December 28, 1876. ] 



JOURNAL OP HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



563 



scoured once a week or so. The refuse should be carried out of 

 the place at once, and not allowed to accumulate. It is best to 

 let the wet run from the hutches into a bucket or into a drain. 

 If the former plan be adopted, empty the bucket daily or of iener, 

 and keep a little disinfectant in it; and if the latter, swill a 

 bucketful of water down occasionally. In either case keep plenty 

 of disinfectants about the hutches, and a little charcoal suspended 

 from the roof with string will often lessen the smell. If these 

 precautions be attended to the rabbitry should smell Bweet 

 and will be healthy. 



I will not leave this subject without considering the question 

 of a stove for heating. If in a town, or anyplace where gas is 

 cheap, I can recommend nothing better than a jet of this kept 

 burning constantly. This will be quite sufficient to keep up the 

 temperature if the room be dry and snug. Another very good 

 stove is one constructed to burn paraffin. This will be found 

 both cheap and effective. If coals are burnt, a common open 

 stove will not do, because it will be impossible to keep it at a 

 uniform temperature. A closed stove will fulfil its work very 

 fairly, but hardly so well as paraffin or gas. 



This is the treatment recommended when young Rabbits are 

 being reared for showing. When reared for breeding, however, 

 I should advise the total abolition of all the heat, and if bred in 

 the summer the more they are kept out of doors the stronger 

 and hardier mothers they will make. If bred out of doors care 

 should.be taken to construct the hutch so that there cannot be 

 the slightest opportunity for draught, and the front should not 

 be made so open as is the case in hutches of an ordinary nature. 



In purchasing Babbits for breeding it is just aB well to note 

 which way they have been reared. Bear in mind that a 20-inch 

 outdoor-bred doe is far better for your purpose than a 21-inch 

 indoor-bred one. The latter are often very poor at breeding. 

 Also to observe how many were reared with it, and to select 

 from those litters that were few in number, as in that case you 

 will be more certain of hardiness and strength. — Geta. 



HIVES. 



Peehaps no one is better able to defend himself upon any- 

 thing he has said than Mr. Pettigrew, who has so lately advo- 

 cated the use of the improved cottager's straw Bkep by the poor 

 labouring man, or those who can spend comparatively little time 

 with their bees. Many of your readers will ever feel deeply in- 

 debted to thaff gentleman for his plain systematic teaching on 

 the management of bees in large straw skeps — a kind of hive 

 many can have for the making, with supers, hackles, and all 

 complete. And it is the labouring cottager who is bo deeply 

 interested in thia question of bee-keeping ; therefore hundreds 

 there must be who can hope for nothing else, and perhaps 

 need nothing better, all things considered. There may be 

 many a splendid " little move " in bee management to produce 

 such grand results as one witnessed at the Alexandra Palace 

 this season, but even those in favour of Stewarton or bar- frame 

 hives can hardly make it necessary or desirable to write down the 

 hive at work in the hand3 of hundreds or thousands who cannot 

 appear at a London palace. 



In endeavouring to do something of the sort, your correspon- 

 dent "A Renfeewshibe Bee-keepeb," in your issue of No- 

 vember 30th, tells a strange story, no doubt quite true ; but if all 

 kinds of hives were to be judged in like manner, what one is 

 there which may not be condemned as useless ? Your corre- 

 spondent says, "jOn stand No. 10 stood a swarm of the preced- 

 ing year hived in two 7-inch Stewarton boxes, and side by side 

 on No. 11 a swarm of the same year located in a roomy straw 

 skep, both possessing queens of 1874, each having an overflow- 

 ing population." After bestowing care, of course both equal, to 

 obtain the greatest amount of super honey from both, the result 

 was — No. 10, Stewarton, gross weight (four octagon anpers) 68 lbs.; 

 No. 11, straw skep, one Abingdon glass not sealed out, 21 j gross ; 

 largo straw skep, with its 8-inch eke starving. The Stewarton 

 no doubt was crammed completely, although we are not told so. 



Now I venture to ask your correspondent a plain question. 

 Does he, as an intelligent bee-keeper, believe that the great 

 difference in these results is due to the kind of hive used ? While 

 the business of No. 10 was going on, what could the " overflow- 

 ing population " of No. 11 have been doing ? And yet they did 

 not swarm, so they lost no time in that way. Perhaps your 

 correspondent will kindly inform ug how they lost so much time. 



The season of 1875 was so bad here that bees in any kind of 

 hive in the months of June, July, and August were in a starv- 

 ing state, and almost depopulated by wind and wet. In the 

 autumn I united as much as possible, and fed vigorously, taking 

 care of all good hives of comb for the following season. Most of 

 us_ know something of the difficulties of last Bummer, autumn, 

 winter, and spring, but no sooner did June appear than the bees 

 went to work with a will truly admirable. On June 18th two 

 first swarms were hived into 18-inch Btraw skeps full of good 

 combs, and on the 23rd two others were hived into skepa also 

 full of clean healthy combs, and perhaps something larger. 

