October 14 , 1880 . ] JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 363 
and Southern Colorado no rain has fallen for thirteen months. River 
beds that have never run dry before are without moisture for hun¬ 
dreds of miles ; the grass has ceased to grow, and nothing but the 
Cactus is to be seen on the plains in the way of vegetation. As a 
consequence the cattle and sheep, which formerly found a capital 
living here, are dying by hundreds. Unwilling to risk further loss 
by waiting for rain, the stockowners have determined to transfer 
themselves and their stock, numbering 200,000 head of cattle and 
250,000 sheep, to a more favourable district. The exodus began last 
April, when a drove of 8,000 cattle and 12,000 brood mares, belonging 
to Judge Hilton, the “ cattle king” of San Louis Valley,New Mexico, 
set out for the Black Hills country. They arrived at Fort Fetterman 
in the beginning of September. Other droves belonging to other 
owners followed in rapid succession, and it is said that from Dowder 
River in the north, to the Rio Grande in the south, there was for 
some weeks, an almost continuous line of cattle and sheep. 
FOUL BROOD. 
Aftek all my experience with foul brood I am still at as great 
a loss as ever to say what is the cause of it. Like some of your 
readers I thought it was caused by the introduction of the Ligu¬ 
rians into my apiary, but then I had it previous to that time ; 
and besides, a neighbour had it in his long before we ever heard 
of a Ligurian bee. I am as convinced as ever that chilled brood is 
not the cause, but one thing is certain—it can be cured, though 
only with much trouble. For a number of years I had been ex¬ 
perimenting with it by partially cleaning the skeps by washing 
them in hot water and soft soap, and boiling all the honey before 
I gave it to the bees, and taking away all the old comb every 
year, leaving only the new ; but with all my care my stock was 
decreasing every year. I at last resolved that I would adopt 
similar means to those of the late Mr. Woodbury. I began by 
burning every piece of old comb and everything not connected 
with the hives themselves, which consisted of the Woodbury hives 
and some Stewartons. 
All those which were empty of bees I boiled in a large copper 
for three or four minutes—skeps, broods, bars, and everything 
connected with the hives, taking the precaution to do it in a cold 
frosty day in winter, so that there could be no chance of any bees 
coming near me. When the operation was going on a man stood 
with a fork keeping all down in the. water, and it boiling all the 
time ; they were then washed in clean water but not so hot, and 
at last in cold, and then they were dried thoroughly and kept in 
a shed in which they had plenty of air by day. Some of the 
skeps were made with straw sides and tops, as Woodburys. Those 
after being dried I painted over the straw with white lead; and 
in passing I may remark that the bees do as well in those painted 
as in the wood or the straw without paint. In case of failure in 
cleaning the old skeps I obtained some new common straw ones, 
and put swarms in them the same season, 1878, that I put the 
swarms into the boiled Woodburys, which gave me two chances : 
if they were not clean by boiling, they might be cleaned by 
putting them into new straw hives. It was giving me two strings 
to my bow. When fed they bad nothing but pure sugar. All my 
old honey and combs I had destroyed. When they were ex¬ 
amined in the autumn I found the Woodburys were all clean 
except one. Why that one I cannot tell, they were all treated 
alike in every way. The straw hives we could not be so certain of 
as we could not see all the cells, but we thought they were clean, 
and found it to be so this spring when we broke them up after 
they had swarmed and all the bees driven out. In the beginning 
of June this year I shook nearly all the bees from the Woodbury 
skep which had the foul brood into a clean Woodbury, placing 
the skep with the foul brood, combs, and bees into a vinery for 
twenty-one days to hatch out the brood. The skep was lifted out 
of the vinery every good day. that the bees which could fly might 
have an airing, and kept in the dark while in the vinery. As soon 
as they were hatched they were added to the one they were taken 
from, and all the comb immediately destroyed, and the skep sunk 
over the head in water. 
I confess I was afraid the experiment would be a failure, and 
that it would not be free from foul brood ; but after a careful 
examination of every comb the other day I am glad to say there 
is not a single cell of foul brood in my twelve stocks ; they are 
now in as good condition as I ever saw them. That same skep 
gave me a super f 21 tbs., and has 50 fibs. in the skep still. It 
will be seen that I followed very nearly the course Mr. Wood¬ 
bury recommended, with the exception of placing the bees in a 
clean skep for two or three days before they were placed in the 
skep they were to remain in. Had I failed I would have adopted 
that plan before I finally gave it up, as it was a matter of some 
consideration to burn about twenty otherwise good skeps and 
start with a new lot, when they, too, might have foul brood. 
