February  G,  1896. 
JOURNAL  OF  HORTICULTURE  AND  COTTAGE  GARDENER. 
129 
m 
rr~F: 
m  BEE-KEEPER. 
I  ■  I  •  I  •  I  .  I  •  I  •  1  •  I  ■  I  .  l  ■  I  ■  I  •  I  •  f-l  ■!  -  T.|  .  I  .1  .  |.|  -1 
APIARIAN  NOTES. 
Age  of  Bees. 
“A  Surrey  Novice”  at  page  107  draws  my  attention  to  a  crude 
and  ungrammatical  sentence,  which  is  more  likely  due  to  the  want 
of  sleep  than  napping.  The  sentence  will  perhaps  be  more 
intelligible  this  way.  My  youngest  bees  are  at  least  five  months 
old,  while  the  majority  of  them  are  several  months  older. 
After  our  bees  were  taken  to  the  moors  nearly  a  fortnight  of 
very  untoward  weather  set  in,  every  hive  started  brood-drawing  at 
its  commencement,  and  by  the  time  the  warm  but  sunless  weather 
set  in  there  was  no  brood  in  the  hives.  When  the  honey  flow 
began,  and  the  weather  was  still  wet,  egg-laying  commenced 
again  ;  but  about  a  week  after,  when  the  temperature  lowered  the 
last  week  in  August,  every  cell  of  brood  was  emptied,  and,  unlike 
their  performance  in  other  seasons,  was  never  resumed,  although 
the  weather  improved  at  the  end  of  September  up  to  the  middle 
of  October. 
According  to  the  statement  sometimes  made  that  bees  live  only 
thirty-five  days  in  the  summer,  there  would  not  be  a  living  bee  in 
any  of  my  hives  by  the  middle  of  October.  But  instead  of  having 
an  api.iry  of  empty  hives,  I  question  if  there  are  better  in  the 
country,  old  as  they  are,  that,  together  with  the  multitude  of  young 
bees  now  showing  at  every  hive,  augur  well  for  the  coming 
summer. 
In  1894,  as  well  as  in  previous  years,  I  took  joined  swarms  of 
bees  to  the  Heather  which  were  hived  in  the  middle  of  June. 
These  colonies  stored  nearly  a  hundred  pounds  of  super  honey 
during  August  and  September,  times  and  circumstances  during 
which,  according  to  some  theorists,  there  would  be  no  bees  to 
gather  honey.  By  stimulating  bees  to  breed  after  August  to  have 
young  ones  to  survive  the  winter  is  unsafe,  and  a  process  which 
soon  makes  a  queen  old  and  the  hive  unprofitable. 
When  I  hear  and  read  that  about  dead  bees  being  on  the  floor 
of  the  hive,  stating  “they  are  old  bees,”  I  know  differently. 
Bees  do  not  die  from  old  age  inside  the  hive,  as  when  the 
inevitable  stage  is  reached  they  leave  the  hive.  I  hope  these  hints 
will  be  the  means  of  putting  some  on  the  right  track,  as  they  are 
undoubtedly  accurate. — A  Lanarkshire  Bee-keeper. 
A  Successful  Octogenarian  Bee-keeper. 
Lately  I  received  a  letter  from  Ireland,  in  which  the  writer 
expressed  the  benefit  he  had  received  from  Journal  of  Horti¬ 
culture  over  a  long  period  of  years  ;  and  he  wound  up  by  asking  if 
I  was  the  “Lanarkshire  Bee-keeper”  he  was  addressing.  A 
subsequent  letter  contained  some’very  interesting  matter,  including 
the  following  :  — 
“There  is  a  grand  old  bee-keeper  in  a  neighbouring  county  to 
this  ;  he  is  a  clergyman.  He  had  Langstroth’s  hives  and  frames  when 
they  first  came  out,  some  time  long  before  the  so-called  Standard, 
and  still  sticks  to  them  ;  he  never  had  a  bad  honey  year,  his  worst 
was  in  one  of  the  seventy’s  ;  he  fed  up  £10  worth  of  sugar  that  year, 
in  July,  to  prevent  starving,  and  sold  £30  worth  honey  in  August. 
