NATURAL HISTORY MISCELLANY. 109 
midable disease, the daily reading of the NATURALIST, but we can heartily 
recommend the perusal of the American Bee Journal, which is devoted to 
the habits and natural history of the Honey Bee 
A little knowledge of Natural History is resily: the only antidote yet 
discovered against this fell disease. We quote from the American Bee 
Journal for March, the Editor’s remarks on the subject of 
kieres AND FRUIT BLossoms. =A silly prejudice against bees is entertained by some fruit- 
d, both in quality 
A more nailed notion, or one 
deriving le less support TE observation and science, can scarcely be pon mocived. Yet it regu- 
larly ti 



p 

the wiseac: 
Repea sed ee of the resuscitation of this vikate are ait in the history of bee- 


—* in Germany, espec tally in t 2e per riod betw tween 1530 and 1800, On some of these occa- 
as sọ ap F d trati S, as to constrain the almost 
total PREE z Alot ty + Tr +) ta fé#hit 
cam 
of b y 
e the substitution of cider and beer for the ancient mead or metheglin, as the popular 
erage; and amid ach opposition and disco ouragement, bee-culture rapidly sunk to be of 
as 

In 1774, Count Anthony of Torrings-Seefield, in Bavaria, ature of the agrees 4 of Bci- 
ence at è Munich, striving to re-introduce be e-culta re on his patrimoni und in this 

o ove ae 
HoGa] to show that pees, far from being injurious, were directly beneficiai in the fru on 
of blossoms — causing the fruit to set, by conveying the fertilizing pollen ig tree to tree and 
roved moreov: offici: ily r 
ury ear 
when bees were kept by every tenant on the estate, fruit was staid Siia then, when 
pied seven kept bees, and none of these had more than three colonies, fruit w arcer than 
ever among his t 

ten. 
e Apiarian General Convention, held at Stuttgard, in Wirtemburg, in September, 1858, 
the subj being under discussion, the celebrated pomologist, Profes- 
re Lucas, goo of the directors of the Hohenbeim Institute, alluding to she pr EPPES went on 
however, ere 

was A TE of ' the horticulturist and the vee-keeper combine hoard run parallel. AR adicious 
pruning of d yield honey more plen- 
tifully, ee urge i attention to this on those particularly who at are nee fruit-growers 
bee-keepers, testo me that his trees yield 
decidedly aiem crops since he has established an apiary in his arenai; end the annual product 
is now more certain and regular than before, though his trees had always received due atten- 
” 

or our fruit-tr 


Some years ago a w lished h t iderable cost, 
and stocked it with a a great aa of choice native and exotic fruit-trees— expecting in due 
time to have remunerating „n Time passed, and annually there was a superabundance of 
blossoms, with only very littl e fruit. Vari plans devised and adoptet i to bring the 


tion, and that by means of bees the needed work “eould be effected. A hive of busy honey- 
gatherers was introduced next season; the remedy was effectual—there was no longer any 
difficulty in producing crops there. The bees distributed the pollen, and the setting of the 
fruit followed naturally. 
THE MOTTLED Owx.—I think Mr. Samuels has misunderstood my re- 
marks on the nests of owls. What I intended to state was that the Mot- 
tled Owl never built a nest to my personal knowledge, and I did not state 
that the Mottled Owl occupied the ‘abandoned nest of a crow or hawk,” 
but I did state that other species of owls (of course meaning our local 
Species), when they did occupy a nest at all, inhabited the abandoned 
a crow or hawk, which they had partially repaired. — AUGUSTUS 
FOWLER. 

