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JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



[ December 24, 187iJ. 



lamentations, they can be as speedily hushed into perfect quiet 

 and contentment by the restoration of their lost queen. 



3, Hearing. — The lecturer did *' not think that bees possessed 

 any powers of hearing. He had shouted, screamed, played on 

 the fiddle, and made other noises, but they took no notice what- 

 ever." Bees can both make and hear sounds. They have a 

 lancjuage well understood by themselves. In times of activity 

 they are seldom dumb. A single bee can give a note of alarm 

 or a cry of pain that affects the whole community. With the 

 point of a penknife I once caused a bee at the door of a hive to 

 utter a cry of distress, which instantly produced the responsive 

 hush of disturbance throughout the whole swarm. In a hive of 

 bees there may be heard the sounds of grief, of joy, of peace, of 

 trouble, of starvation, and of suffocation. It is the noise of bees 

 in swarming that keeps them within earshot of one another; 

 and this noise never wholly subsides till all have clustered in a 

 mass like a bunch of grapes on the branch of a tree. If bees 

 were deaf, sounds would be of no avail; but many different in- 

 stances and occasions could be named in which sound is a very 

 useful instrument in the economy of a hive of bees. 



Bees will follow the sound of their own hive in a dark place 

 and in daylight as hounds follow a fox. It were an easy 

 matter to make bees on the floor of a house at night follow the 

 noise of a strong hive from room to room over the whole house, 

 and even from one end of a garden to the other end. 



4. — The sense of taste in bees does not admit of doubt, though 

 we know very little about it. The fact that .bees resort to the 

 water of dunghills and the secretions of an insect does not prove 

 that their sense of taste is imperfect. The saline matter of 

 manure is useful for breeding purposes. If the syrup of sugar 

 be made too weak bees will not take it. If six dishes of honey 

 be placed on a garden walk beside six of good syrup the bees 

 take all the honey first, afterwards the syrup. If honey be given 

 to them in a warm state they generally overload themselves, 

 and cannot fly for some time. 



5, Smell. — This sense in bees is wonderfully acute. They can 

 smell the nectar of flowers at some distance and go direct to it. 

 We have seen bees on the way to the fields halt over the mouth 

 of an uncorked bottle of syrup in our hands, and drop on to it in 

 an instant. We have seen bees dance around the chimney top, 

 and drop down the chimney to get the honey in the room below, 

 which they had smelled. We have seen honey placed in a dark 

 kind of cellar behind a room 10 yards wide; bees scented this 

 honey, went in by the door, flew across the room, and crawled 

 on the floor of the dark cellar till they reached the honey. The 

 sense of smell in bees is so keen that they can detect the presence 

 of strange bees in their hives, and are greatly offended, at the 

 breath and sweat of human beings. 



Bees have good memories as well as acute senses. If they be 

 fed one day from a plate placed in a particular spot of a garden 

 they will go back next day or next week to see if any more can 

 be obtained. If weather keeps them at home for weeks they 

 remember the place, and go to it as soon as they leave their hives. 

 We think that bees are very clever little creatures, and that 

 they have the power of conveying ideas to one another. If one 

 or two robber bees find access to the honey of a weak hive or 

 stock, the community to which the robbers belong generally 

 gets all the honey in a very short time. This is almost invariably 

 the case : one hive getting the whole of the booty before the 

 other hives are aware that any booty can be had. If bees have 

 no powers of conveying ideas to their own community, how 

 does it happen that one hive gets all and the rest none ? We 

 have frequently resorted (on a larger scale) to the same kinds of 

 experiments that the baronet adopted, but the results and con- 

 clusions were quite the reverse of his. Again : When one hive 

 is robbing another there is, generally speaking, no resistance 

 offered, and the robbers never cease till they have carried every 

 particle of honey to their own hive. If the undefended hive be 

 removed from its stand before all its treasures are gone, and a 

 strong hive be placed where it stood, the first robbers that come 

 now find a resistance too great for them, and the whole of the 

 fraternity of the robbing community are speedily piade awarg 

 that " their game is up." 



In preparations for swarming is there no community of ideas ? 

 no internal arrangements made ? Twenty or thirty thousand 

 bees are about to emigrate and leave twenty thousand behind in 

 the mother hive ; those that go have to take rations to last 

 three days, and to be ready by twelve o'clock I Is all this mere 

 blind instinct ? The question cannot be answered in the 

 affirmative by — A. Pettigrew, 



OUR LETTER BOX. 



FowTS FOB Large Rcn (H, T. P.).— You may easily keep two hundred 

 io\i\s in the space {seven acres of grass and an orchard), and with tlio appli- 

 ances you mention you may keep more if you will. The only thiog you 

 must Btrictly observe is, the fowls must have separate bouses for roosting, 

 layinp, and sitting. They will not do well if they roost with Ducks or Geese. 



Breedhig Aoe (Novice).— Yovl do not mention the ages of the fowls ; 

 we therefore take it for granted the cock is at tho least as old as the pallets. 

 You may get the eggs after the first twelve have been laid. 



ENDrBAh'CE or Male Influence (W. A.). — If hen«, they are not now 

 probably laying, and they are not likely to do so during the present weather. 

