JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
138 
[ August 11, 1881. 
part of the glasses. In every case of supering the use of the 
artificial foundations properly fastened will be found very advan¬ 
tageous, specially so in supers with perpendicular sides or in 
frames or sections. The larger the skeletons used in supers the 
sooner they are filled. The thicker kind of artificial foundations 
used for brood comb I have not tested. At the swarming season 
I was hardly able to do anything, but my neighbours who used 
up almost all the brood foundations I had in their apiaries speak 
well of it. 
Natural comb is a costly material to both bees and their 
masters. Much honey is consumed by bees in order to secrete 
or manufacture wax. Baron Liebig calculated that 1 lb. of 
wax was obtained at the expense of 20 lbs. of honey. I can¬ 
not confirm or contradict this statement. I know that a great 
deal of honey is spent in the creation of wax, that hives engaged 
in building combs store up comparatively little honey, and that 
hives filled with combs store up honey very fast. Swarms on 
being cast into empty hives are placed at a great disadvantage 
for a few days, having no cells for eggs and no cells for honey. 
There is also the disadvantage of so few bees being able to work 
till the foundations of natural combs have considerably advanced. 
One “ great bee ” lays the foundation of the city, other bees build 
on it, but very few builders can be employed for a time. The 
introduction of a few sheets of good and clean foundations must 
be a very great advantage to swarms on first being hived. I 
heartily commend their use to the notice of our readers, and also 
the study of their application and advantages.—A. PETTIGREW, 
Borodon , Cheshire. 
BEE MANAGEMENT. 
I should be glad if you could give me some advice as to my 
bees. I have a swarm hived in a Stewarton on the 27th May ; two 
boxes and super are filled and sealed. I have added a fourth 
box where they are busy ; I should think it weighs 50 or 60 lbs. 
Can I take any honey besides the top super box ? if so, how may 
it be done ? I have also a large straw hive of last year’s second 
swarm which have not swarmed this year, but the hive weighs 
50 lbs. or more. Would it be wise to drive the bees into a hive 
of the same size and feed them ? if so, how should I feed them ? 
I have only the parent stock of my Stewarton swarm, otherwise I 
would unite them ; and the parent stock is a small straw hive, and 
is sufficient weight to stand the winter. Last year in taking a 
stock of the previous year I found much brood, and was much 
troubled to drain the honey. Can you recommend me to a good 
extractor—a cheap one? 1 have only read of them—have not 
seen one—and would it answer my purpose better than draining 
through sieves, which I find is tedious work, and where you have 
50 or 60 lbs. to drain, it takes some time ? If you would kindly 
oblige in your earliest issue I should feel greatly obliged.— 
A Constant Reader, Salisbury. 
[As we understand the matter your swarm in a Stewarton hive has 
filled two body boxes, and has since had both a super and a nadir 
added. The super alone may be expected to be filled with virgin 
honey, but later in the season you may safely take also the upper 
body box, leaving the bees to winter in the remaining two. If there 
be brood in the upper body box leave it till hatched, and feed the 
stock to a good weight for wintering. If comb foundation has 
been freely used there will be little or no drone comb in the lower 
boxes ; otherwise there may be too much to make it advisable to 
winter in them. In that case rather remove the nadir and leave 
both body boxes to the bees. Why did you not place supers 
on the large straw hive that has not swarmed and tbe honey of 
which you now desire to appropriate ? Even a stock weighing 
50 lbs. would scarcely yield honey to pay for the trouble and 
expense of feeding up again to a good weight. Old combs, brood, 
and pollen would probably reduce the nett weight of the extracted 
honey to 20 or 25 lb3. Our advice would be either to leave it 
alone as a keeping stock, or transfer it to a bar-frame or Stewarton 
hive—that is, save all the good empty comb and brood and take 
the best of the honey. Driven stocks fed up in autumn usually 
have too much drone comb to make good hives next year unless 
comb foundation be used. 
We cannot recommend an extractor cheap enough to pay for the 
small quantity of honey you will have to drain, and as you have 
no bar-frames you might find that, even with an extractor, your 
troubles were not ended.] 
DRIVING BEES FROM SUPERS. 
On cutting supers of comb from hive some honey cells are often 
broken, and thus the faces of the supers are disfigured with honey. 
