December 25. 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
199 
opinion, that shallow, wide hives are best adapted for their 
intended object, and this form presents an improved out¬ 
ward appearance. One main feature consists in each box 
having its own independent floor, and top-board, giving 
facilities for moving, unknown to any other hive. Through 
these the holes are so cut, as to admit the use, at pleasure, 
either of two small, or one large glass, for those who prefer 
them to the box super. The stock-box can be made with 
the usual single entrance, or it may have two distinct door¬ 
ways, near the extremities of the front. In summer, both 
entrances are opened, but in winter one of them may be 
closed, by which means the bees (being in a shallow box) 
are farther removed from the influence of cold air, than 
when the door is in the centre. 
Besides the hives already mentioned, the Exhibition con¬ 
tained nothing original, or very good, beyond mere modifica¬ 
tions of old things—nothing to give even a new idea; and the 
same remarks are equally applicable to the foreign exhibitors. 
I will now endeavour to fulfil my promise in giving a 
description of Mr. Kitchener's ventilated passage as exhibited 
in the Crystal Palace. This very ingenious contrivance, by 
means of which the two splendid glasses of honey (by far 
the best in the exhibition) were obtained, is made of half¬ 
inch deal, the upper side of which is twelve inches-and- 
tliree-quarters, by twenty-two-and-a-half. The under side 
ten inches, by nineteen-and-a-half, leaving a space of one 
incli-and-an-eighth between it, and a rim of an inch which 
surrounds the upper side. This space of an inch-and-an- 
eighth round the under side is filled up with perforated zinc; 
the two boards are kept at the distance of three-eighths of an 
inch from each other by means of blocks; the under board 
has a circular hole in its centre, fig. 4, of three inches-and-a- 
lialf, and the upper one two of the same size, figs. 2 and 1, 
the centre of each being five inches-and-three-quarters from 
the end. A slide, fig. -‘3, is fixed near the middle, for the 
purpose of cutting off the communication when necessary 
between the glasses. The ventilator as exhibited is now 
with Messrs. Neighbour and Sons, 127, High Holborn, who, 
I am sure, will have pleasure in shewing it to any one 
who may call on them for that purpose. 
And now a word or two as to the method of using it, 
which Mr. Kitchener has done with undeviating success in 
the summers of 1848, 1849, and 1850. In the first place, 
he puts on to the stock hive, a small super in the ordinary 
manner, and it is not until this super is half-full of comb, 
and quite full of bees, that he begins to use the ventilator. 
He then lifts up the super, and places the ventilator upon 
the stock hive, putting the super on the hole, fig. 1, of the 
ventilator. In a favourable season it is not long before 
more room is required, and he does this by placing an 
empty super between the original super and the ventilator. 
A lien the last super is partly full of comb, and full of bees, 
he then, and not till then, moves it to hole, fig. 2 (of course 
then opening the internal communication, fig 9), and he has 
then generally to place yet another super beneath the first; 
and in one or two instances he has had to put on a fourth, 
two over each hole. The great point to be attended to, is 
not to make use of the ventilator too soon. 
The advantages Mr. Kitchener considers to be great; 
first, there is no brood in the,supers, for he has never yet 
had an instance of a queen being hardy enough to traverse 
the aerated passage; and, secondly, there is no discolouration 
or impurity; the heat and steam ascending from the hive is 
checked by the ventilator, and the perforated zinc at the 
side is made quite wet and discoloured by it; this he 
considers a very great advantage, and the purity of the 
honey is still further preserved by the reduction of the heat 
in the supers, effected by a division of the masses of bees. 
Still he is free to admit that in this last summer he was not 
so successful as before, but this he attributes to the season; 
yet he has great confidence that in a favourable season, and 
for such only it is intended, an apiarian may, by the use of 
this simple machine, greatly improve the quality of the 
honey, and lessen the chance of losing all by an untimely 
swarm. He further says, that if it fails with any one, it 
will arise from a too hasty use of it, and this is the caution 
it is necessaiy strongly to impress on any one intending to 
give it a trial. It may be well to observe, that this machine 
is more especially intended to be used in a bee-house; if 
used abroad, some protection from wet must be afforded. 
Stock Hives. —All the attention that will be required 
during January, will be on a mild clay to clean the floor¬ 
boards, and to see that they are free from damp, and that 
the coverings of the hives effectually keep out the weather; 
should it, however, unfortunately be found that damp exists 
in a hive, it will be better to exchange the floor-board at 
once for a perfectly dry one, and to go on to do so once 
a-week through the winter, or till all appearance of damp 
ceases to show itself. 
- Miner’s American Bee-keeper’s Manual. —Having been 
very much amused with the author’s opinion of straw hives, 
and the manner in which he expresses himself upon the 
subject, I cannot forbear giving a short extract. He says, 
“ Straw hives are not much used in this country (America), 
and they never would have been made in any country, but 
for their cheapness. The peasantry of Europe, who are not 
able to furnish their apiaries with wooden hives, still con¬ 
tinue in the use of those made of straw; I consider this 
kind of hive as wholly unfit for the use of people who live 
in a land of plenty, and who are able to make wooden ones 
at a rate but a little dearer than those made of straw. 
Straw hives are only worthy of a state of abject poverty, and 
I hope I shall never see one in this land of milk and honey, 
where every man can sit down to his “ roast beef and plum 
pudding,” and go to bed with his pockets jingling with 
“ mint drops.” 
Straw Hives. —The time is fast approaching for having 
a supply of new hives, and where those of straw are used, I 
would recommend a swarm never to be put into an old hive; 
the old hives will be useful as covers to glasses, and for 
hiving second and third swarms that are to be joined to 
others on the evening of the day they swarm. "Where wood 
hives are used a second time, great care must be taken to 
make them thoroughly clean, and free from the eggs of 
moths. The little alteration made in the form of my 
improved cottage hive, I feel assured will prove a great 
advantage; my hive-maker is now busily employed in making 
them to meet the coming demand. The price, I find, will 
not be affected by the alteration in size. 
MANAGEMENT OF BOULTRY IN A CONFINED 
SPACE. 
If you think the annexed worthy of a place in your 
Cottage Gardener, accept it as from the pen of a practical 
man. I have long looked for an article from a fowl fancier, 
who keeps his birds up, or at least, like myself, who has no 
croft, or any larger place than something like six or eight 
