142 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
{ August 15, 1878. 
sacrifice of brood, and no waste of honey—everything is hus- 
banded to the greatest advantage ; but the time of driving bees or 
doing this work must be left to the bee-keeper himself, and be 
determined by circumstances. 
Now a word about sugar-fed stocks. Some fifty years ago I 
was interested by an experiment with a swarm driven from a 
straw hive in the month of September. It was put into an empty 
hive and fed on treacle alone—not golden syrup but black molasses. 
Tt half filled the hive with combs, kept its bees well through the 
winter, and becamea good stock. The knowledge of the discovery 
that bees can build combs rapidly from sugar and be healthy and 
live to a good old age while eating nothing else, cannot be too 
widely circulated. The experience of every season gives addi- 
tional proof of the value of sugar-fed stocks. We prefer them to 
swarm hives or old stocks. Their combs are young and sweet, 
and while being erected the centre ones are filled with brood, and 
thus almost every cell in six or seven of the centre combs yields 
a young bee in August or September. We invariably find on 
examination of our stocks in February or March that those treated 
by sugar-feeding in the preceding autumn are comparatively 
strong in population. They thrive better, too, than older ones, 
for their combs are not clogged and cloyed with pollen. We 
leave it to the doctors to tell us how it is that bees gather in 
Great Britain more pollen than they require, but we notice the 
fact that the superabundance found in old combs is a great ob- 
struction to the bees themselves and a great nuisance to bee- 
masters. We have seen more than three cells out of five in the 
centres of hives rendered useless by pollen stored in them. From 
another cause, too, old combs are objectionable. Their cell walls 
become thick by the skins or pellicles which young bees leave 
behind them. Every bee hatched in a cell leaves a coat behind 
it, which becomes a part of the cell, Only fancy ten such coats 
being left in every open cell in the centre of hives every two 
years, and that is a moderate calculation of five hatches of brood 
every year. G elt 
Much is being said by a certain school of apiarians about the 
wisdom and economy of preserving old combs and saving the 
bees from building new ones. We honestly question both the 
wisdom and the economy of such practices. Take an empty 
16-inch bar-frame hive and put a swarm of thirty thousand bees 
(or 6 tbs, weight) into it. Give it 5s. worth of sugar, and the bees 
will fill it with combs and brood. Forget the 10 or 20 lbs. of 
honey in the combs whence the bees were taken, and compare this 
sugar-fed stock with any swarm or stock hive near it. Though it 
cost only 5s. to create it, an experienced and competent judge 
would probably value it at 10s. more than any bar-frames filled in 
the usual way. , ; 
This morning a working man came from Partington, a village 
five miles distant, to see my bees. Some hives were turned up 
for him to see, amongst these three sugar-fed stocks in course 
of creation, which greatly astonished him. He had never seen 
or heard of such a thing before. He said he had four hives, and 
he left me saying if he treated his bees in that manner he would 
get 1 cwt. of honey from them without reducing the number of 
his stocks. 
To “H. W.S.,” and others who wish to take the bees from the 
honey hives and feed them into stocks, let me say in conclusion 
that size of the swarms should determine the size of the hives in 
which they are to be fed. There is a danger of using hives too 
large for this work. If hives are not nearly filled with combs in 
autumn there is the probability, I might say the certainty, of 
haying too much drone comb built in spring, and the less drone 
comb we have in stock hives the better, as drones eat honey and 
gather none. Five pounds of bees put into a 16-inch hive, and fed 
with 20 tbs, of sugar made into good syrup, will nearly fill it with 
combs and brood. The warmer the weather is, as we have already 
seen, the faster the combs are built. All the syrup should be 
given to the bees in fourteen or sixteen days. : : 
The easiest and best way of giving it to them is by placing a 
flower-pot saucer or other dish on the floor-board, with chips of 
wood in it, and filling it every night through a 9-inch length of 
half-inch gas pipe running through the hive into the dish.— 
A. PETTIGREW. 
BEES THIS SEASON. 
Wovtp Mr. Briscoe kindly give a little further explanation 
about his Stewarton system? I take it a Stewarton consists of 
three stock boxes, but that the three are seldom used the first 
season, as he states that he has only two used with the swarm he 
has hived this season, but has substituted supers for the third 
stock box. What I wish principally to know is, Does he drive 
the bees into one stock box at the end of the season and take 
away the other two, as of course the bees would have plenty of 
yoom in one box when the honey season is ended? Also, Is it the 
lowermost box he retains and takes away the upper one? as of 
course the largest quantity of honey would be in them, and if 
there is not enough in the lower one for the winter’s supply they 
can easily be fed up toit. I think any frame hives can be made 
to work on the same system as well as the Stewartons. 
Referring to his honey harvest, I took last week from a stock 
of black bees in a standard hive 54 Ibs. of honeycomb in supers, 
and though I had no zine or adapting board of any kind between 
the stock box and the supers taere were not two dozen cells in the 
lot tainted, and the same bees are now filling another super I put 
on when I took the others off—not bad for the natives. This is 
my second year with Ligurians, and they have not beaten the 
blacks yet, but I think they breed faster and swarm more; but 
this is not much advantage if you can only keep a certain number 
of stocks ; however, I will continue giving both fair trials before 
I fall out with either. 
Referring to the Stewartons, are not two stock boxes quite 
sufficient without three, and when the two are full add the 
supers ?—H. J. 
OUR LETTER BOX. 
