October 23,1830. J 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
3G7 
HE 
APIARIAN NOTES. 
Beginner s’ First Hives. 
Many people I know have this year commenced bee-keeping. 
Premising that attention has been given that each hive has not less 
than 20 lbs. of stores (better if it be 40 lbs.), and the bees occupy¬ 
ing a hive large enough to allow space for the breeding powers of 
the queen, and that she be young and fertile, the beginner may 
rest assured that all will be well, and there will be no lack of bees 
within their hives when the spring arrives. 
The Evil Effects of Damp. 
Some have perhaps been feeding their bees. Now when 
bees are being fed the syrup ought to be much thinner than when 
the bees have it sealed for the purpose of enabling them to take it 
up rapidly, as thick syrup or thick honey is taken up very slowly. 
The right proportion is about equal weights of sugar and water, 
that proportion being much thinner, but better than is sometimes 
recommended, and the bees should rather expel the superfluous 
water than be necessitated to go outside in search of it to liquify 
the thick syrup. Expelling the superfluous water creates a damp 
inside the hive, particularly in the extreme angles, and upon the 
floor, which, if not removed, causes mould upon the combs, and 
induces the honey to ferment. At the same time it is slowly, but 
surely, extracting the heat from the bees and the hive, causing the 
bees to be restless, and consume more food than can be properly 
digested. The bee often becomes powerless and dies. 
The Best Way to Preserve Bees. 
Keep them dry and free from draughts, so that no more heat is 
necessary to keep them alive than what the bees generate of them¬ 
selves. Repeatedly I have had clusters of bees living between the 
outer wrapping and the dried grass coveting the hive at the end of 
ten days. The longer bees can be sustained without feeding, and 
the less of it, the healthier will they be, and of course when extra 
meat is taken the reverse will be the case. The whole sanitation 
of the hive may be summed up as follows :—To have bees sufficient 
in number to be able to carry on the internal economy of the hive 
successfully without the brood nest suffering when a portion of 
the bees are abroad collecting water or pollen, or from any sudden 
atmospheric changes that may take place, and these bees located in 
a hive receptacle large enough for the demands of a prolific queen 
and an increasing population so provisioned that imminent want 
is never feared or known, and entirely free from draught or 
moisture. I have repeated the above so as to impress beginners 
with its importance. 
If any beginner has been feeding his bees let him examine the 
interior of the hive, and he will at once see the moisture as 
described. Transfer bees and combs into a clean dry hive and the 
evils will to a great extent be averted, but not wholly, because as 
the bees consume more food during the winter if the hive is a non¬ 
ventilating one. 
Water is condensed upon the extreme angles and floor of the 
hive, and the bees suffer in proportion. If an enamelled cloth lie 
close upon the top of the frames of a conducting nature condenses 
the vapour, which falls back upon the bees ; but provide them with 
dry non-conducting porous material, with the ventilating floor and 
narrow doorway, then your hive is safe. When a hive is heated 
in transit through long confinement, water sprayed against the 
outside of the hive lowers the temperature inside the hive. Not 
unfrequently have we saved bees from suffocation by this simple 
but effective plan. Now, if a hive stands exposed whenever it 
becomes damp it has the same effect as when drenched with water, 
as stated above, and the bees suffer greatly from the lowering of 
the temperature. To avoid this we cover the whole exterior of 
the hive with dry and non-conducting material. We avoid double 
cased hives because the moisture passes from the bees through the 
inner shell, and is condensed upon the sides forming the “ dead air 
space,” which also extracts the heat from the inside of the hive, 
and the hive soon decays whether the space has been filled or not 
I know full well the advantages derived from “ dead air spaces ” 
proper, but a hive having the space filled with cork sawdust is not 
such a one, neither is it one so long as a hive must always have a 
doorway for the bees to pass out and in : the principle is destroyed 
The foregoing is, perhaps, enough to enable the beginner to under¬ 
stand the evil effects of damp both inside and outside a hive, and 
how to avoid and prevent it. Never place any non-porous material 
close upon a hive, any more than you would close a chimney you 
wished to draw freely. 
Tiie Site. 
Next in importance to the hive and its coverings is the site, 
which is as essential for the well being of the bees to be dry as the 
hive and its coverings are. Never set hives where the surface is- 
very damp, because when the bees alight upon it they soon get 
chilled, and there is always a coldness that renders the bees un¬ 
comfortable when inside their hives. A little labour will some¬ 
times convert a very bad site into one of the very best, and there 
are few places that cannot be improved by judicious draining and. 
planting. A carpet of Arabis is one of the best for bees to alight 
upon, and it affords both honey anl pollen, but it answers a dry 
soil best. Without dictating too much or too far, leaving the 
beginner to arrange according to his fancy and means, but we 
cannot urge too far the importance of windbreaks either in the 
form of hedges, timber, or iron, avoiding eddies or lakes of water. 
The Kind of Bee. 
I have been so well served and so highly pleased with the 
Carniolian that had it not been for the introduction of the Punic, 
apparently the best of all the foreign varieties, I would have had 
no hesitation in advising no other but the former, and may be it 
will be as well for beginners to be content with what they have 
until Punic queens are imported in numbers, which I hear from, 
good authority will be before long. 
Crosses. 
As a rule crosses are the best for honey gathering, the Punics 
being an exception, the pure bees of that race being the most 
assiduous. It may, however, turn out that with certain varieties,, 
crosses of that race may be the best. It is a pity that dealers have- 
been so imprudent as to introduce into almost every country bees 
from another. By that injudicious act it is difficult to procure any 
race pure, and the same may be done with the Punics. 
Yery shortly after the introduction of the Ligurian bee crosses' 
between it and the common bee found their way to this country as 
pure Ligurians. Complaints about that were loud and long. After 
a while Syrian and Cyprian races were introduced, and some of 
these after a while showed signs of being crossed. To remedy the 
cry against the more sombre Italians they were crossed with 
Syrians or Cyprians, and were sold as pure Ligurians, having 
“sometimes as many as five yellow bands.” Out of a dozen 
Carniolian queens one only represented the true breed, all the 
others were simply crosses between pure Carniolians and Cyprians 
or Syrians. The greatest 'or most prominent distinction between 
these two races and Ligurians was the yellow saddle upon the 
thorax of the two former. There are other distinctive features that 
fully prove them to be distinct varieties, but I never saw a bee 
having five distinct yellow bands amongst the progeny of hundreds 
of queens. 
I have never witnessed a pure Ligurian bee having the yellow- 
band, and I emphasise this, because in “ Gleanings ” Mr. Doolittle 
admits the three varieties as distinct, but adds that “ Italians 
showed this yellow (italics mine) shield fully as plainly as do the 
Cyprians, so that claim went for nought.” From what I have seen 
and handled of all these races I never yet saw a pure Italian bee 
having the yellow shield. It was a trick of the dealers to produce 
