July 21, 1870. ] 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



mented by moths. These sharp sounds in 3 little while were 

 caught up by other bees, and a troubled movement began, whioh 

 gradually extended itself. At length the sounds became so 

 merged as to resemble a continuons hiss, and a general running 

 backwards and forwards over the oomb followed. In the 

 midst of the commotion the queen for a minute or two re- 

 mained placid till the tumult became irresistible, and she also 

 began to move. As soon as she was fairly in motion a rush 

 was made towards the entrance, and her majesty, nolens volens, 

 fairly carried along with the crowd. The like procedure to that 

 now desoribed was noticed on the second occasion as well as on 

 the first, and I have no hesitation in expressing my conviction 

 that queens have very little to say in the matter of swarming, 

 and that it iB instinctively initiated by the bees alone when the 

 arrangements within are complete, and circumstances without 

 are favourable. — R. S. 



DRIVING BEES. 



About the middle of Jane last year I had a first swarm of 

 bees. I hived them in a common straw hive, and about the 

 middle of July I found it to be about 40 lbs. weight. The 

 weight of the honey being tempting, and having heard people 

 talk about driving bees, I tried the experiment. I had a man 

 to assist me, and we turned the hive containing the honey and 

 bees upside down (this was about 9 p.m., when the bees were 

 all quiei) ; we placed an empty hive upon the top, then drew a 

 piece of muslin round the place where the two hives joined, and 

 commenced tapping round the under hive, which made the 

 bees rush into the top one. Still we were uncertain whether 

 the queen had gone up, and, consequently, placed the two hives 

 in that position upon the bee-stand, and took off the muslin, 

 leaving them over the night. The next morning they com- 

 menced working as if nothing had happened. In the evening 

 I lifted the top hive to examine, and found the bees were 

 working in it. I allowed them to reinaia another day in the 

 same position. On the following morning a drizzling rain 

 afforded a very suitable opportunity ; I therefore took down 

 the two hives, lifted the top one upon the stand again, and 

 exposed the other to the raiD. As a matter of course, the 

 inmate3, not liking the rain, fled in hundreds to their new abode. 

 As soon as they all left I took away the hive containing the 

 honey, and the bees continued working in their new home ap- 

 parently as contented as though nothing had occurred. In 

 the autumn I sold them for 20s., and they were a first-rate 

 standard. 



I believe there is no difficulty in driving bees out of one of 

 Neighbour's hives, as described by Mr. Elcome. It is a very 

 interesting process 1 , and one I should greatly recommend, rather 

 than allowing the bees to throw a virgin swarm ; it should not 

 be attempted after the middle of July, but earlier if possible, in 

 order to allow the bees time to provide their winter storage. — 

 Jas. GLESSiLL, Old Hall, Milnthorpe. 



[The objection to the above process is, the enormous quan- 

 tity of brood which must have been destroyed. This difficulty 

 may, however, be got over by transferring the bees into a 

 moveable-eomb hive, and utilising all the worker brood comb, 

 by fitting it into frames in the manner delineated in page 72, 

 of our seventeenth volume.] 



HOW LONG ARE QUEENS IN HATCHING, AND 



WHEN DO THEY COMMENCE EGG-LAYING? 



The perusal of Mr. Pettigrew's recently-published " Handy 

 Book of Bses," has set me observing, and even experimenting 

 upon my own bees, with the view of correcting some of the 

 mistakes which he has made in the natural history of our little 

 favourites — mistakes which I know he is himself most anxious 

 to rectify as soon as sufficient evidence has been adduced to 

 satisfy him that he is really in error. 



In the first place, then, Mr. Pettigrew states that " perfect 

 queens are produced on the fourteenth day after eggs have been 

 put into royal cells," whilst a worker is" " in the cell twenty- 

 one days," and he calls upon us to marvel at the shortness of 

 time in which queens are in their cradle-cells. Huber, on the 

 other hand, declares that queens occupy thwr cells sixteen, and 

 worker bees twenty days respectively; whilst Dr. Bevan, who 

 in this respect is followed by most later writers, assigns the 

 same period to queens, but extends that of workers to twenty- 

 one days. 



