THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



25 



Enemies of Bees. 



There are amongst the animal tribe, few crea- 

 tures who have a greater number of formidable 

 enemies than the Ijees. Notwithstanding their 

 sting, so dreaded by the greatest of all their ene- 

 mies, man, and which in manyinstances is so ef- 

 fectual for their defence, there are amongst the 

 feathered tribe many, which swallow the bees 

 whole, or they appear to make it a matter of 

 amusement to' kill them and then to pick the bod- 

 ies to pieces, without apparently appropriating 

 any part of them to the purpose of food. Amongst 

 the insects there are many, which are their su- 

 periors in strength, who attack and kill them 

 for the purpose of devouring them. There is 

 scarcely any season in which the bees are secure 

 from the attacks of their enemies. In summer, 

 they are kept in a continual state of alarm and 

 agitation by the wasps, moths, ants, and ear- 

 wigs; and in winter, they are subject to the de- 

 structive visitations of the mouse, who .prefers 

 the warmth of a hive, and good cheer before 

 him, to his cold domicile in the ground, and to 

 a precarious subsistence obtained by personal 

 exertion and robbery. The depredations of the 

 common and the field mouse may be alwaj^s 

 prevented by the provident bee-master, by so 

 contracting the entrance of his hive at the com- 

 miencement of the winter, that only a single bee 

 can come out at a time. We have, however, 

 experienced, that this precaution does not al- 

 ways succeed; for the cunning animals, finding 

 their ingress into the hive prevented, where 

 they expected to find it, haveproceedcdto gnaw 

 away a portion of the lower band of the hive, 

 and thereby steal into the hive, as they suppose 

 unperceived ; but the vigilant bee-master, on 

 taking the periodical survey of his apiary, will 

 soon discover the secret inroad of the animal, 

 if he observe on the ground a number of nib- 

 bled straws, which will be an indication to him 

 that some evil has been committed to his hive, 

 and the cause of it will soon present itself As, 

 however, in all cases,. a preventive is better than 

 a remedy, so it is with the inroads and attacks 

 of the enemies of the bees; for in the majority 

 of cases, it is Avithin the power of the bee-mas- 

 ter to adopt those measures, by which he may 

 bid defiance to all the enemies of the bees, with 

 the exception of those who obtain admittance 

 into the hive by their wings. It is the careless 

 and injudicious manner in which the hives are 

 generally placed, that exposes them to the at- 

 tack of their enemies; and in some instances, 

 it has come under our observation, that the pro- 

 prietors of hives, so far from adopting any pre- 

 cautionary measures, have, literally, liberally 

 supplied the enemies of their bees with the 

 means of making their attacks. Sometimes, the 

 hives are placed so close to a hedge or paling, 

 that the ants, the earwigs, and the spiders have, 

 as it were, a ladder provided for them, by which 

 they can ascend into the hive; at another time, 

 the hives are placed so near to the ground, if 

 not on the ground itself, that the slues, the 

 snails, the lizards, and other vermin can obtain 

 easy access to the hive, and carry on their dep- 

 redations unknown to the careless proprietor. 



A snail is a vile enemy of the bee, not so much 

 for the Ciuantity of provisions which it con- 

 sumes, as for the injury which it commits to the 

 combs. The creature, except in winter, is sel- 

 dom at rest, and invigorated by the warmth of 

 the hive, it crawls over the combs, leaving be- 

 hind it its track of slime, which is so hateful to 

 the bees, that rather than endure it, they will 

 leave the hive altogether. 



The single pedestal is one of the best pre- 

 ventives against the attacks of almost every ene- 

 my; to ensure success, however, the bottom of 

 it must be covered over with some unguent, 

 such as pitch or tar; or a piece of sheep's skin 

 with the wool on, will be found, of all preven- 

 tives, the most efficacious. 



It is in the winter that the attack of the mouse 

 is most to be dreaded, and therefore every 

 means should be taken for its destruction. It 

 is however the field mouse, more than the com- 

 mon house mouse, which takes up its Avinter 

 quarters in a hive, and, therefore, we generally 

 keep some traps of the following construction 

 in the immediate vicinity of the apiary. Let a 

 pea be soaked in water, then draw a thread 

 through it, and tying the two ends to two small 

 sticks, place them in the ground the exact width 

 of a brick; the brick is then, like an inclined 

 plane, placed gently upon the thread, when the 

 mouse commg to eat the pea, gnaws away the 

 thread, on which the brick falls, and kills him. 

 By means of this simple trap, we have killed 

 three and sometimes four mice in one night. 



All spider webs should be carefully removed 

 from the vicinity of the apiary; and in this re- 

 spect, the bee-master cannot be too vigilant in 

 the month of August and September, when the 

 spiders abound, and construct their webs in ev- 

 ery quarter. It is believed by some persons 

 that the size and weight of the bee will carry 

 him through the web, but in this opinion they 

 will find themselves deceived. It may happen 

 in isolated cases; but we have too often witnes- 

 sed the corpse of a bee in the web of a spider, 

 to doubt for a moment the great evil which the 

 spider commits in the vicinity of an apiary. 

 We, in general, do not satisfy ourselves with 

 brushing away the Aveb, but we also brush away 

 the cause of it, by effecting the death of the spi- 

 der; for the removal of the web is but a tem- 

 porary remedy, as perhaps before six hours arc 

 elapsed, another one will be found at no great 

 distance from the former one. 



It is not, however, the common garden spi- 

 der which insinuates itself into the hives, but 

 that particular species which spins its Aveb in the 

 corners of our rooms. Towards the close of au- 

 tumn, they steal into the hives, deposit their eggs 

 between the bauds of straAv; and thus, at the com- 

 mencement of the season, the eggs are hatch- 

 ed by the increased temperature of the hive, 

 and the bees become subject to a perpetual and 

 irremediable annoyance. It is on this and simi- 

 lar circumstances that our objection to the com- 

 mon cottage hive, and indeed to all those the 

 make of which prohibits the examination of the 

 upper part of the combs, is founded. The pro- 

 prietor, from the make of the hive, has no means 

 of knowing that the spider or any other vermin 



