172 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
[ August 25, 1887. 
should be shown in a box or pan at once and stood in a cold frame. The 
young plants when large enough should be placed in 3-inch pots, in 
which they will pass the winter safely if given a position on a shelf 
close to the glass where the temperature at night will ran^e about 40°. 
Pinks .—A good batch of the common white garden variety and 
Mrs. Sinkins should be established in from 3 to 5-inch pots for forcing. 
For this purpose bushy plants should be lifted from the outside and 
potted. If these have not been previously prepared, strong cuttings of 
the former may be inserted thickly in sandy soil, and in a short time 
they will be well established if placed in a cold frame and kept well 
shaded. 
HE BEE-KEEPER. 
CYPRIAN AND OTHER FOREIGN BEES. 
CARNIOLIAN. 
Mr. G. Remmer wishes to know which of the breeds of bees are 
“ best suited to the cottager.” Taking everything into considera¬ 
tion, I place the Carniolian first on the list, not only for the 
cottager, but country gentlemen. They are hardy, have mild 
tempers, prolific, and good honey gatherers ; therefore, will com¬ 
mend themselves to every person who keeps or examines them. Of 
all breeds they are the least affected by crossing. The pure ones 
are equal to the crossed for honey gathering. Moreover, they, as 
far as I have experienced, are not so subject to disease as other 
varieties are. 
The most satisfactory way of securing these bees is to get them 
from some dealer. I have always placed myself in the hands of 
Messrs. G. Neighbour & Sons, and have advised others to that 
course, and I am glad to say there has never been the slightest 
cause for reflection. A Carniolian queen costs about 7s. Gd., and if 
a few cottagers in an isolated place would secure one and breed 
from, and secure pure fertilisation, it would pay them to supply 
queens and at the same time increase the pleasure and profit derived 
from bees. Introduce the queen to a good stock, with every pre¬ 
caution, so that she may not be killed. The safe method is to 
deprive the bees of the power of raising another queen from eggs 
or larvae, and to let the bees be queenless thirty hours. The safest 
method of increasing the stock is to allow it to swarm, or take the 
swarm artificially, and from the eighth to the tenth day after, not 
later, divide the bees and combs into nuclei. I frequently make 
twelve of these. The flying bees will be numerous on the one 
placed on the old site, and it must have fewest combs and brood, 
arranging and dividing the others, so as to equalise as much as pos¬ 
sible each respective nucleus. Attention must be paid to these, so 
that none lacks food or the queen be lost, and these attended to 
properly make the best of stocks for next year, but be careful no 
surplus drone comb exists or is allowed to be built, or it may cause 
disappointment. Excess of drone comb causes bees to swarm pre¬ 
maturely, lessening the yield of honey as well as profit to the bee¬ 
keeper. 
Unlike the Syrian bees, the Carniolian bees work well up to the 
day of swarming, but with this exception they surpass all other 
varieties when they have surplus bees to go to work. The Cyprians 
seem much of the same nature, and their crosses excel all others for 
honey gathering, but it is necessary to be careful to cross with the 
proper variety ; and when this is done swarming is a rare thing 
with them while they have room. This last is the key to success¬ 
ful bee-husbandry. It is a mere sham to work with standard hives of 
nine or ten frames, and expect surplus honey in quantity from 
them. The best help and advice to give bee-keepers is to show 
them the proper hive to keep and work bees in. I have described 
the cheapest and best hive, which the merest type in handling tools 
can make at a cost of not more than 2s. 6d. each. This present 
week I have had numerous visitors from long distances, who, not¬ 
withstanding the fine season, have had no honey from the standard 
hives. I showed them the produce from my commodious and 
cheap hives, and they were all equally astonished, and the locality 
here is not a good one for bee-keeping. 
I cannot speak for the future except from ten hives. I have 
queens for next year from two of them, two being set aside for that 
purpose. I lost one prime swarm totally and two others partially. 
I have taken 5 cwt. of super comb, while twenty-four stocks at the 
Heather, which, if all were put down, I should have from 8 to 
10 cwt. more, and if favoured with a fortnight’s fine weather 
between the 5th August and 31st, I have not the slightest hesi¬ 
tation in saying that these ten hive3 will give me a yield of con- 
eiderably more than a ton of honey in one season. 
