October 12, 1882.] JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 851 
labour will accomplish it, but the half-measure attempts at cleansing 
are of no use. One washing does good, but it is effectual or otherwise 
according to its thoroughness. The insects must not only be reached 
on the most exposed parts of the plants, but in every crack and in¬ 
equality from the top of the plants down to their roots. A simple 
dressing will not effect this, but it should be repeated at least half a 
dozen times, and at intervals of two or three days. Every particle 
of material likely to harbour the pests should be removed from the 
house; the woodwork, &c., washed three times with petroleum in 
solution with water (as used by Mr. W. Taylor in cleansing vineries). 
During the next two months is the best time to destroy mealy bug. 
Urceolina aurea is now throwing up its flower stems, and though 
it flowers without the leaves it must not be allowed to become dry at 
the roots. Its fine pendant flowers—yellow, with green tips—render 
it very attractive and acceptable at this season. Hippeastrum 
pardinum is also flowering freely, and needs to be kept moist at the 
roots. 
\M\ 
m BEE-KEEPER. 1 
[LaJAAMlL 
THE STEWARTON HIVE. 
The members of the British Bee-keepers’ Association who read 
the article on this subject in your last number, must have been 
surprised at the statement made by Mr. Pettigrew, that “ since 
the retirement of the ‘ Renfrewshire Bee-keeper ’ no one 
has come to the front to take his place ” in advocating the claims 
of the Stewarton hive. On the contrary, this hive formed the 
subject of a paper and a very full discussion not long since at one 
of the quarterly meetings of the British Bee-keepers’ Association ; 
and the Rev. E. Bartrum, who read the paper, published it with 
additions by the “ Renfrewshire Bee-keeper” and others, 
only last year. His little work, “ The Stewarton, The Hive of 
the Busy Man,” has had, I believe, a considerable sale. Messrs. 
Longman are the publishers, and the price is 6^. 
Mr. Pettigrew will be interested to learn that in the new edition 
of “ Modern Bee-keeping,” about to be published by the British 
Bee-keepers’ Association, the straw skep, in all probability, will 
not be wholly ignored, as the Committee will be asked to add a 
chapter, if not on the straw skep, at all events on sections arranged 
on the top of straw skeps. As many skeps cost no more than 
Is. 6d., whereas a good bar-frame and its appendages cannot well 
be obtained under something like 7s 6d. or IOs., it seems very 
advisable that the British Bee-keepers’ Association should at all 
events recognise the skep, and by means of sectional supers lead 
those who are willing to aim at higher things. If they would do 
this they would, I am convinced, conciliate a considerable section 
of the bee-loving public, who consider that the bar-frame hobby 
is sometimes driven too hard.—A Member of the British 
Bee-keepers’ Association. 
PREPARING BEES FOR WINTER. 
Every bee-keeper should now take advantage of the earliest 
opportunity that offers to prepare his bees for passing the long 
winter months in comfort and safety. At the risk of repeating 
advice oftentimes given before, we would endeavour to impress 
upon our readers the necessity of giving great attention to the 
proper arrangements of the exterior and, interior of their hives 
while fine w r eather still permits such attention to be given. Many 
bees are still kept in the straw skep, and, compared with the 
wooden bar-frame hive as a winter domicile, the straw skep 
requires by far the least amount of trouble bestowed upon it to 
make it a snug and healthy winter residence. But the bar-frame 
hive has so many other advantages over the straw skep that we 
willingly give the extra labour and attention required to prepare 
it for the winter. Even the well-made skep ceases to be a healthy 
home for its much-neglected inmates in the hands of the careless 
bee-owner. We have seen straw skeps in a cottage garden left 
to pass the winter with the only protection a decaying sack and 
broken milk-pan. But let us hope that such a state of things 
will soon be unknown, now that so many are competent to give 
kind advice to the thoughtless or ignorant. 
