July 1, 1875. ] 



JOURNAL OP HOBTICULTUBE AND COTTAGE GAKDENBB. 



19 



at present will not enter upon it beyond saying that, with a view 

 to have more light, I am also prepared to give Dr. Morgan, or 

 anyone else, £50 in money or plate who works out the problem, 

 either forwards or backwards, in accordance with the terms 

 stated in Mr. Huie's letter. — Geo. Uke. 



HOW I OBTAINED MY BEES. 



It is fourteen years since I lived with a gentleman who kept 

 bees, since that time I have seen bat little of them. On the 

 5th inst., at 11 30 a.m., I was going from one part of the garden 

 to the other (which is about thirty acres), when one of the men 

 called to me, saying " Here's a swarm of bees." He was knock- 

 ing a beef-tiu with his hoe. He called it " ringing them down," 

 a very common thing in Lincolnshire. So I ran to a house 

 600 yards off where they kept bees to see if theirs had swarmed. 

 They had only one stock hive, and it had swarmed a few days 

 before, and the swarm had gone into an empty hive, where the 

 bees had died during the winter, standing by the side of the parent 

 hive. So I borrowed a hive of them, a common straw skep 

 13 inches across by 12 inches deep. I ran home for a glass of 

 beer and some sugar and some fennel, and rubbed the hive with 

 the mixture. When I returned the bees had alighted on a 

 straight piece of the thorn hedge, sol pulled it down and gave it 

 a good shake and turned it down under the hive. I did not 

 even get stung, 



Off I went to my employer to tell him and ask him for the 

 bees, as I am only garden bailiff here, and did not like to take 

 them away of my own permission. He gave me consent, so at 

 night I wrapped-up the hive in a sheet and carried them home. 

 On the 8th I weighed them, and the hive altogether was lOJ lbs. 

 My friend weighed two of his empty hives, and they were 

 5 lbs. 6 ozs. I have given them 1 lb. of sugar with cold water, 

 a little every day up to the ITth, and at night I turned them up 

 to look at them. They appear to have iilled the east side of the 

 hive from the middle nearly to the bottom with beautiful white 

 comb. They go laden in, some with yellow and some with a 

 very dark pollen on their legs. There was a drone went in 

 yesterday (June 17), the only one I have seen. I suppose it is a 

 first swarm by its being so early as the 5:h of June. To-day I 

 boiled a pint of water and 1 lb. of white sugar together, and 

 poured it into two jars, and put a bit of round wood with a lot 

 of holes in it to float on the top, and by dinner-time they had 

 cleared it all up. — J. M., Lincolnshire. 



SWARMING. 



In reading over Mr. Pettigrew'a article on swarming I am 

 fairly put to bay, insomuch as that I am doing all I can to pre- 

 vent my bees from swarming to insure first-rate stocks for nest 

 season, and, as I hope, good early swarms. But where is the 

 nse of these good early swarms if — after filling their hives, and 

 we will premise fill supers as well — through their industry the 

 hives are too well filled with honey to be of much use for stocks 

 for the ensuing season ? I know of two straw hives, Clinches 

 diameter, quite full and heavy (as much as I could lift comfort- 

 ably), and the swarms had only been hived a fortnight; then a 

 nadir was placed under each of them, and if the proprietor only 

 reaps the benefit of that nadir from each this season he will 

 have no need to go to the stock hive for more. What is more 

 difficult than to extract one or more bars from a stock hive that 

 is full of bees? Am I to understand that Mr. Pettigrew advo- 

 cates at a certain time after hiving the driving of a swarm from 

 its then stock hive into another artificially, extracting the honey 

 and comb from the first, and then returning the swarm to re- 

 commence their arduous labours, to rebuild their home, and re- 

 stock it with a suDply for their winter use? He likewise states 

 that hives with 20 or 30 lbs. to spare in spring, in which the bees 

 have been fed during the winter, do not yield large swarms. 

 Now, by this I conclude that it would be best either to give the 

 bees so much food that the hive shall not be increased in weight 

 very much — that is, if food be found wanting, by weighing the 

 hive ; or to deprive them of at least 20 lbs. of honey, say in 

 March. One would almost think that a hive strong in bees and 

 heavy with honey would be the most valuable and most likely 

 to yield a good return at the honey harvest by a goodly supply 

 of supers. I have always understood the cry to be " feed ! feed ! ! 

 feed!!!" late in winter and early in spring. Now, if we do, and 

 the bees collect in food and honey 20 to 30 lbs., we sacrifice large 

 swarms ; if so, what course must be adopted to ensnre them ? 



— J. H. HoWAliD. 



[Mr. Howard has read my remarks very intelligently, and has 

 stated his dilficulties clearly enough. I am glad he has done so, 

 for they will enable me to explain more fully the points noticed 

 by him, which are important. We maintain that by the swarm- 

 ing system of managing bees better stocks for keeping can be 

 bad than on the non-swarming one. Let us suppose that Mr. 

