July 20. 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
277 
i cheap rate. But little purchased material will be necessary 
i for some time. The thinnings of the allotment, with some 
| Indian corn meal, oat, or barley meal, &c., to correct a loose 
I habit, engendered by the free use of green materials, will 
be found a sure economy. As to the purchase of meals, 
we are not sure how this matter rests. We have been pig- 
feeders some twenty-live years, and have tried all the meals. 
Bran, here, is too dear for its quality. Indian com meal has 
been the greatest favourite of late in these parts; perhaps 
owing to its comparative cheapness, generally from 15s. to 
18s. per load, of 240 lbs., and it is a truly good thing. 
Barley meal is too well known to need description—always 
a good pig food; pork flavour is understood to be of a capital 
character from this food. Oatmeal makes a capital gruel 
for young pigs, where a breeding sow is kept; it remains 
suspended where barley meal would sink. Beans should be 
used with caution, and should be well cooked; they are 
rather apt to swell and produce constipated bowels. How¬ 
ever, districts differ; people must be in part ruled by the 
neighbourhood they live in. Now that the direful potato 
disease has set in again with a virulent appearance (?), fa¬ 
voured by high atmospheric conditions, we fear that many 
broad acres will go to the swine and other stock, and in that 
event they will take the place of meal up to feeding-time. 
We have a good deal to say about breeding sows, as well as 
store pigs; and these things, with the cow, must pass on to 
future papers. B. Errington. 
THE APIARIAN’S CALENDAR.— August. 
By J. II. Payne, Esq., Author oJ'“ The Bce-Kccpcr's Guide." 
The Season. —The honey-gathering season this year has 
been a most extraordinary one. Continued rains during the 
usual time of swarming, so that up to the end of June very 
little or no honey was stored; and, indeed, many stocks 
were lighter at that time than they were in April. Bees, in 
such a season as this has been, will be subject to all sorts of 
vagaries; and owing to the continued succession of rainy 
weather during part of May, and nearly the whole of June, 
which has proved an obstacle to swarming, no doubt many 
embryo queens were destroyed, and thus prime swarms as 
well as after-swarming was put a stop to. Since the hot 
weather of July has set in honey-gathering has gone on 
rapidly, and much of fine quality has been stored in the 
supers; but from the unusually high temperature it is feared 
that its duration will be but short, and that the hot weather 
will dry up all the flowers, as the wet washed their predeces¬ 
sors away. 
Melted Combs. — Complaints are reaching me of the 
combs of early swarms having been melted by the heat of 
the sun. Shading should always be had recourse to in such 
weather as that of the middle of this July, and more espe¬ 
cially so for swarms of the year. In those cases where it 
has unfortunately taken place, it will bo better to shade im¬ 
mediately, and nothing more, leaving the rest that is to be 
done entirely to the bees. 
Additional Room. —Although the time for swarming may 
be considered past, yet, where bees are seen to persist in 
clustering outside tire hive, additional room should be afforded 
them ; but whatever kind of super is added, it should not 
exceed in depth four or five inches at the most, at this 
advanced period of the honey season. 
Transporting Hives. —I should imagine that after such a 
season as this, and in the prospect of a fine autumn, every 
person whose locality admits of it will embrace the oppor¬ 
tunity of sending his hives to the moors. The advantages 
must be incalculable; not only in the quantity, but in the 
delicious quality of the honey there obtained. I can almost 
i fancy, while writing, that I have its delicious flavour on my 
palate. 
Taking off Glasses or Honey. —Some persons, I doubt 
not, are beginning to be anxious to possess themselves of a 
few glasses of honey from their bees. If the combs are sealed 
up they may be taken, but I would recommend every one 
who attempts it during hot weather to be more than com¬ 
monly careful how they remove them, or the combs will fall 
out. 
WHAT BREED OF POULTRY IS LIKELY TO 
PROVE MOST PROFITABLE TO THE 
FARMER AND COTTAGER? 
This, after all, is the main question, for the solution of 
which we must look to the now rapidly increasing poultry 
exhibitions, since it is evident, that the public interest and 
support that has been so extensively accorded to these 
societies can only be maintained by such practical evidence 
of the benefits wrought by them for the above classes. 
It is, indeed, more than probable, that without the skill ! 
and outlay that in the beginning was so liberally bestowed ' 
on poultry matters by amateurs and fanciers, general atten¬ 
tion would not have been sufficiently drawn to this subject, 
nor would such acquisitions of really pure and valuable 
breeds of poultry have been effected as now encourage the 
efforts of the farmer and cottager, who possess the means 
of keeping a few fowls, to replace the comparatively un¬ 
profitable barn-door, or other mongrel races, with birds 
whose excellence and merits have been well tested and 
thoroughly proved. 
Following the Birmingham classification, let us commence 
with the Spanish, for which I can now venture to say but 
little for the purpose we have in view. Their present price 
alone would indeed be as yet a bar, for really good speci¬ 
mens will readily sell from two guineas to three guineas per 
pair. They are, certainly, very beautiful birds, laying a large 
number of eggs, but difficult both to hatch and rear, and 
requiring greater care and attention than would be con¬ 
sistent with a profitable return. Whenever their price may 
become more moderate, they will doubtless be sought after 
where eggs can be profitably disposed of. 
With regard to Dorkinys, I feel much hesitation in speak¬ 
ing of then' comparative merits, so many excellent judges 
and skilled poultry-keepers thinking so far more highly of 
them than I as yet am disposed to do. But bearing in 
mind that this breed has not been as yet commonly kept in 
this county (Cornwall^, it is not unlikely that their good 
qualities may appear to better advantage when we know 
more of them. Of several very fine specimens sent down 
by Mr. Baillie, of Mount-street, Grosvenor-square, and other 
known judges, the chickens have not shown such rapid 
growth and hardy constitutions as would give them pre¬ 
eminence over other breeds. As regards eggs, I have not 
found them by any means remarkable layers; and the 
young chickens are not unfrequently found so weak in the 
shell as to require assistance. Judging from the account 
given of the Dorkings in the best works on poultry, it would 
seem that there is often great delicacy of constitution, and 
that it is only by the constant judicious intermixture of 
fresh blood that degeneracy is avoided. I last year was in 
possession of some good specimens of white Dorkings, my 
experience of which would lead me to this same conclusion ; 
and only last week I hatched a nest of grey Dorkings, all 
of which, but one, required assistance in emerging from the 
shell, though hatched by a hen remarkable for her excel¬ 
lence as a sitter. My neighbours, who are poultry-keepers, 
give me the same account; but it is very possible that 
others may form a different estimate of their merits, and 
that I may be mistaken in thus questioning their fitness for 
the general purposes of the poultry-keeper. 
We now come to the Cochin-Chinas, a race, judging from 
imported specimens, containing several varieties. In the 
view we are now taking we shall have to lay aside all points 
which are merely matters of taste to the fanciers of these 
line birds. For instance : the pale buff and fawn colours, 
at present so much coveted, would be the last I should ; 
recommend for the purposes of profit, since it seems that . 
the darker birds not only possess a more vigorous habit, 
but also attain a much greater weight. Of some hundreds • 
of young birds, bred by different persons, that I have lately 
seen, the dark red and partridge-coloured cockerels are 
many of them from five pounds to six pounds in weight— 
a size I have not seen attained by any of the lighter colours 
at the same age. The white Cochin-Chinas ore, indeed, 
splendid birds, of robust shape, and, as I believe (never 
having had any in my own possession), equally hardy with 
the others; but from their present value it must be some 
time before they can be generally obtainable by the classes 
for whose information these observations are made. 
