10 
THE AUSTRALIAN BEEKEEPERS’ JOURNAL. 
shovel, or in the absence of a shovel a flat 
trowel, or even a piece of bent tin, zinc, or card, 
and both are turned over, so that the bottle 
stands upon the shovel, as in the engraving A, 
fig. 6. The shovel is now placed upon the 
feeding-stage, the bottle grasped with one hand 
and the shovel slipped away with the other. 
The bees within pass up their tougues, and 
without leaving their cluster take down the 
sweets. Cover the bottle over, or robbing 
around its neck is likely to lead to rob- 
bing at the entrance of the hive. With Bkeps 
the rack described at page 51 can be used for 
feeding if we remove the sections and the strips 
of wood inside. The roof will shut in ail com- 
fortably, and prevent robbers getting at the 
syrup. 
XVII. — Robbing and Fighting. 
When honey is scarce and the weather open, 
stocks of bees are prone to rob one another. 
The usual indication of this is a good deal of 
excitement about the hive-door, while now and 
again two or three bees in fierce combat are 
seen to fall headlong from the entrance to the 
ground, where generally we shall find many 
dead or dying. Robbing is very quickly brought 
about at the times indicated, when the greatest 
care is necessay, as a little syrup spilt or access 
given to some food-bottle standing over a stock 
is likely to lead to the ruin of some of our 
colonies. We have said elsewhere that feeding 
with honey is particularly dangerous, and this 
is because its odour at once gives information of 
where it is placed. Should fighting have com- 
menced the doorway must be made narrow and 
this will check the attack, but will rarely 
entirely stop it if the besieged stock has suffered 
much before our attention has been drawn to it. 
We have found that if the form of a tunnel be 
given to the narrow opening, the defenders have 
at once an enormous advantage, because as 
robbers pass into this they are met singly by 
guard after guard ; and each combat, instead of 
giving the opportunity of entrance to those 
watching for it, as in the case of the narrowed 
doorway, simply blocks the opening, bo that 
other would-be intruders are effectuallly kept 
out until the first have been ejected. 
Carbolic powder from a dredger-top is most 
effectual in stopping the robbing if resorted to 
early in the day. The powder sticks on to the 
hairs, at d is taken to the robbers’ hive, and in a 
few minutes all will be gone and never 
return. A few of the defenders may be sacri- 
ficed, but it is worth this loss to stop the rob- 
bing. The entrance being contracted, few bees 
will came outside. 
XVII. — Uniting. 
It is often desirable to make two stocks into 
one. Perhaps both are weak, and separately 
are of little value, or unable to stand the winter, 
or one may have lost its queen at a season when 
she cannot be replaced. With swarms or casts 
the operation is easy ; no preparation is needed 
if one has not come off more than a day or two 
before the other. In the evening blow a little 
smoke into the hive containing the older swarm 
or cast, and throw the strangers down against 
the hive-door, in order that they may run in. 
Much of the success depends on the bees having 
their honey-sacs full, so that if a swarm should 
be discovered, which may have been waiting to 
be hived during the previous night at least, it 
will not be safe to attempt uniting it to another 
until the bees have been well fed or thoroughly 
sprinkled with thin syrup, time being after- 
wards allowed them for clearing it up. 
Uniting established stocks requires more care. 
We will first explain howto act with skeps 
should one or both of the skeps have just arrived 
from a distance. They may be placed close to- 
gether, and united at once, as presently 
described. If two skeps which have stood in 
the same garden are to be joined, they must first 
be brought side by side by slow degrees, or 
many bees will be lost. Let their approach to 
each other be made by removals of not more 
than a yard each day, not reckoning those days 
upon w r hich the weather has not permitted the 
bees to fly”. When the distance between them 
is reduced to a couple of yards, drive the bees 
from the hive to be broken up ; gently turn up 
the skep into which they have been driven, and 
sprinkle with thin syrnp (thick syrup would 
gum the bees, to their great injury), which 
most bee-keepers scent with pepperment, cloves, 
or nutmeg. Smoke the bees which are to 
receive them, and lifting their hive, sprinkle 
them between the combs with syrup scented as 
in the case of the others. After an interval of 
a few minutes give another puff of smoke, 
sprinkle again, and putting down the skep be- 
tween the two stations which the hives pre- 
viously occupied, and propping up its edge, 
throw the driven bees down against its entrance 
upon a large board, newspaper, or sheet, as 
explained under the head 1 Swarming,’ Some 
recommend that both stocks of bees be driven 
out, and united while absent, from the combs, 
scented syrup being used both in the case of the 
bees and the hive ©f combs intended to receive 
them. To unite bees in frame-hives attention 
to position will be as necessary as in uniting 
Bkeps, as described above. Outside unoccupied 
frames, from the hive to receive the addition, 
being removed, the bees are smoked, and their 
frames drawn together, scented syrup being 
used as with skeps. The smoking and scenting 
are repeated with the second hive, and if one of 
the queens can be utilised she is of couise taken 
away. If both queens are not required, and one 
is known to be a better breeder than the other, 
destroy the inferior one. The frames are now 
lifted out one by one, and put in proper order 
beside the other fiames in the first hive, keeping 
ail the brood in the oentre for warmth, then, 
brushing off all the rest of the bees left on the 
combs for which there is no room, and, covering 
up all, our work is complete. Should fighting 
commence, a free use of smoke and rapping 
upon the hive side will restore order. Since 
sometimes, atthough rarely, the one queen left 
is killed, it is a wise precaution to cage her for 
for forty-eight hours. 
(To e Continued). 