In  1893  he  sold  £93  worth,  and  told  me  that  he  never  came  so  close 
before  to  the  £100  as  in  1894.  I  do  not  know  his  last  year’s 
returns.  He  had  13,000  sections  off  in  August,  and  being  eighty- 
two  years  old  and  delicate,  complained  he  could  not  take  off  the 
rest.  He  has  fifty  to  sixty  hives  in  a  good  place.” 
Had  that  clergyman  yielded  to  the  clamour  for  a  Standard  hive 
he  would  not  have  to-day  to  rejoice  in  such  large  yields  of  honey. 
As  important  to  bee  keepers  as  the  above  is  the  closing  part  of  his 
letter,  which  reads,  “I  shall  tell  you  some  time  about  my  bees  and 
foul  brood.  It  is  well  the  ‘scientists’  have  given  up  recom¬ 
mending  medicine  as  a  certain  cure  in  all  cases  ;  or,  indeed,  I  shall 
let  them  know  it  is  no  such  thing.”  Were  it  only  for  exposing  the 
so-called  “  certain  cures  of  foul  brood,”  and  the  nostrums  advertised 
to  effect  such,  the  Journal  of  Horticulture  would  have  done  good 
service  to  bee-keepers. 
At  an  important  meeting  of  bee-keepers — converts  to  the 
Standard  hive — one  of  its  greatest  advocates  declared  that,  “  not¬ 
withstanding  all  that  had  been  said,  the  Lanarkshire  hive  in  one  or 
other  of  its  forms  was  the  coming  hive.”  I  am  quite  cognisant  of 
the  opposition,  and  the  cause  of  it,  to  the  hives  and  system  of 
managing  them  ;  therefore  advise  bee-keepers  to  test  the  matter 
for  themselves.  “  When  doctors  differ  patients  should  decide.” — 
A  Lanarkshire  Bee-keeper. 
SEASONABLE  NOTES. 
The  fine  weather  experienced  during  the  past  month  is  worthy 
of  note  by  bee-keepers.  The  phenomenal  mildness  of  the  season, 
and  the  bright  sunny  days  of  the  last  week  in  January,  will  long 
be  remembered  by  those  who  are  interested  in  the  pleasurable 
pastime  of  bee-keeping  ;  the  rainfall,  too,  being  much  below  the 
average,  only  registering  half  an  inch.  The  first  two  months  of 
1895  were  noted  for  the  extremely  low  temperature  that  prevailed 
throughout  the  country.  Many  stocks  of  bees  were  found  to  be 
dead  in  the  spring,  but  those  that  were  judiciously  managed  were 
strong  and  healthy,  thus  showing  that  bees  if  well  supplied  with 
stores  at  the  proper  time,  and  protected  with  plenty  of  warm 
coverings  on  the  top  of  the  frames,  although  the  hives  were  otherwise 
exposed  to  all  weathers,  with  bottom  ventilation,  they  came  out 
strong  and  healthy.  Bees  worked  on  these  lines,  I  am  convinced, 
will  winter  well  in  the  open  through  the  most  severe  weather  we 
are  likely  to  experience  in  this  country. 
But  what  effect  is  the  abnormally  mild  weather  likely  to  have 
on  the  bees?  is  the  question  asked  by  a  reader.  Bees  have  been 
on  the  wing  almost  daily,  and  owing  to  their  activity  stores  will 
have  decreased  rapidly.  Breeding  has  commenced  in  the  majority 
of  stocks,  with  a  corresponding  increase  in  the  consumption  of 
stores. 
On  comparing  notes  made  during  the  past  I  am  convinced  that 
bees  consume  more  food  during  a  mild  winter  than  when  the 
weather  is  severe,  a  fact  that  should  be  borne  in  mind  by  bee¬ 
keepers,  who,  through  various  causes,  may  find  their  bees  are  short 
of  the  necessary  food.  Such  stocks  will  often  commence  breeding 
daring  a  spell  of  fine  weather,  but  the  brood  will  be  turned  out  of 
the  hive  at  once  should  a  few  days  of  extra  cold  set  in. 
