138 



JOUENAL OF HOKTICULTUEE AND COTTAGE GAKDENEE. 



[ August 15, 1866. 



what puzzled to account for its unusual adventure. AH this 

 was matter of intense astonishment to a juvenile relative who 

 happened to accompany me, and who seemed to deem my 

 explanation that bees were most inoffensive creatures when at 

 a distance from their hives, a rather lame intei-pretation of 

 what appe:ired to him so remarkable a phenomenon. 



But, (fear me ! what am I saying ? That I never saw but one 

 bee ? What a mistake ! How could I forget that I paid a 

 visit to two excellent maiden ladies (sisters), residing near a 

 neighbouring village who, to their eternal honom- be it spoken, 

 devote the whole of their time and otherwise ample means to 

 the gratuitous maintenance and education of a number of de- 

 stitute orphan girls, childen of officers who, haiing spent them- 

 selves in the service of their country, had been unable to 

 provide for those dear ones that remained behind them. All 

 honour, indeed, to these admirable women, before whose hfe- 

 loug labour and glorious self-abnegation, deeds of what the 

 world is accustomed to call heroism appear but as pimy and 

 dwarfed abortions. By one of these estimable ladies was I 

 escorted over the apiary, which I foimd to consist of about a 

 dozen hives of various descriptions scattered about the garden 

 — some swarms, some old stocks, some working-supers, and all 

 doing well. But what most forcibly engaged my attention was 

 two or three hives with entrances at the top, after the fashion 1 

 advocated by Messrs. WiUiams and Stuttle, and one of which j 

 was working a couple of good supers. This my conductress 

 informed me had been for some years a very favourite and i 

 successful plan of hers ; and on my inquiring what became of i 

 dead bees and other refuse, she replied that she supposed they 

 must be di'agged out at the top, for there was no other means 

 of egress. 



Having returned from my fourteen-days holiday in the evening 

 of the 13th July, my first care was to insert an empty box under 

 the super adverted to in page 19, which was by this time well 

 filled, with the exception of the outside of the two side-combs 

 which the bees had not been able to seal completely over, but 

 which, nevertheless, contained in the whole about 3.5 lbs. of 

 beautifully white honeycomb. Most of the bees had deserted it 

 by the next morning, when I took it off, permitted the stragglers 

 to escape, and had it all ready for Mr. A. Neighbour, who made 

 his appearance about one o'clock in order to convey it to Ply- 

 mouth in time to be exhibited duiing the following week, at 

 his stall in the show-yard of the Eoyal Agricultural Society. 



The afternoon was devoted by Mr. Neighbour and myself to | 

 a trip to the residence of the clerical friend whose " mistakes" 

 weie related in No. 221 of " our- Journal." Here we inspected 

 his apiary, minutely examining the hive mentioned in page 477 1 

 of the last volume, and which at that time contained so large a 1 

 quantity of chilled brood in all stages of decomposition. We 

 found tiiat the great bulk of this abortive brood had been re- 

 moved by the bees, whilst that which remained appeared to 

 have dried into a perfectly innocuous condition, nor was there 

 the slightest trace of that fell disease, foul brood, with whose 

 appearance I have unfortimately been so familiar that I could 

 not fail to recognise it almost at a glance. The result of this 

 " mistake," therefore, proves as conclusively as a somewhat 

 similar experiment purposely instituted by myself, and fre- 

 quently referred to dm-ing my discussion with Mr. Lowe on 

 the subject, that chilled brood and foul brood are by no means 

 identical. 



Eeturning in the evening, I saw my friend and his weighty 

 glass box off on their way to Plymouth, where I doubt not his 

 stand has proved one of the most attractive features of the 

 show. 



Those who are familiar with the writings of the illus- 

 trious Huber may, perhaps, remember that during his ex- 

 periments with drone-breeding queens, whose abnonnal con- 

 dition, erroneously attributed by him to retarded impreg- 

 nation, has since been proved to be owing to parthenogenesis, 

 since di-oue-breeding queens are imdoubtedly virgio queens ; 

 he remarked the singular fact, that these defective mother- 

 bees sometimes lay the eggs of males in queen cells, and was 

 astonished at finding that the workers took exactly the same 

 care of drone eggs deposited in royal cells, as of those that 

 would really become queens. More than once, in the fii-m per- 

 suasion of finding royal nymphs, he opened these royal cells 

 after they had been sealed, yet the nymph of a drone always 

 appeared. 



