May 23, 1889. ] 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
427 
sary to ensure a regular supply of fruit throughout the year. Only 
three pottings of suckers are required — viz., March, June, and 
September. 
PLANT HOUSES. 
Thee Carnations. —Cuttings that were rooted in February and 
placed in 3-inch pot, may now be transferred into others 2 inches 
larger. For the present these should be grown in cold frames, and air 
must be admitted liberally when the weather is favourable. During 
mild bright weather the lights may be drawn off during the day, so that 
the plants will be sufficiently hardened for placing outside early in June. 
Later rooted cuttings may be repotted as they need more root room. If 
these have been grown in an intermediate temperature up to the present, 
time it will be necessary to gradually harden them to cold frame tieat- 
ment. For a time after they are placed in this position they must be 
kept moderately close, then gradually hardened and grown with the 
earlier plants. Plants just rooted inboxes can be placed singly in 3-inch 
pots, and kept in a night temperature of 55°, until they are established 
and rooting freely, when they should be placed in cold frames. Any 
plants of Souvenir de la Malmaison which have not thrown up stout 
flower spikes that will produce fine flowers should have them removed. 
The plants may then be placed in 8-inch pots, and grown for 
flowering at this season next year. Use for a compost good fibry loam, 
one-seventh of decayed manure and sand. Water carefully after potting. 
Do not allow the soil to become dust dry. Fumigate with tobacco 
smoke if aphides attack the points of the young shoots. Do not pinch 
the plants, they will branch freely enough if they are well attended to 
and given root room from time to time as they need it. 
Chrysanthemums. —Whether the plants are intended for the pro¬ 
duction of large flowers or as bushes, those rooted early should now be 
placed into their largest pots. It is a mistake to allow them to become 
root-bound and checked before the final potting is done. Drain the pots 
carefully, and press the soil moderately firm into them. Ample room 
should be left for top-dressing after the bud has been taken. Those 
grown on the single-stem principle should be supplied with a stake to 
prevent their being broken by strong winds. Place the plants in a 
sheltered position for a few weeks until all fears of rough winds are 
past. We are screening our plants by means of a few poles and mats 
on the north, east, and west sides. Short poles are driven into the 
ground and the mats secured to them. It is surprising how a simple 
arrangement of this nature will preserve the lower foliage of the 
plants from injury. Pinch the shoots of all plants that are required for 
bushes, and place late-flowering kinds or any intended for that purpose 
into 5 and 6-inch pots. Cuttings may still be rooted and fine flowers 
produced from plants grown without stopping. Syringe the plants 
once or twice daily when the weather is bright, and be careful not to 
overwater them. Any plants that show signs of producing a bud 
should be hurried out of this state as quickly as possible, by pinching 
the plant and removing from the axils of the leaves all lateral growths 
that appear except one near the top. 
Bouvardias. —Plants that were pruned back, shaken out and 
repotted as directed, will be ready for moving into larger pots, the 
size depending upon the size of the plants and the pots they were placed 
in at first. Young plants raised from strong roots and started in 3-inch 
pots may now be placed into 5-inch pots. If the roots were laid into 
boxes the plants may be placed singly in 3-inch pots, or a number 
may be grown together and divided when they are repotted next year. 
Cuttings that have only just been removed from the propagating box 
should be potted singly as soon as they will bear full exposure in any 
structure where the temperature ranges about 60°. Pinch the shoots of 
these as well as the earlier plants, and gradually harden them to cool 
treatment. Nothing is gained by forcing them in strong heat and a 
moist temperature. Under these conditions they soon grow weakly. 
Solanums. —Any shoots that are taking the lead may be pinched, 
and the plants removed as early as possible to cold frames. Be careful 
to pinch the 6hoots of plants raised from cuttings to induce them to 
branch freely. Repot them until they are placed in 5-inch pots, and 
the sooner they are in this size the better if well berried plants are 
needed. 
Cyperus distans. —This plant seeds freely enough provided it is not 
grown in a very warm, moist, and shaded house. Where the plants have 
ripe seed upon them cut off the flower heads and expose them in a dry 
place to the sun to ripen and harden. The seeds will fail to germinate 
if sown directly they are cut from the plants, but after they have 
been well dried they can be sown any time. They then germinate as 
freely as grass seeds. Plants raised from seed sown early in the year 
and pricked into boxes when large enough may now be placed in 
3-inch pots. Do not. grow them too warm or they will draw up weakly, 
and this must be avoided if the best results are to be obtained. 
