THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
December 2C.J 
190 
less there is something still to be discovered in apiarian , 
science, as in others. My mistake arose l'rom the following 
fact:—My bees were hived Sept. 3, and were fed regularly 
from about three days after that time (I could not get a 
proper feeder before). The weight of contents, exclusive ot 
bees, was on the 18th of the same month, 21 lbs.; on the 
ilCth, 7-J lbs.; on the 1st of Oct., 10 lbs. They had thus in- 
creased 8£ lbs. in five days. Naturally, I concluded that 
storing did not advance much till the hive was filled to a 
considerable extent with combs. For though I attributed 
the great increase at last partly to a great improvement in 
my feeder, which enabled the bees to appropriate nearly as 
much food during the last five days as they did in the first 
fortnight. I did not conceive they could in five days have 
built sufficient fresh comb to store 8 J lbs. of food, and have 
stored it as well. I acknowledge the justice of the observa¬ 
tion, that the sagacity of bees would prevent them from 
building comb with an uncertain prospect of getting any¬ 
thing to fill it ; but I cannot help thinking that, in this case, 
when they found provisions coming in plentifully, they set | 
vigorously to work to enlarge their storehouses, and that 
comb-building went on much faster than storing food. I 
cannot make out, by calculation, that I gave them altogether 
more than 28 lbs. 'of food, besides a little refuse honey in 
combs. However, I believe there was still something to be 
gathered from the mignonette, and the ivy blossoms afforded 
a small supply. 
I must say, I have often felt for the poor exiled bees, 
working w'ith all their might and main from morning till 
night, to lay in a store for winter, while the occupants of my 
other hives were lazily luxuriating on the produce of their 
summer labours, and scarcely stirring from home on the 
finest day. This was partly the reason why I wished to give 
them a hive already to 'some extent furnished. It seems j 
hard to put them so late in the season into an entirely 
empty one. The advantage of forming artificial stocks is 
so great that it is important to consider the best way of 
effecting it. The chief advantage, in my opinion, not to 
mention one’s own interest, is being able to provide a home 
for the bees, which one’s unenlightened neighbours will not 
see that it is to their interest to preserve, and will burn, if 
some benevolent person does not interfere. Even such 
interference is not always effectual. I was refused some bees 
this autumn by a neighbouring farmer, who said, “ he did 
not want to have any trouble wi’ ’em; he should smother 
’em, and have done wi’ ’embut kindly offered me the 
“ dead uns,” if I liked to accept them. It is not always 
advisable, I think, to unite such preserved bees to one’s own 
stocks, supposing these to be sufficiently strong ; and the 
formation of an artificial swarm at once furnishes a habita¬ 
tion to the bees, and increases the number of stocks lor the 
following year. 
A word as to burying. I do not like the notion of con¬ 
signing a hive of bees to the earth for four months of the 
year, however snug they may be in such a condition ; and if 
they do consume two or three pounds more above ground, I 
am far from grudging it them. If I can protect them by 
shading from being tempted out in cold weather, it is all I 
require. Accordingly, I should not be disposed to follow 
the plan to any extent in my own practice—this, however, 
is beside the question. It is of the greatest importance 
that the capabilities of the plan should be fully tested ; and 
the experiments, if successful, will not only furnish new 
facts in the science of bee-keeping, but will be of great 
practical advantage. It will often be expedient, sometimes 
necessary, to adopt the plan once well established. I am 
myself among the experimentalists. 
With regard to the disputed question of honey dew, I have 
seen much of it this year, but never saw a single bee touch 
it, though it was much resorted to by wasps. Can any one 
explain the cause of the humming noise often heard in 
woods ? I have noticed it particularly in fir-trees, and in 
some other trees yielding no blossom. Can it proceed from 
flies ? or has it any connection with the gathering of honey 
dew ?—A Most Edified Reader. 
OBSERVATIONS ON THE CULTURE OF BRITISH 
MOSSES. 
