47 
THE AUSTRALIAN BEEKEEPERS’ JOURNAL. 
The Manual opens with a carefully-written 
chapter on the history of beekeeping, and of 
the introduction of bees into Australia and 
New Zealand from Europe and America ; on 
the suitability of the climate and the flora of 
Australasia to beekeeping, &c. This is followed 
by a very interesting and exhaustive account 
of the different varieties of bees and their chief 
characteristics. For some years past many 
American and English apiculturists have 
devoted a good deal of attention to ascertaining 
the relative values of different varieties of bees 
and crosses between them as honey gatherers, 
breeders, &c., and Mr. Hopkins has given a 
summary of their experience in this direction, 
which will be valuable to beekeepers intending 
to try different races for themselves. The 
chapters on the apiary, hives, section boxes, 
extracting honey, comb foundation, manipula- 
tion, feeding, &c., are full, clear, and up to 
date in all the newest modes and contrivances. 
The chapters on transferring, swarming, 
dividing, &c., are excellent, and well repay 
the careful reader. 
The article on queen rearing in chapter 12, 
describes Alley’s method, which is probably 
now the method. This will he most valuable 
to the practical apiculturist, and is another 
evidence of the author’s good judgment in 
giving the most advanced, yet well-proved, 
methods. The same remarks apply even more 
forcibly to diseases of bees in chapter 16, 
where Mr. Cheshire’s mode of curing foul 
brood by feeding phenol, is given in extenso, 
with engravings of the microscopic appear- 
ances of the juices of bees afflicted with this 
disease, alongside of the new hive method of 
Mr. Smith, the starvation method of Mr. 
Jones, of Canada, and Mr. Bonney’s, of Ade- 
laide modification of Smith’s method, which 
will commend itself to all Australian bee- 
keepers. The remaining chapters are all 
equally satisfactory, clear in style, and very 
practical. We have tried to find some faults 
in the Manual, but have not succeeded suffi- 
ciently to satisfy our critical mood. We have 
therefore the pleasant duty of recommending 
this Manual as the newest and best bee book 
of the Southern Hemisphere, and indeed we 
may even venture to say the best bee book 
extant. It should find its way to the hands 
of every beekeeper in Australia ; its moderate 
price puts it within reach of the many, and 
possessing this Manual, a beekeeper in Aus- 
tralia will want no other. Mr. Hopkins is to 
be congratulated on the production of such an 
excellent, compendious, complete and practical 
book on Australasian Bee Culture, and we 
trust his venture may turn out as great a 
commercial success as it is a literary and 
scientific one. 
NOTES AND NEWS. 
Destroying Ants. — Although ants do not 
usually do much damage to strong stocks, they 
often become very annoying, and in some parts 
of Australia in dry season do certainly attack 
hives of bees. It will be always desirable, 
therefore, to destroy the nest of any found 
about an apiary. A very effectual method is 
to pour a little bi-sulphide of carbon (now 
largely used for suffocating rabbits) down 
each of the principal apertures of the nest, 
say about half a wineglass full in each. They 
seldom require a second dose, and the few ants 
which escape generally bring up the dead 
queens to the surface and decamp. Another 
effectual way is to sprinkle powdered corrosive 
sublimate (a very powerful poison) over the 
nests, and then water the surface slightly. 
A Cheap Wax Extractor. — The following 
is a description of a wax extractor, which has 
been doing excellent service. A tin vessel, 
eight inches diameter and ten inches high, 
with a bottom made of wire net, ten or twelve 
meshes to the inch, has three legs each three 
inches long, soldered to the bottom rim. This 
is put inside a common large tin billy, or any 
other boiler large enough to receive it, and to 
leave a little space all around it. Water is put 
into the billy until it nearly reaches the wire 
bottom of the extractor, the leg t of which keep 
it three inches above the bottom of the billy, 
which is put on a slow fire to boil. Now all old 
combs, fragments of wax, &c., can be dropped 
into the extractor, and the wax melts out very 
rapidly, and floats on the water, while the 
extractor retains all the refuse which must be 
from time to time emptied out ; and so must 
the wax if there is much to render down. If 
the water with the wax on top be poured 
into a tub of cold water it can be melted 
up into blocks again ready for the final 
cleaning. 
Beekeeping in Tasmania. — Although bee- 
keeping in boxes is largely carried on in 
Tasmania, and the yields, as a rule, are very 
good, the modern frame hive method of bee 
management does not appear to have gained 
much ground in this beautiful island. It is 
with pleasure, therefore, we see from para- 
graphs in the Hobart Mercury that an apiary 
has been established at Glenorchy, near 
Hobart, at the orchards and hop grounds of 
the Messrs. Wright (called the Marrinook 
Apiary,) where forty stocks of Italians are 
already established. From a later paper we 
find that Mr. T. Lloyd Hood, of Hobart, was 
the first to introduce the Ligurian bee into 
Tasmania, and supplied the Marrinook Apiary 
with some twenty stocks. Mr. Hood had an 