 It was a sight not to be forgotten to watch the going in and 



out of these thousands of busy labourers in hives so liberally 

 offered with roomy alighting boards and entrances, 4£ inches 

 wide and 1 inch deep. They increased in weight so rapidly that 

 I was induced to weigh one, and found that in thirteen days it 

 reached 69 lbs. gross. One stock, which swarmed June 23rd, 

 threw off a cast ten days after, and twenty-three days after the 

 first issued I turned out the old stock into a good hive of 

 comb ; the bees went to work the next day as if nothing had 

 happened. The old hive and contents weighed 54 lbs., and in 

 August the first swarm, hive and contents, 85 lbs. ; the turnout, 

 ditto again, 61 lbs. ; caBt 22 lbs. (for some reason this did not do 

 well) ; total 222 lbs. gross; and I believe many of the bees went 

 back. The three stocks of bees sugar-fed are now in splendid 

 condition. 



In August I drove out the bees from five straw skeps into 

 others quite empty and sugar-fed, uniting bees from cottagers' 

 condemned stocks when I could, as so often advooated by Mr. 

 Pettigrew, to keep up strength. The gross weights of these hives 

 and their straw supers were as follows : — 



No. 1 hive, 64 lbs super 16 lbs 80 lbs. 



„ 2 „ 70 lbs , 25 lbs 95 lbs. 



„ 3 „ 801bs „ 211bs lOllbs. 



„ 4 „ 741ba „ lllbs 851bs. 



„ 5 „ 851bs 851bs. 



373 lbs. 73 lbs. 446 lbs. 



These weights (not much to some people perhaps) are sufficient 

 to show that the old straw Bkep is not the despicable thing to be 

 avoided as your correspondent would have us believe, for it is 

 worth remarking that nothing was done to obtain these results 

 which the poor labourer could not do who leaves his home at 

 five o'clock in the morniDg, with instructions to hiB wife that if 

 such a swarm should come off to-day put it into such a hive. 

 On his return at 6 p.m. he is delighted that it did come off and 

 is all right. 



" A Renfrewshire Bee-keepee " will do us good service if 

 he will conduct fair trials of different kinds of hives, and show 

 the one which comes within the reach of poor people, and can 

 be managed by either man or wife as occasion requires, and 

 which will enable him to obtain super as well as first-class ran 

 honey in greater abundance than can be done by the use of the 

 18-inch straw skep as advised and worked by Mr. Pettigrew. — 

 W. J. C. 



INTBODUCING QUEENS— TWO SOVEBEIGNS. 



Youb valued contributor "B. & W." recently narrated an 

 interesting case as to how he had introduced an Italian queen 

 twelve hours after the removal of the black queen, by means of 

 a broken wineglass and piece of perforated zinc. She was 

 well received by the bees at first, but subsequently the disturbed 

 state of the hive oaused him to return their own black queen ; yet 

 notwithstanding, young yellow-jackets have since made their 

 appearance, and your correspondent thinks the phenomenon 

 may possibly be accounted for by a joint reign. 



First as to the mode of introduction. In the days of my 

 novitiate I found many queens dead on the zinc from the cold- 

 ness of the night air causing the workers to fall back towards 

 their centre. Queens ought to be caged between the combs to 

 be safe, and for a much longer period than twelve hours. The 

 disturbed state of the stock aroBe from the Italian queen being 

 then encased, and on having a choice the workers simply pre- 

 ferred the Italian, which alone reigns. 



I will illustrate this by a parallel and more striking case from 

 my own apiary last year, and singularly enough the heroine of 

 my tale was the joint occupant of a throne. The ragged wings 

 of my imported Italian queen bespoke her having seen service, 

 but she was still amazingly prolific. The workers persistently 

 built royal cells, which were as regularly excised. Her 

 majesty seemed to have made up her mind to abdicate the 

 throne, as she exhibited not the slightest interest or paid any 

 attention to the royal cells building (a most unusual circum- 

 stance), when suddenly a princess burst upon the scene hatched 

 in some odd cranny; she treated her with sovereign contempt, 

 and for many weeks this state of matters continued. On my 

 return after a short absence I was sorry to find my old valued 

 queen had disappeared, most probably expelled, but regret much 

 I had missed a sight of her departure. 



Shortly afterwards I deposed the young queen of the observa- 

 tory to make room for an imported successor, and, not wishing 

 to destroy her, removed an older queen from one of my Stewar- 

 ton stocks, and after she was missed caged the young queen 

 from the observatory therein. On the third day after I excised 

 several royal cells, and so soon as the hive had quieted down I 

 liberated her; but shortly, from the disturbed state of the 

 workers, judged she was encased, raised the frames,^ and found it 

 even so. I again caged her for a similar period with no better 

 results. A third term of like imprisonment only resulted in yet 

 another encasement. I was by this time so heartily sick of my 

 perverse f avouriteB that I abandoned her majesty to her fate, and 