RENEWING A FIELD OF OLD LUCERNE (G. R. P., a Subscriber).—lf this 
is a piece of land where spade culture can be available, and the old lucerne has 
died off and a turf of sour grass left, it would be better to cut the turf off 
with a spade about 1} inch in depth, and burn into ashes during the 
present autumn, spread the ashes with a fair dressing of yard dung or town 
manure in addition, and dig-in the same deeply, and allow the land toremain 
during the winter and take the changes of weather ; in the spring during the 
month of April shallow dig and make the land fine, and drill at 12 or 14inches 
apart 20 lbs. per acre of seed, and apply with the seed about 4 cwt. of bone 
superphosphate per acre ; this manure will soon drive the lucerne up out of 
the way of the weeds, but as soon as the lucerne can be distinguished in the 
rows let the ground be hand-hoed between them, and the weeds in the 
rows hand-pulled. If it is best adapted for horse culture let the land be 
rafter-ploughed, scarified across, and the old turf burnt and the ashes spread, 
together with a dressing of 3 ewt. of Peruvian guano per acre, and ploughed 
with a deep furrow, and allow the land to lay during the winter and take the 
frost, &c.; in the spring drag, roll, and harrow, and obtain a fine tilth, and 
without ploughing again drill in the month of April the same quantity of 
seed and manure per acre as above stated. The object of burying the ashes 
and manure deep in the soil is to prevent its action upon the growth of sur- 
face weeds, and to secure its action upon the deep-rooting plants of lucerne. 
We cannot advise the growth of a crop of potatoes, as it involves the loss of 
a year’s growth of the lucerne ; if, however, the land is very foul with couch 
it would be well to take a crop of potatoes, which should haye a dressing of 
dung or guano, and after lifting the potatoes then drill with lucerne and 
the manure as above stated. We do not, however, recommend the drilling of 
lucerne the same season, unless the potatoes were an early sort and the land 
cleared both of crop and weeds at the earliest period. We advise wide drilling 
because the space between the rows should be hand-hoed or horse-hoed every 
autumn, and if liquid manure is not available apply 2 cwt. of nitrate of soda 
per acre in April every year. 
METEOROLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 
CAMDEN SQUARE, LONDON. 
Lat. 51° 32’ 40" N.: Long. 0° 8’ 0" W.; Altitude, 111 feet. 
DATE. 9 AM. IN THE Day. 
-g |es¢_-| Hygrome-| Es |S.,,|Shade Tem-| Radiation | § 
1878. |B aD ter. 8 |255| perature. Temperature.) 3 
Sip rr he ane Deena 
August] 5 2S | Ee |8S7 In On 
#37) Dry.) Wet.| AS JA Max.| Min.| sun. | grass 
.| deg. | deg. deg. | deg. .| deg. | deg.) In. 
We. 7 2: 71.2 | 648) S.W. | 64.0 | 748 122.0 | 56.0 | — 
Th. 8 66.9 | 623 | S.W. | 640 | 76.6 127.8 | 53.6 | — 
Fri. 9 | 30,142 | OL7 s. 64.1 | 79.0 123.0 | 50.2 0,180 
Sat. 10 | 29.714 | 621 | E.S.E.| 64.9 | 70.0 116.2 | 57.2 0.180 
Sun.11 | 29.830 3 | 60.6 | N.W. | 64.0 | 74.3 121.6 | 50.3 0.050 
. | 61.7 | S.W. | 63.2 | 70.3 114.0 | 56.0 0.130 
| 58.1 | S.S.W. | 62.9 | 70.2 115.0 | 51.1 0.310 
Means | 29.830 | 61.6 63.9 | 73.6 | 56.8, | 119.9 | 53.5 jj Ceee 
REMARKS. 
7th.—Fine day on the whole, although rather cloudy, with appearance of 
rain about noon,’ 
8th.—Cloudy in the first part of morning, but afterwards fine and bright. 
9th.—Fine morning, but rather hazy afternoon; brighter evening, cloudy. 
10th.—Very wet in morning ; fine brizht afternoon ; heavy rain began agaim 
in evening about 8.30, with one flash of lightning. 
11th.—Fine bright morning, though occasionally cloudy ; rather dull after- 
noon ; fair evening. 
12th.—Alternate heavy showers and bright sun all day ; thunder at 0.35 P.M., 
and again between 2 and 3 P.M. ; fine eyening. 
13th.—Heavy showers at 11 A.M. and 0.20 P.M.; fine afternoon; wet evening” 
and heavy rain in night. 
Mean barometer rather lower than last week. All thermometric mean 
values above those of last week, except the maximum temperature in shade 
and in sun, which were both about 1° below.—G. J. SYMONS. 
COVENT GARDEN MARKET.—AvGusrT 14, 
TRADE very quiet, and quotations unaltered. 
FRUIT. 
sd. s.d. g§ d. 5. a 
ADPleS...eeeeeee ysieve 2 Oto4 0) Melons.......... each 4 (tol0 0 
Apricot dozen 1 0 3 0} Nectarines . dozen 4 0 12 0 
Cherries . tb 0 G6 1 6| Oranges........ #100 8 0 16 O 
Chestnut: bushel 10 20 0} Peaches........ dozen 2 0 12 0 
Currants . tsieve 38 6 4 G6} Pears,kitchen.. dozen 0 0 0 0 
Black . ¢sieve 6 0 6 6 dessert ..... . dozen 00 00 
Figs... dozen 2 0 4 0| Pine Apple yt. 8 0 6 0 
Filbert: 5 Ptb. 0 0 6 0} Piums... dsieve 3 6 5 & 
(CopShenencetce » Ib 0 0 0 O| Raspberries Pl. 0 6 10 
Gooseberries .. quart 0 6 0 9 | Strawberries etl. 00 00 
Grapes,hothouse tb 10 6 0 . bushel 5 0 8 0 
Lemons ......06 #100 6 0 10 0 pl00 00 0 0 