The day before I wrote this an old man asked me to assist him 
taking off two supers from a hive swarmed three days before any of 
'mine. Both his supers were soiled, one with brood and the other 
by the bees daubing the combs all over, while the hive is under 
40 lbs. in weight ; the bees are supposed to be black ones. Not 
more than 100 yards distant from these bees is an apiary wrought 
upon my principle, whose bees have yielded even more than my 
own ; but they are foreign bees crossed, and “ cross ’’ they are- 
following intruders into the house, and stinging them there. This 
spitefulness, however, I attribute to the way they are handled. 
I hope these hints will assist Mr. Remmer in his purpose ; but 
do not expect big things uutil big hives are adopted. Large as the 
yield of honey has been this year it is not equal to 1876. That year 
I had above 6 cwt. supers from six hives, irrespective of the 
Heather honey. The real honey season did not last more than two 
weeks this year; the drought become too great and shortened the 
season, then July brought showers, but we are satisfied. 
There is one essential thing to know in bee-keeping, and that is 
to know the internal state of the hive, but if possible by experience, 
and not by meddling with them too much. In a future article I 
will give some information of aberrations in my apiary, some of 
them which even puzzled—A Lanarkshire Bee-keeper. 
P.S.—To prevent swarming too often practise excising royal 
cells on the eighth day after the prime swarm issues, or divide into 
nuclei. 
“ R. C., Kent," page 80, and Mr. G. Remmer, page 103, would 
like to own stocks of Cyprians if the price of queens were withm 
their means. I pen these lines to inform them, and others in the 
same fix, that there is a good time coming. 
For years (as nearly all know) 1 have made queen-rearing and 
introducing a deep study. I have wanted daughters superior to 
their mothers, and after trying everyone’s plan of queen-rearing I 
could not get a daughter better than her mother, though it was 
easy enough to get them worse. Cutting the queen cells out m 
chilly weather always resulted in a worthless queen. By careful 
observation, reflection, and experiment, I succeeded in getting 
improved daughters—queens that can fly well, even when laying 
3000 eggs per day, and whose muscular powers enable them to 
run about like spiders, finding every empty cell, and depositing an 
egg in it. Queens that cannot move quickly soon have their ovaries 
overcharged with eggs, when the ignorant think they are large and 
fine, even when they are not laying a quarter of what they ought. 
To get such superior queens a very strong stock is required, and 
the cells must not be cut out or in any way meddled with to chill 
them ; thus I could only get one queen instead of many. I began 
using my law of direct queen introduction to obtain serviceable 
queens, as by it I could calculate to the hour of hatching, and 
therefore what chilling they got was in their last stages. Not 
content with this, I followed up a clue, and now I can get the bees 
to keep them prisoners several days, and feed them in the mean¬ 
while. Thus I get now fully matured virgin queens without any 
cell cutting, and each one is able—and will do, if she gets a chance— 
to fly. 
So far, the above is important, but the queens require intro¬ 
ducing to stocks or nuclei for mating, and all the authorities say 
virgin queens cannot be introduced without risk and trouble. 
Well, I can now remove a laying queen from any stock and en¬ 
throne a virgin one, with no further trouble than just turning up the 
quilt and dropping her in—it does not matter whether the queen 
has only just come from her cell or been with other bees a week— 
and I can enthrone a fertile queen at the same moment I remove a 
laying one, in the same way. 
To test the value of the idea, I have sent quite a number of 
virgin queens by post to correspondents, and they have successfully 
introduced them, in accordance with my instructions. If the 
demand is great, I think the most superior bred virgin queens 
could be sold at Is. each. 
Superior virgin queens at a cheap rate would be an important 
factor in honey producing, especially comb honey— e.g., queens 
rarely lead off a swarm in the season they are bred in ; thus a 
stock could be brought up to swarming point with the old queen, 
and then replaced with a young one mated in a nucleus that had 
just begun laying. Such a stock would then not swarm, neither 
would it breed drones, nor would new hives be wanted for swarms. 
Cyprians.—These have proved grand workers, and with proper 
handling are like tumbling flies about; in fact, nothing could be 
desired under the heading of tameness. I had no hybrids to begin 
the season, so cannot speak of them. 
Syrians.—These require a little more care than Cyprians to 
handle ; but still they are quite as manageable. My imported 
(1884) queen was superseded early in the season, so their tale is 
short. Hybrids crossed with pure native black drones have again 
proved the best over all others ; in fact, I question if any cross 
will equal them for producing extracted honey, as it is always so 
clear and the bees so tame. I never saw them gather black honey, 
but beware of Syrians crossed with hybrid Italian drones. They 