While so many efforts are making by horticulturists to 
bring to perfection their respective favourites in the floral 
world, there is one family or class of plants that have hitherto 
been almost altogether overlooked, at least as far as their 
cultivation is concerned. I refer to the numerous genera of 
Mosses, whose bright green tufts and polished capsules are 
now ornamenting the wall-tops, rocks, and trunks of trees, 
according as these localities are fitted for their growth. 
Though universally admired, even by those who have not 
made them the subject of scientific study, very little has yet 
been done with the view of making them inmates of our 
gardens; more attention, indeed, having been paid—and no 
doubt rightly—to eradicate such species as infest garden- 
walks. There are, however, many species which with a 
little care might easily be cultivated ; and when estab¬ 
lished and well grown would form elegant and beautiful, 
if not strictly showy, objects for the alpine frame or green¬ 
house. Many, also, would do well in a Wardian case. 
Having been engaged for some time in cultivating some of 
the most interesting of these objects, I shall now brieflynax- 
rate the modes I find most useful to secure success in 
growing them, hoping that some of your readers will think 
it worth their while to devote a little time to the same pur¬ 
suit, and throw further light on the subject. 
, Though the mosses have much of a common character, as 
far as their reproductive organs are concerned, they vary 
i much in form, texture, and the localities which they affect. 
Their treatment, therefore, in cultivation must necessarily 
vary. The strictly aquatic genera, Fontinalis, Cinclidotus, 
and some Hypnums, would succeed best where there is a 
constant supply of clear flowing water. Sphagnum, again, as 
I its name of “ Bog-moss ” implies, luxuriates in peat bogs, 
where in process of time it accumulates to a great depth. 
We pass, however, from these to such as grow on banks, 
wall-tops, rocks, or trees ; denoting in the list at the close 
the habitats of such species as we think most easily found, 
and likely to repay the trouble of cultivation. 
A mixture of clay or heavy loam, with rotten sticks, or 
other decaying vegetable matter, is the most suitable soil for 
such as grow on hanks. The pots used should be drained 
till within at least two inches from the top, and a layer of 
thin moss on the surface of the drainage before the earth 
is put in. Some species of Hypnum, or Feather-moss—one 
j of the most beautiful as well as widely diffused of the 
genera—which abound on banks, have a very trailing habit; 
these must be pegged-down on the surface of the pots, and 
j if carefully watered will soon show a profusion ot verdant 
j shoots. "Water should be given to them very carefully, with 
a fine rose ; indeed, with the exception of those always found 
in wet spots, a sprinkling of water on the leaves when they 
appear to shrivel from want of moisture, will be quite suffi¬ 
cient. Dicranum adiantoides, I). Jlexuosum, Hypnum cor- 
d{folium, H. dendroides, Ac., are plants that succeed best in 
pots constantly supplied from below with moisture. 
We next proceed to those whose natural habitat is the sur¬ 
face of rocks and stones. Many species of the genera Tortula, 
Trichostomum and Orthotrichum are found only on these, 
and thus require little earth in the pots in which they are 
j cultivated. A porous stone, whose stu-face is level with the 
top of the pot, is the best situation in which to put any of 
these mosses. In order to give solidity to them, a little 
loose earth may be sprinkled in the interstices between the 
lumps. 
My experiments have not yet been directed to those that 
grow on trees, though I have little doubt that a decaying and 
gnarled branch of some aged monarch of the forest would 
form a fitting dwelling for cultivating many species, and 
present in a stiitable place, as is often seen in a wild state, 
an object of much beauty. It must be remembered in 
making such attempts, that there are species which confine 
themselves to one description of tree. 
In conclusion, it is only necessary to say that care in 
water in g j udi ciously is the matter of the greatest importance 
in the cultivation of the Mosses. In summer they should 
he kept in a cool, shady place, under the shade of shrubs, 
or below a north wall. The back shelves of a greenhouse or a 
pit will give sufficient protection in winter. Besides being 
interesting as objects to admire, the man of science may 