A neighbour here many years ago cleaned his in the same 
manner as I have attempted to describe, and was also successful. 
He has now fifty stocks, and has had a hundred in former years, 
and all perfectly free from the malady.— Alex. Shearer. 
ANTI-ROBBING PORCH FOR HIVES. 
During- the last two or three years I have had abundant oppor¬ 
tunities of testing the working of a simple arrangement I have 
often recommended to check or cure robbing—that trouble of 
early spring and late autumn, or indeed of every season when 
bees can fly but gather nothing. 1 have so often proved its thorough 
efficacy, that I have now begun to adopt it as an integral part of 
my hives, the draw doors of which it replaces. The usual narrow¬ 
ing of the hive mouth, although very helpful to an attacked colony, 
is not by any means uniformly sufficient. Robbers that have 
gained confidence by success present themselves with so much 
assurance that they often slide past the guards and get into the 
wider opening lying behind the doors before they are known to 
be intruders. This happening continually will allow a hive after 
the narrowing of its mouth, if thinned or intimidated before the 
siege has been noticed, to still suffer from the attack, which will 
oniy more slowly, though quite as surely, work its ruin in spite 
of the precaution taken. If, however, the mouth be not only 
narrowed but have the form of a tunnel given to it, the would-be 
thieves are placed at a tremendous disadvantage ; they have to 
pass guard after guard, and the moment they are challenged by 
one, others are at hand to close with them to do battle or com¬ 
mence the work of ejectment. The combatants fill the aperture 
in the tube-like opening ; and the tussel, which bj its excib ment 
gives in ordinary arrangements opportunity to sneaking watchers 
to slip in, bars effectually all ingress. The defenders gain courage ; 
and the marauders, finding it all fight and no booty, in an hour 
or two seek some new field for their energies. I now cut two 
pieces of wood about three-eighths thick, 2 inches wide, and 
5 inches long. One of these is nailed to the end of another about 
1 foot or 1-1 inches long, and also 2 inches wide. The unfixed 
piece, now sliding backwards and forwards under the two, gives 
the size of the opening to the hive as they stand together on the 
alighting board. The opening is altered in a moment to suit season 
and size of stock, and has this great advantage, that when robbing 
begins and it is needful to make the entrance very narrow, it is 
still the one known to the proper inhabitants, to whom it in 
consequence does not add the disadvantage of a bewilderment 
at the very moment home has to be defended against an enemy. 
The skep as well as the frame hive may be very easily furnished 
with this before-described form of entrance, which would certainly 
reduce the chances of stocks being robbed out to a minimum, 
while those who know how often the cottager loses his “ stances ” 
from this cause will not think any help in this direction to be dis¬ 
regarded. Last year I had an opportunity of saving for a primi¬ 
tive bee-keeper a stock from destruction, before which, he said, 
‘ the bees was always a-fightin.” I found in the somewhat rugged 
pathway two pieces of thin tile, one of which I broke in half, 
and placed the parts in front of the skep mouth with the newly 
separated edges, about a third of an inch from each other. The 
other piece, by being put over these, formed the protective tunnel 
at once. 
Uncontrollable robbing, it is true, points to some error in man- 
agement or defect in condition in the hives themselves, and in the 
apiaries of uninstructed bee-keepers robbing is sometimes a blessing 
in disguise, as two stocks, each singly too poorly provisioned to 
winter, will first fight and then fraternise, and deport the whole 
of the stores from the hive to be deserted to that of the attacking 
party ; but this, though true, but represents the exception. In 
all well-cared-for apiaries robbing is not only a nuisance but a 
loss, for which not one shred of countervailing advantage can be 
pleaded. The importance of preventing rather than curing rob¬ 
bing is enhanced by its tendency when commenced to rapidly 
increase until honest labour seems to be forgotten in the hurry to 
get booty from others. Its annoyance where many bees are kept 
is felt in the savage ill temper it infuses into all stocks alike. The 
wasp, which this season has been unusually troublesome, would 
find the kind of entrance I am now recommending a bar to pro¬ 
gress by no means to his liking.— Fkank R. Cheshire, Acton. 
A FIGHT WITH FOUL BROOD. 
I AM truly glad to find that our old friend Mr. Pettigrew has 
given such an emphatic warning of the danger of trilling with 
