August 8, 1878. ] 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
119 
Rabbits will require some place of warmth to go into at night. 
Along another side a place 2 feet wide, with a top to open on 
hinges, will be sufficient. Half a dozen holes should be cut in it 
to allow the Rabbits to run in and out, If wished two or three 
partitions can be placed on the outside, but they are not needed. 
They keep the place a little warmer. This must be kept well 
filled with straw ; a little hay may be given, but as the Rabbits 
will eat this it should not be relied on for bedding. 
Such a place as this will be very useful for young Rabbits in 
the summer and autumn, but it will be found cold in winter, when 
it may be used as a rabbitry for varieties not requiring heat.— 
‘GETA. 
VARIETIES. 
Ow1neG to the heavy rains that have fallen harvest operations 
are suspended in some districts, and injury has been done to the 
grain by the extreme violence of the storms, With the storms 
a high temperature has generally prevailed; a continuance of 
those conditions can scarcely fail to promote the sprouting of 
grain and to accelerate the spread of the potato disease. The 
showers, except where they have been excessively heavy, have 
much benefited the root crops, which, and also weeds, are now 
growing rapidly, 
—— Ata large and influential meeting of the members of the 
Highland and Agricultural Society recently held in Edinburgh, 
his Grace the Duke of Buccleuch presiding, Mr. Fletcher Norton 
Menzies, the Secretary of the Society, was presented with a cheque 
for the handsome sum of £1225 19s, 2d. and a massive silver tan- 
Eard as a mark of the high appreciation entertained by the mem- 
bers of the Society of his services as Secretary during the last 
twelve years, and of his successful exertions and devotion to duty 
in promoting the usefulness and interests of the Society. Thesub- 
scriptions were limited to five guineas, and the list contained the 
names of 671 members, the total amount subscribed being £1320 11s., 
which, after purchasing the silver tankard and deducting all ex- 
penses, left the handsome balance of £1225 19s. 2d., for which a 
cheque was handed to him by the Duke of Buccleuch, who in 
making the presentation paid a merited tribute to the careful 
assiduity and managing ability of Mr. Menzies. 
—— WE hear that considerable interest in poultry has of late 
been aroused in South Germany. Some of the best specimens of 
Dark Dorkings in the Early Wood yards have lately gone to more 
than one fancier in the neighbourhood of Dresden. 
— ArT the Council Meeting of the Bath and West of England 
Society, held on the 30th ult. at the Grand Hotel, Bristol, the 
Chairman feelingly referred to the great loss sustained by the 
Society by the death of Mr. Charles Gordon, who for many years 
had rendered efficient service as Member of the Council and Stew- 
ard of one of the principal departments of the Society’s Exhi- 
bition ; of Mr. Herbert Williams, who as Chairman of Finance, 
and in other prominent capacities, had served the Society with 
indefatigable zeal ; and of Mr. Bremridge, whose munificent hos- 
pitality on the occasion of the Barnstaple meeting would be ever 
memorable in the history of the Society. The Finance Committee 
brought up their quarterly statement of accounts, and payments 
to the amount of £5719 0s. 8d. were sanctioned by the Council. 
It transpired that considerable loss had been incurred by the 
recent Oxford Meeting, and the Finance Committee were autho- 
rised, should they find it necessary, to sell out £1000 India bonds. 
The Committee appointed to visit Exeter and make arrangements 
for the Meeting of 1879 presented their report, and it was resolved 
that the site opposite the Barracks on the Topsham road be 
accepted, and power was given to the Committee to conclude 
arrangements with the local authorities. The Council having at 
a previous meeting received an invitation from the authorities of 
Southampton for the Society to hold its meeting in that impor- 
tant town in 1880, a further communication from the authorities 
of Southampton was now presented by the Hon. and Rey. J. T. 
Boscawen, and a deputation was appointed to visit Southampton 
on an early day to inspect the proposed site and make other 
arrangements preparatory to the next meeting of Council. On 
the motion of Colonel Luttrell the sum of £2070 was placed at 
the disposal of the Stock Prize Sheet Committee for the Exeter 
meeting ; this amount, being £70 in excess of that offered at any 
previous meeting, having special reference to the claims of 
breeders of Channel Islands stock. Owing to the large amount 
of business to be transacted the consideration of the prizes to be 
offered for poultry and in other departments was deferred until 
the August meeting. 