In order, therefore, to determine which of these statements 



was correct, I on the 7th of Juu9 placed an empty worker- 

 comb in the centre of a populous colony. This comb when re- 

 moved the next morning, was found to contain a great number 

 of eggs deposited in the cells on both sides, and was then with 

 a honeycomb on either side placed in a nucleus-box, which, 

 having been supplied with a sufficient population of worker 

 bees, was left to the development of royal oells. Tiiree of these 

 accordingly appeared in due time, all on the same side of the 

 brood comb. One was speedily seen to be empty, and, of 

 course, never advanced beyond the rudimentary stage ; two 

 were tenanted, and ultimately completed. The morning of the 

 23rd (sixteen days from the commencement of the experiment) 

 witnessed the birth of a very large and handsome queen, and 

 the remaining royal cell being cut opon on the same day, was 

 found to contain only a deai maggot, which had not progressed 

 beyond the larval stage. This experiment conducted juat at 

 the height of a very favourable season, would seem to prove 

 conclusively that Huber and Bevan were right in fixing six- 

 teen days as the period required for the evolution of a queen 

 bee, and I may conclude the history of the one in question by 

 stating, that although I watched her with some care, I failed to 

 determine the exact period of her impregnation, but that she 

 commenced egg-laying on the fifteenth day of her age, and is 

 now breeding most profusely. 



With regard to the time occupied in the production of workers, 

 I have this season obtained abundant evidence by placing nu- 

 merous empty combs in the " brood nests " of various hives, 

 and have invariably found that workers commenced hatching 

 out not later than the nineteenth, and in some cases so early 

 as the e : ghteenth day. 



Taken together, these experiments prove that queens occupy 

 only from two to three days less time than workers in coming 

 to perfection, instead of seven days less, as stated by Mr. 

 Pettigrew. 



It shonld, however, be remarked, that although it does not 

 seem possible that these periods can under any circumstances 

 be materially abbreviated, they may, unquestionably, be pro- 

 longed in less favourable seasons, since I have myself had a 

 fine queen hatched out so late as the twenty-first day. 



Mr. Pettigrew also states that egg-laying " commences from 

 six to ten days after impregnation takes place," whilst Huber 

 and succeeding writers declare that it begins in forty-six hours. 

 Dating my experience in breeding qneens, I have, of course, 

 had very numerous opportunities of observing them either on 

 their actual return from a successful wedding flight, or im- 

 mediately afterwards, and before the well-known sign of recent 

 fecundation had disappeared, and I may at once state that in 

 every instance I have invariably found that egg-laying com- 

 menced on the second day. 



After perusing Mr. Pettigrew's book, however, I became desir- 

 ous of making more exact observation on this point, and have 

 accordingly watched eagerly from time to time during the pre- 

 sent summer for evidences of recent fecundation in such young 

 queens as I have reared ; but fortune seemed against me, and 

 it was not until about 3 o'clock p m. on the 8th of this month 

 (July) that I succeeded in detecting the looked-for appearance 

 at the extremity of the abdomen of a young queen then just 

 eight days old. Careful and frequent observations showed that 

 no eggs were laid during the same or the next day, but at half- 

 past eight in the morning of the day following (10th July), the 

 discovery of a couple of eggs placed in cells at some distance 

 apart, proved that oviposition had commenced weli within the 

 period of forty-six hours assigned by Huber. 



I am satisfied also that Mr. Pettigrew is equally wrong on 

 other points, which unfortunately do not, like the foregoing, 

 admit of being readily put to the test of actual experiment. — 

 A Devonshire Bee-keepee. 



LARGE AND SMALL HIVES. 



I commenced this year with four hives. No. 1, A small straw 

 skep with a hole at the top, of 1864. No. 2, A S'.ewarton with 

 two boxes, of 1865. No. 3, A wooden Woodbury hive, of 1868. 

 No. 4, A straw Woodbury hive of May, 1809, the strongest of 

 the four. 



No. 1 commenced work in a super about the 20th of May, 

 and has filled a good-sized glass and two go.->d-sized boxes ; 

 but nothing that I could do would indues any of the other three 

 to take to a super till the 8ih of July, when the limes came 

 into bloom, and all three took possession of their supers in 

 great force. Up to that day I tried clean comb of last year, and 

 new comb of this year with fresh honey in it, but all was in 