All  stocks  ought  to  be  examined,  and  if  found  to  be  short  of 
stores  I  have  found  a  cake  of  soft  candy  placed  on  the  top  of  the 
frames  carry  them  over  the  crisis.  If  examined  every  ten  days, 
giving  them  more  when  required,  no  harm  will  happen,  breeding 
will  go  on  apace,  and  the  stocks  invariably  come  out  strong  and 
healthy  in  the  spring.  Some  bee-keepers  object  to  candy,  and 
may  have  good  reason  for  so  doing,  but  judging  from  that 
which  I  have  long  used  I  am  of  opinion  that  there  is  no  food 
to  equal  it  at  this  season  with  the  exception  of  their  natural  sealed 
up  stores,  as  it  is  too  early  to  feed  with  syrup  ;  in  fact  I  have  known 
bees  starve  with  a  plentiful  supply  of  syrup  within  their  reach. 
There  is  a  possibility  of  severe  weather  during  the  next  two 
months  ;  it  is,  therefore,  a  wise  precaution  to  keep  all  colonies 
covered  and  well  supplied  with  food.  Removal  and  re-arranging  of 
hives,  if  desired,  should  be  carried  out  without  delay,  choosing  a 
dull  day  for  the  purpose,  for  if  left  till  late  in  the  spring  many 
bees  will  be  lost  in  returning  to  their  old  stands. — An  English 
Bee-keeper. 
•#°  All  correspondence  should  be  directed  either  to  “  The 
Editor  ’’  or  to  “  The  Publisher.”  Letters  addressed  to 
Dr.  Hogg  or  members  of  the  staff  often  remain  unopened 
unavoidably.  We  request  that  no  one  will  write  privately 
to  any  of  our  correspondents,  as  doing  so  subjects  them  to 
unjustifiable  trouble  and  expense. 
Correspondents  should  not  mix  up  on  the  same  sheet  questions 
relating  to  Gardening  and  those  on  Bee  subjects,  and  should 
never  send  more  than  two  or  three  questions  at  once.  All 
articles  intended  for  insertion  should  be  written  on  one  side  of 
the  paper  only.  We  cannot  reply  to  questions  through  the  post, 
and  we  do  not  undertake  to  return  rejected  communications. 
Catalpas  (F.  iff.). — The  trees  to  which  you  refer  are  Catalpas.  We 
cannot  tell  you  “all  about  them,”  but  you  will  find  a  good  deal  iu  an 
article  on  page  120  that  will  interest  you  and  presumably  other  readers. 
Fuchsias  at  3£ew  (IF.  L.'). — We  have  seen  others  besides  the 
species  you  name  grown  in  outdoor  beds  at  Kew,  including  a  charming 
display  of,  we  think,  the  small-flowered  Riccartonh  In  no  other  way 
can  you  obtain  such  reliable  information  on  the  subject  as  by  writing  to 
the  Curator,  Royal  Gardens,  Kew,  who  will  readily  answer  your  letter. 
Apple  from  Ribston  Pippin  Tree  QWaUunian). — If  the  fruits 
sent  have  been  produced  by  a  branch  direct  from  the  Ribston  Pippin 
part  of  the  tree,  and  not  from  the  stock  on  which  the  Ribston  was 
grafted,  the  sport  is  a  remarkable  one.  Even  if  the  growth  has  issued 
from  the  stock  the  variety  is  noteworthy,  as  if  the  fruit  is  not  identical 
with,  it  has  a  very  close  resemblance  to,  the  “  new  ”  Beauty  of  Stoke, 
which  was  not  long  ago  certificated  by  the  Royal  Horticultural 
Society.  It  is  a  beautiful  conical  Apple,  faultless  in  symmetry,  and 
worthy  of  increase  by  grafting. 
