 

 only half-manage the Stewarton hives, I would " find them very 

 profitable, and be able to send to the market first-class honey, 

 whilst the inferior which we now produce would gradually dis- 

 appear." This is rather too strong, and so is the following 

 quotation : — " I would emphatically state that the whole world 

 has not yet produced in quantity and quality honey equal to that 

 obtained from the Stewarton hive." I should fancy this ex- 

 pression of wild enthusiasm would have no more weight with 

 thinking men than the sigh of a butterfly in love. As it is my 

 intention to visit Lanarkshire next year in July, and stay four- 

 teen days there, I earnestly hope that this gentleman will let 

 me have his address, and permission to visit his bee garden ; 

 and if I find there what he talks about — results so prodigious 

 that hives which took two men to lift have given place to the 

 Stewarton hive, I can assure him that I will use what little 

 influence I possess to bring it speedily into repute. At pre- 

 sent I have no faith in the worth of wooden hives — no faith in 

 the present size of the Stewarton hive, and, I regret to say, 

 less faith in the recommendation he has given of it. 



The "Lanarkshire Bee-keeper" has in one instance, 

 perhaps unintentionally, misrepresented my meaning. He 

 makes it that Mr. Pettigrew says if these Stewarton hives were 

 "properly managed, much more honey would be obtained." 

 I never dreamed of such a thing. My words are " If these hives 

 were twice as large and properly managed," &c. His remark 



about " the inferior run honey of large hives gradually disap- 

 pearing " is another bold stroke. The markets of Great 

 Britain demand ten times more run honey than honeycomb, 

 and while this demand lasts bees will be managed sojas to 

 produce it. — A. Pettigrew, Brighton Grove, Manchester. 



GREAT MEETING OF GERMAN BEE-MASTERS 



HELD AT DARMSTADT.— Sept. 8th, 9th, & 10th. 



These meetings of bee-masters held periodically in one after 

 another of the principal towns of Germany, show what a point 

 bee-keeping has reached in that country, and are most inter- 

 esting as well as advantageous in their results. The meeting 

 which was held this year at Darmstadt, the capital of the Grand 

 Duchy of Hesse, was attended by a large number of the cele- 

 brities of German bee-keeping. Some well-known names, in- 

 cluding Baron von Eerlepsch (who is suffering from a stroke of 

 paralysis, but growing better), are missed from the list, but 

 still a meeting attended by such men as Dzierzon, Von Hru- 

 schka (the inventor of the centrifugal comb-emptying machine), 

 Vogel (introducer of the Egyptian bee to Germany), Dathe, 

 Koehler, Professor Leuckart, of Giessen, perhaps the first au- 

 thority of the day on the natural history of the bee, a Greek 

 Priest from Croatia, Marches! Crivelli, the great reformer in 

 Italian bee-keeping, from Milan, to say nothing of many others 

 more or less known, from all parts of Germany, and several 

 from France, could not fail to be interesting. Great facilities 

 were also afforded by the fact, that almost every railway com- 

 pany in Germany and Austria conveyed bee-keepers or other 

 visitors to the meeting, as well as articles for exhibition, at 

 fares generally 50 per cent, or more reduced. 



The first day of the meeting was Sept. 8th, and at half-paat 

 ten the President, His Excellency Herr von Berchthold, opened 

 the proceedings, by welcoming the visitors in the name of 

 H.R.H. the Grand Duke, who had placed his orangery and ad- 

 joining grounds at the disposal of the meeting, and addressed 

 the assembly in a short speech, followed by two other addresses 

 by the Mayors cf Darmstadt and Bessungen. 



The President then read out the rules for guiding the speakers, 

 and the real business of the day was commenced by a speech 

 by Professor Leuckart, enforcing first of all the necessity of 

 learning theory as well as practice, in order to become a suc- 

 cessful apiarian. He then proceeded to notice the points of 

 similarity and difference in their habits between hive bees, 

 wasps, ants, and humble bees, dwelling especially upon the 

 extraordinary fertility of the queen bee. 



The first subject upon the programme then came on for dis- 

 cussion. " 1, What is the cause of the difference of size in 

 queen bees ? 2, Are the larger queens to be preferred to the 

 small, and why ? 3, Is it in the bee-master's power to insure 

 the production of large queens ?" 



These questioiis had been proposed by Dzierzon, who as- 

 cended the speaker's platform amidst a storm of applause. The 

 substance of his remarks was : 1, That the difference in size 

 is caused by difference in food during development, and 

 depends, therefore, much upon whether the queens be bred 

 during the time when there is abundance of pollen or not, 

 pollen being, in fact, the element of their food which is of 

 most importance in this respect. 2, That although smaller 

 queens are, often at least, as fruitful as large ones, yet that the 

 advantages of size in other respects are great, as, for instance, 

 if the queen is to be caught, and especially because experience 

 has shown that large queens are annually impregnated in a 

 much shorter time than small ones, a difference sometimes, 

 especially in cool weather, being observed of ten days. The 

 tLird question is answered mainly in the remarks on the first, 

 merely adding, that the fewer queens that are being bred at 

 once by one stock, the larger they are likely to be. 



Dr. Pollmaun, from Bonn, thought that the difference in 

 size depended much on the age of the grubs in the case of ar- 

 tificially-bred queens, for that a grub which had been fed four or 

 five days with common food, could not develope to the same 

 size as if it had all along enjoyed royal food ; and also on the 

 fact that the egg naturally destined to become a queen is kept 

 warmer at the first than other eggs. As every bee-keeper will 

 allow, large queens must be stronger than small ones, and to 

 produce large queens we must always take care to commence 

 with the egg at as early a stage as possible. 



The second subject came then in order. " What is the 

 result of all that has appeared in the ' Bee Journal ' during 

 the last year upon foul brood ? " 