 Howard has two stocks ready to swarm about the end of May; 

 ten days sooner or later will not disturb the argument. One 

 stock yields a swarm which may be honsed in an 18-iuch hive ; 



the other is prevented from swarming by the use of supers, 

 ekes, or a nadir. If supers be used the hives will be pietty well 

 filled with honey, and the breeding space much contracted 

 before the first super bo filled. If the nadir process be resorted 

 to instead of supers, the top hive will become the storehouse 

 for almost all the honey the bees may collect. The nadir will 

 gradually be filled with combs, and become the breeding room; 

 but unfortunately bees that are prevented from swarming gene- 

 rally and instinctively make far too much drone comb, which 

 greatly impedes healthful progress. Nadirs are most advan- 

 tageously used with early swarms of the current season, when 

 both honey and stocks are aimed at from them. If I understand 

 aright Mr. Howard's letter, the gentleman he allades to has 

 nadired two swarms of this year in 21-inch hives, which are 

 already heavy. The top hives will, weather being favourable, 

 become too full of honey for stocks, but will yield a large harvest 

 of honey and honeycomb. 



Now let us go back to the hive and its swarm. A second 

 swarm may or may not be obtained. We take all the second 

 swarms we can from hives that swarm in May. But suppose 

 for a moment that the hive does not cast off a second swarm. 

 All the brood in the old hive will be hatched about twenty- 

 one days after the first left it. At this time the bees have 

 no brood to attend to, and plenty of empty cells and bees 

 to store honey in them. Such hives in good seasons rise in 

 weight to 80 lbs., and sometimes more, and thongh too heavy 

 for keeping are far better for stocks than those that never 

 swarmed at all. We are now driving the bees out of our stock 

 hives on the twenty-first day after swarming, and taking about 

 15 lbs. aver^o.,iy of run honey from each stock. The quantity 

 is unusually small, but the season has not been a favourable 

 one. When the honey is thus taken the bees are put into 

 empty hives, which they have to fill. As one stock hive is 

 emptied it is refilled with the bees of another. These hives, 

 filled with young combs and possessing young queens, generally 

 make good stocks. We now come to notice the first swarm, 

 which if obtained in May will in a favourable season for honey do 

 better than and run before all non-swarmers. 



If I am asked how it is that swarms invariably rise to greater 

 weights than non-swarmers in honey seasons, I may not be able 

 to give a satisfactory and philosophic reply ; but the facts of 

 fifty years' experience cannot be overturned by any philosophy. 

 It is natural for bees to swarm, and to let them swarm is cer- 

 tainly and incontestably the surest and best method of obtaining 

 and keeping good stocks. In the swarming system of manage- 

 ment there are two or three hives full of bees at work, two or 

 three queens laying, and any of the three hives under proper 

 management is equal, we think better, for keeping than a non- 

 swarmer. Bat one or two of them are marked for honey, and 

 their bees united to the one that may be kept, thus making it 

 doubly or trebly strong in bees. The apiary is thus kept full of 

 hives with young queens and young combs. 



When quite young we were instructed to look on nou-swarmera 

 as ineligible for stocks under ordinary circumstances, and at the 

 end of a long and extensive practice we say that it is but seldom 

 and with great reluctance we ever keep a non-swarmer another 

 year. I thank Mr. Howard for his letter, and trust that both he 

 and others will frankly and fairly state their opinions and per- 

 plexities. — A. Pettigbew.] 



SPARROWS KILLING AND EATING BEES. 



A FEW days ago Mr. Tates sent me the following letter : — " My 

 brother has jast returned from a visit to Doncaster, where he 

 has been spending a few days. He remarks that when watch- 

 ing the bees he noticed the sparrows taking them. The sparrows 

 perched on a tree near the hives, and suddenly darted and 

 caught the bees. The birds carried the bees to the roof of the 

 house, there killed them, and then carried t'nem to their young. 

 To be quite sure the gun was brought, and we soon had a good 

 opportunity of shooting at a sparrow, which caught a bee and 

 alighted on the ground ; but, though the bird was hit and 

 wounded, it flew away. On going to the spot a number of 

 feathers were there and a bee — a drone, and so surmise the 

 sparrows were catching drones only, which I believe they did at 

 rather a considerable rate." 



In confirmation let me say that on Sunday last I happened to 

 be looking through a window at the bees working, when I 

 observed two hen sparrows busily catching bees on the flight- 

 board of one of the hives. Each bird jamped on the flight- 

 board and caught a bee by the back, carrying it to the roof of the 

 house. They soon returned for more, giving me ocular evidence 

 of their destructive powers. I saw the sparrows ju'np oft the 

 flight-board with bees in their bills, and there kill and eat them. 

 I was rather too far off to be sure whether the sparrows took 

 drones only. I thought those that were killed and eaten in 

 front of the hives were working bees. One drone I saw taken 

 and carried away. — A. Pettigkew. 



P.S. — Since the above ha? been written I have seen hen 

 sparrows again catching and killing bses, but have not yet sue- 