I am not, however, aware that any instance has yet been re- 

 corded in which bees, with the full opportunity of selecting 

 from hundreds of worker eggs and young worms, have yet 

 committed the mistake of choosing a male egg, giving to it a 



royal cratUe, and nursing it to maturity. It will, I think, be 

 admitted that such an aberration in the instinct of the bee 

 is extremely unusual, and I for one should be very slow to be- 

 lieve it, unless occun-ing. as in the instance which I am about 

 to relate, under circumstances that preclude the possibility of 

 either doubt or mistake. 



It may be remembered that on the 19th of June, I introduced 

 a young queen that had exhibiteil signs of fecundation, to a 

 stock which, as related in page 19, had lost its queen in an 

 attempt to swarm six days before. This introduction having 

 been successfully effected, I supplied the " nucleus " from 

 which the young matron had been abstracted with a suitable 

 brood-comb on the 25th of June. This comb contained worker- 

 brood in all stages, from the egg to the sealed nymph, as well 

 as a patch of drone-brood at one end. Only one royal cell was, 

 however, formed, and this, as is very frequently tlie case, was 

 situated near the bottom of the comb, and just at the point of 

 junction between the worker and drone brood. After vainly 

 watching day after day for the expected appearance of a queen, 

 and finding the royal cell apparently neglected by the workers, 

 who, having denuded its apex of wax, seemed to jjay no further 

 attention to it, I cut it open on the 23rd day, and was at first 

 quite confounded at fincliug that it contained a living inha- 

 bitant. My momentary impression that I had prematurely 

 destroyed a queen nearly ready to emerge from' her cell was, 

 however, speedily dissipated on a more minute examination, 

 which proved the individual thiis reared "in the purple" to 

 be neither more nor less thaii a full-grown and well-developed 

 drone, which would probably have made a natural exit during 

 the next (the 24th) day. 



I should be glad if any of the apiarian readers of " our 

 Journal " would state whether a similar instance to that last 

 related has ever come under their observation. — A Devonshirb 



BEE-KEIirEIl. 



BJiJRS AND SLIDES OF STEWARTON HIVES. 



M.\Y I trouble you or "A EEXFREWsnir.E Bee-keeper" for 

 a minute description of the bars and shdes used with the 

 Stewarton hives ? A section, such as was given of the Wood- 

 bury bars and frames, would, I think, be valuable to many of 

 your apiarian readers in common with myself. — W. J. 



[The six central bars in Stewarton hives are IJ inch wide, 

 the outer two are IJ by j inch thick. If frames are intended 

 to be attached, to make a more secure job, the thickness had 

 better be increased one-eighth of an inch. On each side of the 

 bar, one-eighth of an inch from the top, is run a groove, one- 

 eighth square, to receive the feather of the slide ; the lower 

 corners are roimded off to the Woodbury rib. The slides are 

 five-eighths of an inch wide on the imder and three-eighths of 

 an inch on the upper side, and a quarter of an inch thick, the 

 upper side of the slide worlcing flush with the top of the bar. 

 The accompanying sketch, showing an end view of the bar 

 and sUde, may aid the description. 



J 



h 



The sUdes are left IJ inch longer than the bars, to diaw by, 

 and should be slightly roimded on the lower edge that they 

 may work very easily at the start. An obdiu-ate shde or over- 

 thick comb I can easily remove from one of my hives by simply 

 bringing the others a little closer ; this advantage is attainable 

 by placing the bars on the top of the hive, a portion of their 

 under side being removed to lower the edge of the groove equal 

 in extent to the thickness of the hive ; whereas in those hives 

 in which are bars or frames sunk into notches, the bars do not 

 offer the same facility, but are in a gi-eat measure fixtures. 



When frames are attached to bars the notches are carried 

 further on, so as to leave a quarter-of-inch passage between 

 the end of the frames and the hive. The ends of the frames 

 are of the same breadth as the bars, fully one-eighth of an inch 

 thick when di-essed, the lower corners are rounded off in imi- 

 tation of combs, and kept together at bottom by a narrow strip 

 of wood seven-sixteenths of an inch broad by a quarter of an 

 inch thick. Frames so made are an improvement on those in 

 which the bottoms are of the same width as the sides, such 