Let me remind inexperienced bee-beepers that such supers should 
be raised by wedges about three-eighths of an inch to let the bees 
clean out the broken cells. In less than an hour the bees should 
be driven from the supers. Formerly I used to give the bees a 
sniff of sulphur in the smoke of fustian rags, which makes them 
run from the supers into their hives as fast as they can. Instead 
of sulphur I now use powder or saltpetre. These are dissolved in 
warm water, and brown paper is dipped in the solution and dried. 
Mr. Addey calls it “ touchpaper.” A small piece the size of a 
watch rolled up, lit at one end, and the smoke of it blown into 
a super, will drive every bee out in a few minutes. Where prac¬ 
ticable the smoke should be blown in from the top of supers. 1 
removed some time ago a glass super with a wooden top weighing 
19 Tbs. I bored a hole through the top with a small gimlet, aud 
applied the smoke through the hole. The work of ridding supers 
of bees is easily and speedily done, and this touchpaper will be 
useful in many operations in the apiary.—A. Pettigrew. 
FLOWERS FOR BEES. 
I have a flower in my garden which bees seem to be ex¬ 
ceedingly fond of. Although I do not keep any, I never approach 
the flower without finding a large number of ordinary bees as 
well as the humble bee at work. The flower is an Epilobium or 
Willow Herb, and very much resembles the common Willow 
Herb found in ditches and damp places, but I believe it is the 
French Willow Herb. The flowers are produced in long spikes 
and have been unusually fine this year; some of the spikes nearly 
3 feet in length, and have continued in bloom for the last five 
weeks or more. There is no trouble in propagating it, but on the 
other hand it spreads too rapidly to be grown in the flower 
garden, but if the cottager or bee-keeper could find an out-of- 
the-way corner for it I think it would be a valuable acquisition. 
—Amateur, Cirencester. 
APIS DORSATA. 
(Translated from the Bienenzeitung; Communicated by Mr. 
Alfred Neighbour .) 
BEES FROM THE ISLAND OF CEYLON. 
Professor Frank Benton sent me the other day from the 
Island of Cyprus a copy of the periodical the “Ceylon Observer.” 
I noticed in this journal an article by him, marked in blue pencil, 
to which he evidently wished to direct my attention. As this 
article will doubtless interest most readers of the “Bienenzeitung” 
I have made a translation of it. The above heading of this article 
is followed by a second one as follows :—“ Of Apis dorsata, the 
most marvellous bee of the world, a few colonies have been dis¬ 
covered and captured by Mr. Frank Benton. We are glad to find,” 
the article continues, “ that Mr. Benton has at last been successful 
in procuring Apis dorsata—called Bambara by the natives, which 
he describes as the most valuable bee of the world. Mudaliyar 
Jayetellike hired a few Cingalese bee-hunters, who accompanied 
Mr. Benton to the Bambaragala, a chain of mountains thirty 
English miles from Kurunegala, and there after an interesting 
journey attended with a good many difficulties, of which Mr. 
Benton will, no doubt, give an account later on, he was fortunate 
enough to procure two colonies of Apis dorsata. On account of 
the great interest that Mr. Benton takes in this bee, which he 
considers an excellent honey bee, he has decided to postpone his 
departure for Cyprus for a fortnight, and intends to return to 
Kurunegala once more. He left us a few workers of Apis dorsata 
preserved in spirits, which can be seen at the office of our editor. 
The Cingalese were greatly astonished at the way in which Mr. 
Benton handled these bees. If not properly treated they will 
sometimes get very savage, when they will pursue their enemy a 
long way. Mr. Jayetellike declares that as regards the manage¬ 
ment of bees he has learnt more from Mr. Benton in a week than 
from other sources in many years.”—(Signed) C. J. H. Graven- 
horst. 
LETTER FROM MR. FRANK BENTON. 
“ Steamer Jupiter , coast of Syria, 
“ 23rd May, 1881. 
“ I have encountered a great many adventures, and have learnt 
much concerning the bees of these eastern countries, of which I 
should like to give you a full account if it were possible, but you will 
soon understand why I have not written to you before. 
“Leaving Java I proceeded to Ceylcn via Singapore, and imme¬ 
diately after my arrival I started for The jungle—the mountainous or 
woody parts of the island—and with the assistance of a few natives 
I soon discovered a nest or colony of Apis dorsata in a tree about 
60 feet high. This w’as the first time I got a sight of these wonderful 
bees, of which I did not see a single specimen during my five-weeks 
stay in Java. I made numerous excursions afterwards, during which 
I discovered not less than thirty-five nests of them, but mostly on 
