266 



JOUENAL OF HORTICUIiTUKE AND OOZ'TAOK GAltUKNElN. 



I Mm-cli 2S, 1674. 



the Game-breeders in the locality. The Hamburghs were an 

 average lot. The Single cock class coutained seventeen entries. 

 The first was a really good Buff Cochin, the rest were Game. 

 The Bantam classes were well filled, and some good birds were 

 amongst them. The prize Rouen Ducks were large, and in good 

 condition. 

 We published the awards last week. 



EOUP EEMEDY. 



My plan is to take four or five drops of solution chlorinated 

 soda in a teaspoonful of cold water, and turn it down the throat 

 of the fowl or chick, while another person holds its bill open. 

 Also to wash the bill and nostrils thoroughly (if the whole head 

 gets soaked so much the better) in warm water containing a few 

 drops of the same solution. It is perfectly harmless, and I have 

 never failed to cure, though I sometimes have to administer 

 it two or three times a-day for a number of days. It is well to 

 bathe the head in clear water after, to remove the solution from 

 the eyes of the bird. So simple and still so invaluable a remedy 

 as this has proved to me, may be of some use to others. — (Pet- 

 Stoch Bulletin.) 



LOSS OF BEES IN HIVES CONTAINING 

 HONEY. 



Youn coi-respondeut, " Duffer," having lost one of eight 

 stocks, wishes to kuow why the bees deserted the hive with 

 plenty of honey in it ? As many other bee-keepers are often in 

 like misfortune, and puzzled to know the cause of such losses, 

 a short article may be devoted to the oousideration of the 

 subject. 



There are so many causes of the deaths of stock-hives, that it 

 is not to be expected that anyone who has not seen the hives 

 can state with certainty why deaths or ^sertions have taken 

 place. It is necessary for a doctor to have seen a patient before 

 he can safely give a certificate as to the disease that carried 

 him off. 



1. Queen bees live four years at most. Many die when three 

 years old, and some few when younger. If a queen dies when 

 eggs are in the cells, the bees of the hive have it in their power 

 to raise a successor to the throne ; but if she dies when there 

 are no fresh-laid eggs in the hive, the bees are unable to raise a 

 queen, and wiU therefore gradually dwindle away tUl aU be 

 gone. 



2. If a queen is hatched when there are no drones in a hive 

 she is useless for breeding purposes. Her presence will keep 

 the bees together till they die of hard work or old age. Again, 

 queens are never mated inside their hives. They leave their 

 hives with a view to meet with drones when they are a few 

 days old, and if not mated the first fortnight of their lives, they 

 are ever afterwards incapable of laying worker eggs. Drones do 

 not leave their hives during inclement weather, and many queens 

 are never mated at all. These are called drone-breeders, from 

 the fact that they lay a few eggs which hatch into drones. With 

 such queens all hives soon become tenantless. 



3. Take another case. Hives that swarm late in the season, 

 say July, have hardly time enough to real- young bees in sufii- 

 cieut number to make their hives strong for the winter. The 

 laying queens, of course, go with the swarms, and the young 

 queens that succeed them do not commence laying till about 

 three weeks after the swarms have left. Allowing ten days in 

 their cells, and ten days out before they begin to lay, working 

 bees are three weeks in being hatched, and die of old age at nine 

 months. Late swarmers, if not helped by receiving young bees 

 from other sources, are often very weak in bees in spring, and 

 some altogether die out. 



4. Sometimes hives that do not swarm at all become so filled 

 with honey and farina that the bees have not comb enough for 

 breeding purposes. Such hives should not be kept for stock. 

 With one-half less honey and two-thirds more bees they would 

 make excellent stocks. 



5. Diseases of various kinds sometimes affect hives to a 

 dangerous extent. Dysentery often thins the populations of bee 

 hives. Watery honey, or improper food, damp hives, or some- 

 thing else may be the producing cause of dysentery. Foul 

 brood always weakens hives, and sometimes afflicts and dis- 

 courages the bees so much that they often leave as swarms 

 never more to return. Other causes could be named that not 

 infrequently thin the ranks of our favourites materially. 



The intelligent reader mil, on perusing the above remarks. 

 Bee how important it is to examine his hives often and tho- 

 roughly, to note the ages of all his queens, never to risk keeping 

 a good hive with an old queen, and vigilantly to watch the state 

 and extent of the brood in his hives at the end of summer. If a 

 hive has eight or nine combs half-filled with brood in August, 

 and is otherwise healthy and provided for, it will be a strong one 

 in the following spring. Aa the buds of our fruit trees are 

 ripened for the following spring by the suns of autumn, so 

 hives of bees properly managed in autumn are prepared for suc- 



cessful work during the coming year. To have large hives well 

 filled with bees in autumn, is a move that would lift many bee- 

 keepers out of the region of bad luck. And the reader will 

 please to bear in miud, that large hives well filled with bees 

 consume far more honey or food than those containing few bees. 