NOTES ON BEES. 
THE WEATHER. 
Up till- the 10th of May the weather has been wet in the 
extreme, accompanied with severe thunderstorms, sunless, hut mild 
and favourable to vegetation. Fruit and other trees and bushes 
are beautiful in their profusion of blossom, although there is no 
bloom on the Plane trees, a great drawback to the bees when they 
have already suffered so much from unfavourable weather. For 
nearly a week we have had a mean temperature of about 54° Fahr., 
and should it continue with the absence of frosts and high winds, so 
common in years past, the foundation of good and abundant harvests- 
will be secured. 
DISASTROUS YEAR3. 
In some respects these have been of frequent occurrence during 
the past fifty years, but we are liable to think the present the 
worst ; the “ silver lining of the cloud ” always seems obscured in 
the background. The year 1888 will be long remembered as one 
of these, and so will the present spring, although others equally un¬ 
favourable have been experienced ; while the former, unless to hay 
and soft fruit crops, was, we are thankful to say, quite a bountiful 
year. 1860, 1861, and 1862 were a great deal more unfavourable to 
both crops and bees, while about fifty years ago there was one of 
the most disastrous years that we ever experienced. Crops were- 
late and bad, drainage was in its infancy, so to speak, the soil was 
ungenerous, and bees almost died out. In two parishes there 
were about 500 hives ; out of that number only five were saved,, 
one out of 300 and four out of 200. The following year was a 
good one, and one of the individuals who saved two increased his 
stock to eight or nine and sold £14 worth of honey, realising 2s. 6d. 
per lb. That year was about my earliest recollection of bees, and 
well do I remember the bad tasted meal and the disappearance of" 
a long row of bee hives that stood quite openly in front of our 
house and close to the public road. Evil-disposed persons were 
fewer in those days, being kept in order by a few self-appointed 
individuals. 
WINTERING. 
It is not my intention to recount and repeat what I have so 
often stated in these columns, but to take the past winter and 
spring as a criterion for our future guidance. In fact, winter may 
be deleted, because the severest winter has never injured our bees 
to any extent, and there is no practical method of wintering so 
suitable as that of allowing all to remain on their summer’s stand. 
Neither has there been any new method tried or adopted by experi¬ 
mentalists, nor are any of the old methods now being tried likely 
to supersede our method, which may be summarised—plenty of 
bees and a young queen to begin with in August, having 40 lbs. of 
natural stored honey and plenty of pollen, the hive well covered 
with non-conducting porous material, the indispensable ventilating 
floor, and a small doorway, and a porch over the entrance so as to 
exclude the force of the wind and damp-laden atmosphere which 
has been the bane of so many hives this spring. 
It is to the floor, small doorway, and the porch that the reader’s 
attention is principally drawn. A wide doorway in some seasons 
has been proved by me long ago to be an advantage, but it is not 
always to be relied upon, hence our reason for giving it up in 
favour of a narrow one. The argument that a wide doorway is 
advantageous for drying combs is a poor one, for while that may be 
going on the bees will also be weakened and dying—one of the causes 
that clusters of dead bees are found in some hives. The best way to 
test the efficacy or detriment of any plan with bees is to try it with 
a weak colony. In fact, many tests give true results and respond 
to inquiry quickest and most satisfactorily when tested on extreme 
cases. The cause of so many hives succumbing to the cold this 
spring is due to the following causes :—Scarcity of food and pollen ; 
the bees venturing out in search of it never returned. With fed 
hives the same result was obtained, especially those having little or 
no pollen, causing the bees to extend their breeding nest beyond 
Nature’s design, the relaxed cluster and brood consequently dying. 
Wide entrances, and these exposed to the east winds so prevalent, 
have also had an evil influence. 
The following diagram shows how hives may be advantageously 
protected, the square a supposed to be the hive, and b the entrance ; 
C the porch, with a watertight roof, and not less than from 9 to 