In preparing bees to pass the winter there are two things to 
attend to: First, the interior preparation of the hive ; and 
secondly, the exterior. In the straw skep something may be done 
as to the interior arrangement. Stocks that have shown signs of 
being queenless should be examined and the state of the bees 
ascertained. Stocks that are weak in numbers, as well as queenless 
stocks, should at once be united to healthy stocks standing nearest 
them. If the hives contain sweet young combs after the bees are 
cast out they should be well wrapped up to secure them from mice 
and moths, and utilised the following year for hiving swarms into 
them. If left as they were both the weak and the queenless hives 
would die out and the combs become a prey to vermin, or, being 
attacked by stronger colonies, be the cause of much commotion, 
and perhaps slaughter, in the early warm days of spring. Floor¬ 
boards should be scraped and placed slanting forwards, so that 
water may not lodge on them. If the bees have not sufficient 
food to carry them through the winter, say from 12 to 20 lbs. 
weight, then food must be given rapidly and by night by means 
of a feeding-bottle inverted over a hole cut in the crown of the 
skep. How to do it has been so often explained that we feel it 
a trespass on time and space to repeat directions ; yet we are 
constantly meeting with beginners who ask the questions, “ How 
is the syrup to be made, and how applied ? ” Therefore once 
more we will ask pardon for repeating the recipe. 
For rapid autumn feeding put a pint of water to 3 lbs. of best 
loaf sugar and a tea-spoonful of salt. When boiling take off the 
thick scum which collects on the side of the pan farthest from the 
fire, the stew-pan being drawn back when the syrup begins to boil. 
Add a table-spoonful of vinegar, and let the whole simmer for ten 
minutes, then pour it off into a jug to cool. 
To feed the bees with this syrup, place over a hole in the crown 
of the skep a piece of tin or zinc in which eight or twelve holes have 
been pierced with the point of a small French wire nail. Do not 
let the holes be large, or the syrup will run through and flood the 
hive. Fill a wide-mouthed bottle (a pickle bottle will answer the 
purpose) with the syrup; have a piece of flat zinc, or, better still, a 
child’s toy dust-pan, place this on the top of the bottle filled with 
syrup, steadily invert the bottle and dust-pan. Now place the 
dust-pan on the perforated zinc over the hive, withdraw the pan, 
and the bottle of syrup is in position for the bees to feed from. 
Take great care that the zinc over the feed-hole is perfectly fiat, 
and that the syrup be not made too thin. Over the bottle place an 
empty skep or large flower pot, and over this a pan or a hackle to 
shed water. As soon as the bees have increased the weight of 
their stores to that advised above wrap the skep up warmly, and 
disturb no more until the following February. There are many 
ways of doing this which will suggest themselves to bee-keepers in 
various forms. Some means should be employed to prevent the 
rain and snow from drifting against the skep. Anything waterproof 
gathered at the top and bottom, and drawn up under the pan and 
round the post on which the hive stands, leaving an entrance in 
front and ample ventilation under the pan above, will answer the 
purpose. This latter point should ever be attended to, otherwise 
the straw of the skep will become a sodden mass, and the bees 
killed by too much kindness (?). Entrances should be narrowed ; 
half an inch long and a quarter inch high is ample space for a 
winter entry. 
Now we come to bar-frame hives. When properly constructed 
these may be made as snug and as healthy for the bees during 
winter as the warm skep. The interior arrangement shall first be 
attended to. The space occupied by the bees for wintering should 
be much contracted. For a strong stock five or six combs at the 
most will be sufficient to leave, placing those with most honey on 
the outside of the allotted space at each end, and giving the more 
empty combs to the centre, that the bees may not have to cluster 
on cold honey, but be able to creep into the empty cells, and thus 
only have their cluster divided by the thin waxen bases of the cells. 
Winter passages should be made through all the combs ; a small 
tube of tin or zinc will cut these out neatly. Hives should always 
be made sufficiently long to allow of the use of two dummies 
either in winter or summer. All our hives are so made, and as far 
back as the year 1875 we tried the experiment of working such a 
hive, using a perforated zinc divider in summer for working 
sections on either side the brood nest. These moveable dummies 
should now be drawn up close to the outer combs at both ends, and 
the spaces between them and the hive walls packed with dried 
sphagnum moss, chaff, or any other warm material. 
The same system regarding queenless and weak stocks should be 
carried out as with skeps. Some hives will have more honey than 
they need, and others will have too little. We need not teed in 
the case of bar-frame hives when this happens, but take from the 
stronger and give to the weaker, only allowing to either sufficient 
to last until spring, and carefully keeping the other combs for 
expansion of the hives as breeding advances. Entrances, as with 
skeps, should be narrowed, and all made snug over the frames ; a 
piece of ticking or canvas first, then either three or four squares of 
flannel, or, better still, a quilt made of any coarse stuff and filled 
with moss or chaff, leaving a hole in the centre to correspond with 