 You may, therefore, put them to any cocks you please, with the expectation 

 that when they lay the eggs will be the produce of your arraugemeLt. If they 

 are pullets, and now laying, we should not be satisfied with less than a fort- 

 night's separation. It is, however, a disputed point, and many good authorities 

 are content with three or four days' separation from one, and two-days associa- 

 tion with another. 



PoiiTsaiociH Snow. — Mr. A. Kitchen writes to as that the 'White-booted 

 Bantam cock noticed by our reporter as having roap '* was perfectly well 

 when went, and on his return had no signs of roup." 



CRt:vE-C(EDRs' Throats Affected {H. B.).— The severe weather has 

 caused some sickness, but we have not heard of much. Creve-Cceurs are sub- 

 ject to illness while in progress of acclimatising, but as a rule they recover, 

 "We find the boat treatment for French breeds to be, to keep them on sofl 

 food, and to allow them no water, except a drink in the morning and another 

 in the evening. We never allow them to have water by them. 



HouDAN 'Bvi^E.is (A Puzzled Inquirer). — If you had referred to a recent 

 number of the Journal you would have found in Jacque's " The Poultry- 

 Keeper" an excellent description and figure of a Houdan pullet; but as you 

 have evidently got into a bad strain, we will say that the wattles ought to be 

 small, red, and neatly rounded ; that instead of a fluffiness under the chin it 

 ought to be a full beard, reaching back to the eye and closely set. Unless 

 these conditions are present the pullet is comparatively worthless. 



Norwich Hen Canary nearly Bald {P. W.). — Not having the oppor- 

 tunity of seeing the hen Canary it is more difficult to prescribe; but from 

 what you state it appears the bird has not undergone a thorough moult, 

 understood by many as having been *' set fast in the moult." Had the hen 

 moulted properly it should bo in good plumage now. Birds kept in a room 

 heated artificially during the day, but without that artificial heat during the 

 night time, cannot be considered to be in an " even temperature ;" and having 

 to exist in such continuous changes they cannot possibly pass through their 

 moulting sickness as those birds kept in a room entirely without fire both day 

 a'^.d night. Thus a stoppage in the moult is no uncommon occurrence, and 

 disease and death is thereby often brought about. Your bird evidently is in 

 an unsatisfactory state of health, or it would not be in the condition it is. 

 To remedy a defect in the feathers extreme measures are sometimes resorted 

 to, such as a transition from cold to heat, or vice versa, for a week or so, the 

 bird being well kept up in diet. Nothing will more certainly biing on a moult. 

 It is a kind of kill-or-cure system, but sumetimes good results from it. If a 

 bird will thus moult freely it will do well ; if otherwise, its life is jeopardised 

 with the experiment on nature. If, on the other hand, the deficiency of 

 feathers generally about the hen is caused or brought about through a sur- 

 feited scurf upon the skin, somewhat of an oatmeal appearance, the parts 

 affected may be slightly and carefully anointed with oil of sweet almonds, or 

 butter or lard, and the bird put through the washing process — the same as 

 recently published in the Journal. Whichever way the hen is affected it will 

 be well to administer one or two drops of castor oil, followed up occasionally 

 with a little cold soaked bread, to which must be added a few drops of cod- 

 liver oil, or otherwise a piece of beef suet to peck at. This fatty oroleaginona 

 diet keeps up a moderate degree of heat in a bird's system, which in autumn 

 or wiuter especially is essential. Also supply the hen occabionaUy with a little 

 bread and milk, a small portion of biscuit mixed with nherry and cayenne 

 pepper, a rusty nail and scraped stick-liquorice in the water, sometimes a 

 little treacle, now and then a spurting of sherry from the mouth over the 

 bird, a few groats, a small piece of salt, a large cage to exercise in, with a 

 bath occasionally, and plenty of grit sand and crushed old mortar, and lettuce, 

 linseed, or cress seed. The above are essential in the way of a change, and if 

 birds are expected to thrive they must be attended to. Disease and weakness 

 is often brought on through neglect, and equal harm is done by continually 

 pampering and supplying them too freely with food in addition to the usual 

 canary, hemp, and German rape seed. 



Rabbit-keepino (Tiiro). — A hutch such as that described in oar Journal of 

 the 10th inst. with a fence round it would answer well for Babbits bred for 

 table use. The butch should be of substantial boards, and tarred or painted 

 to exclude wet. 



Bees in Winter (P. H. P.). — Your first attempts at bee-keeping have been 

 v>:ry successful and encouraging, and we hope you will realise a large harvest 

 of honey next year, and an increase of stocks. You need not uncover or 

 examine your hives till the middle of February, when the floor- boards should 

 be well scraped and cleaned. During the winter do not let the bees come out 

 while snow is on the ground. We regret that bive-makera or dealers do not 

 advertise their goods sufficiently. They might double and treble the demand for 

 hives by advertising. Write to Mr. K. McMillan, 41, High Street, Kilmarnock. 



METEOROLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS, 



Camden Square, London. 

 Lat. 5P 82' 40" N. ; Long. 0^ 8' 0" W. ; Altitude, 111 feet. 