 The Swiss clergyman and all his followers could not have made 

 a greater or more dangerous mistake than they made in assert- 

 ing that forty thousand bees in a hive do not eat more food than 

 twenty thousand, for bees consume food, like other creatures, 

 according to numbers. In open winters more food is eaten by 

 bees than in colder ones. Hence, it is wise to give hives a 

 little more than is absolutely necessary in ordinary seasons. — 

 A. Pettigbew, Sale, Cheshire. 



TRANSFERRING BEES. 



Beixg a tyro myself in the art of bee-keeping, I desire for the 

 benefit of other novices to relate my experience and mishaps in 

 transferring a stock of bees from au old-fashioned bell-hive into 

 a square hive panedwith glass. 



I have sundry books on bee-management, but in none of them 

 do I find any information as to the best time or the proper 

 manner in which to transfer bees in the above-desired way. 

 After considering driving, fumigating, and chloroforming as the 

 best means to attain my purpose, I decided on the last-named; 

 and also thinking that the operation had best be performed 

 before the queen had laid eggs to any extent, as there were 

 grubs in the combs which might get damaged in the transfer- 

 rence from one hive to the other, I determined one day last month 

 to set to work. And here let me advise those who attempt a like 

 experiment to take care that the " one day" be a fine one, for 

 to my impetuosity and stupidity in changing hives on a very 

 wet day may be attributed the disasters I am about to relate. 

 My old bell-hive contained a very strong swarm of the past 

 year. This hive had been very snugly situated in the shadow 

 of the house facing north during the winter, so very few bees 

 had died, and very little food had been consumed. In one of 

 my books, where chloroforming bees is recommended in a 

 general way, I found that a quarter ounce was the proper 

 quantity to use to stupify a large hive. So after putting this 

 quantity into a saucer, and covering with perforated cardboard 

 to prevent any drowning, I lifted the old bell-hive off its stand, 

 placed it over the saucer, and awaited the result with trepidation 

 (notwithstanding my bee-dress, which failed in this my first ex- 

 periment to inspire courage) and considerable anxiety. 



After ono great buzz had been heard a dead silence prevailed 

 inside, but as I thought in my ignorance that the bees were 

 perhaps shamming and would make a great rush out, to my 

 discomfiture, if I lifted the hive off at once, I left it alone for 

 perhaps five minutes. When I did raise the hive an intoler- 

 able smell of chloroform assaulted my nose, so strong as to con- 

 vince me my poor bees had been overdosed and perhaps com- 

 pletely killed. Here was a nice mess! Instead of being able 

 quietly to put the new hive over them and allowing them 

 leisurely to return to animation as I anticipated, while I re- 

 moved the combs from the old hive into bars of the new one, I 

 had the resuscitation of the bees as well on my hands. I made all 

 the haste I could to cut-out the combs, and left off the top of 

 glass hive, now over bees, meanwhile to let the fumes of chloro- 

 form escape. Then it was I found the evils caused by the rain, 

 for the lower strata of bees (the mass which had fallen was 

 quite 2 inches thick), were completely saturated with wet, and 

 so all chance of their revival was at an end. After placing the 

 combs, which I had much bruised in my hurried removal, on one 

 side, I was about turning my attention to my wretched bees, 

 when I heard a curious noise proceeding from under a comb. I 

 turned it over, and beheld to my extreme grief the queen ap- 

 parently dead, with three or four workers which had escaped 

 unhurt, running over her, feeling her with their antennfp, and 

 generally showing signs of the most affectionate solicitude. 

 This was the climax to all my troubles. I thought it was use- 

 less now to try any means to revive the other bees, for what 

 pleasure or profit would life be to them without their beloved 

 mother ? A happy thought struck me. I took the queen and 

 her faithful attendants up in my gloved hand, and, covering 

 them with the othei-, I warmed them as much as possible. 

 Soon I had the immense gratification of seeing the queen feebly 

 moving her legs and antennje, and after a while restored to 

 complete animation. Finding warmth so effectual in the queen's 

 case, I immediately took the hive into the dining-room and 

 placed it before the fire. It was a long time, however, before 

 the unfortunate inmates completely recovered — some three or 

 four hours indeed; and the lower strata to the number of some 

 three or four thousand, as far as I could judge, never came 

 round at all, from the causes before stated. I trust what I have 

 said will warn my fellow novices, when chloroforming, not to 

 overdose, and to beware of a rainy day while operating. — F. K. L. 



NOBTHAMPTON PorLTiiV Show. — This is not an ill-managed 

 Show, and has hitherto deserved notice for the birds beiag well 



