106 THE APIARY; OEj 



considerable surplus of honey in their " supers," after leaving 

 sufficient for the bees themselves in the lower or stock hives. 



We exhibited in our window last autumn a super of fine 

 honey from the. apiary of Shirley Hibberd, Esq., the proprietor and 

 editor of the Gardiner's Weekly Magazine. It is a box containing 

 20 lbs. nett weight of honey, and was produced at Stoke Newington, 

 only 2>\ miles from the General Post Office. 



The Times " Bee-Master," whose letters from Tunb ridge Wells 

 have awakened so much interest in this pleasing pursuit, also 

 commissioned us to exhibit a " super," produced under his own 

 management in that locality. A friend of ours at Exeter had 

 upwards of 400 lbs. of honey, of excellent quality, though one 

 of his apiaries is quite within the city. 



The last has been an excellent honey yielding season ; our own 

 bees, at Dorking, in Surrey, have produced us large quantities, and 

 the accounts from nearly aU parts of the country coincide in stating 

 that the bees have in the year, 1864, enjoyed unusual opportunities 

 for accumulation. In not a few localities, the season of 1863 was 

 even more abundant. 



WASPS AND MOTHS. 



Bees have few enemies more formidable than wasps. The most 

 effectual method of checking their invasion of hives, is to have as 

 narrow an entrance as the bees can do with. If a stock be not 

 very weak in numbers, the bees wUl be well able to guard a small 

 aperture, and can repel the attacks of those insidious and merciless 

 robbers. On this account, the entrance to our No. 5 hive as 

 described at page 31, may be used. 



The bee-keeper is interested in preventing the increase of 

 wasps ; it is, therefore, a good practice for him to set a price on 

 queen wasps in the spring, the death of one of them at that time 

 being equivalent to the destruction of a whole nest. 



Should nests be found in the neighbourhood of an apiary, their 

 annihilation must be accomplished either by blowing them up with 

 gunpowder, an operation well understood by most country lads ; 

 or any other effectual method. The late Mr. Payne recommended 

 that a small quantity of gas tar should be put into the mouth of a 

 wasp^s nest, and if then covered with earth, the total destruction of 