.—— SINCE we are so greatly indebted to America both for fari- 
maceous and animal food, the following extracts referring to the 
future supply possess interest :—The present wheat crop will be 
grown on an area increased to make up more than the deficiency 
of the last. Its extent is not yet fully determined, but the in- 
erease will probably reach four million bushels, and the entire 
field will comprise not much less than 30,000,000 of acres. Nearly 
every winter-wheat State shows an enlargement of area, small in 
the eastern and middle, variable in the south, reaching 22 per cent. 
in Texas and 18 in Tennessee. In the eastern half of the Ohio 
Valley (Michigan, Ohio, and Kentucky) the increase appears to 
be about 500,000 acres, and in Indiana and Illinois more than 
700,000 acres. There will be an increase of nearly 400,000 acres 
in Kansas, and 300,000 or more in Missouri. In round numbers 
the increase in the spring-wheat States may be placed at 2,400,000 
acres. In the four spring-wheat States of the north-west there is 
a large increase, as well as upon the Pacific coast, the extent of 
which is not yet determined, but it will be likely to approximate 
1,506,000 acres. Of condition both of winter and spring wheat 
little need be said, except that it is fine, not to say extraordinary, 
with very few exceptions as drawbacks as yet in any part of the 
country. If the yield shall prove an average one the crop must 
be as large as that of the past year, equal to a liberal supply of 
home wants and export demand somewhat larger than the average, 
—(New York Tribune.) 
Ir may be interesting to those poultry fanciers who have 
not received their Paris prize money in full, or who have received 
bronze medals in lieu of medals of a superior metal, to know that 
one of the English jurors has addressed a remonstrance on this 
(as he conceives) departure from the promises of the published 
schedule, to the authorities, and has been promised that the 
Minister of Agriculture and Commerce will have the matter 
inquired into at once. The English jurors on the conclusion of 
their labours in Paris were given to understand that gold medals 
would be given to them as little souvenirs of the great Interna- 
tional Exhibition. They are now informed that this was purely 
an error on the part of the President of their section, as no such 
medals were ever cast or decreed to them ! 
—— In an interesting paper on dairy farming recently read by 
Professor Sheldon, it is stated that the enormously increased de- 
mand for fresh milk, coupled with facility of railway transit, is 
rapidly changing the character of dairy farming, and it is well for 
the dairy farmer that it should be so, for it is far more profitable 
and satisfactory in many ways that he should sell his milk as milk, 
and not convert it into cheese and butter—as much of it, that is, 
as he can arrange to sell in that manner. This system, however, 
is making us as a nation more and more dependant each successive 
year on foreign cheese and butter ; and it is more than probable 
that we shall soon become almost wholly dependant on them for 
these most useful and valuable articles of food. Owing to the 
greatly increased consumption of milk the production of cheese 
and butter in this country is annually decreasing, and this is also 
the reason, the chief if not the only reason, why cheese factories 
have not gone on multiplying in number in the midland counties. 
—— As showing the importance of sheep husbandry in various 
countries of the globe, the Prairie Farmer states that Great Britain 
has one sheep to each two acres of land; Germany, France, and 
Spain one to each five acres; the United States one to each fifty- 
six acres. There is no farm animal that with proper care will do 
more for a worn country than sheep. So well known is this that 
their tread has been called golden. It is so, inasmuch that while 
paying well for the care bestowed on them they are constantly 
enriching the soil on which they feed by their droppings. It has 
also been said that sheep pay twice—once in the fleece and once 
in carcase. 
—— Tue American Minister for Agriculture has recently 
stated that in the extensive caverns of Texas enormous masses 
of guano are deposited. The quantity is estimated at 20,000 tons, 
and the quality is said to be superior to that of fish guano. Its 
origin must be looked for in the immense numbers of bats which 
inhabit these caverns. It is also reported that in the Indian 
Ocean several guano islands have been discovered, so that the 
threatened exhaustion of guano deposits need not be feared for 
some time to come, 
BEES IN BRITTANY. 
WHILE recently travelling in Brittany we noticed as far as we 
could the local peculiarity of bee management. Hives were 
large, made of straw, shaped like our old-fashioned bellglass 
supers—i.e., narrowing at the base. As many as forty-nine were 
counted in one small field by the roadside, arranged in a double 
row, each upon its separate slab of stone laid flat upon the ground 
and covered with a sod ofearth. In other places we saw the hives 
ranged one on the top of the other very close, with a bank behind 
them. The entrances were very large, shaped much like an egg 
when lying on its side, allowing free egress and ingress. About 
20 Ibs. of honey was stated as a very fair yield in good years. 
Brittany is generally a poor half-cultivated country, but it ought 
to yield at times an abundance of honey from the prevalent crops 
of buckwheat. If broom is a honey-yielding flower much ought to 
be gathered from it, as it too is found everywhere in great abun- 
dance. Like all hungry soils lying on a substratum of granite 
there is no lack of heather in places, which in fine seasons must 
also be productive. The present season appears to have been very 
similar in character hitherto to that experienced by ourselves, 
The people spoke of a wretched spring and a wet early summer. 
which was followed, as in England, by great heat and heavy 
