But if you have any spare space—and there are always nooks and spots available in the smallest garden—sow on these lemon-thyme in abundance, rosemary, lavender, salvia, borage, mignonette, and crocus. Apple-trees, gooseberry and currant-trees, and above all, raspberry-plants, are great favourites with bees; and as their blossoms come early in spring, they are most seasonable and productive. But your chief reliance must be on neighbouring acres of bean-fields and buckwheat or clover meadows, heather and furze, and hedge-blossoms. Lime-trees are very valuable; I wish people would allow thorn-hedges to blossom. Let me urge the cottager to use for the edging of his garden lemon-thyme instead of box or daisies. Do not fear keeping a dozen stocks. I think many apiarians talk nonsense when they allege that a district may be overstocked with bee-hives. If the surrounding country be wholly arable, with little common, and with too good farming, it may be overstocked. But there are still left commons unenclosed, woods and heath, and clover and tiny weeds, which farmers persecute and bee-masters love; and far off are gardens of all sorts and sizes, in which flowers are cultivated for the owners' pleasure, constituting admirable bee-pasture. I only regret there is such a wide-spread rage for double flowers, for bees never touch them. On that magnificent standard rose, so rich in delicious perfume and so very lovely, a bee never alights; but the briar and hedge-rose are favourites and much frequented. On the Clyde, it is usual for bee-proprietors to carry their hives to Arran, Dunoon, and Kilmun, as soon as the heather comes into blossom; and cottagers take charge of them at a shilling apiece. The hives often therefrom receive great and remunerative additions.
Dr. Bevan states:—
"In Lower Egypt, where the flower-harvest is not so early by several weeks as in the upper districts of that country, this practice of transportation is carried on to a considerable extent. About the end of October the hives, after being collected together from the different villages, and conveyed up the Nile, marked and numbered by the individuals to whom they belong, are heaped pyramidally upon the boats prepared to receive them, which, floating gradually down the river, and stopping at certain stages of their passage, remain there a longer or a shorter time, according to the produce which is afforded by the surrounding country. After travelling three months in this manner, the bees, having culled the perfumes of the orange flowers of the Said, the essence of roses of the Faiocum, the treasures of the Arabian jessamine, and a variety of flowers, are brought back about the beginning of February to the places from which they have been carried. The productiveness of the flowers at each respective stage is ascertained by the gradual descent of the boats in the water, and which is probably noted by a scale of measurement. This industry procures for the Egyptians delicious honey and abundance of bees'-wax. The proprietors, in return, pay the boatmen a recompense proportioned to the number of hives which have thus been carried about from one extremity of Egypt to the other."
Richardson sensibly remarks:—
"Water carriage, when procurable, is the best, as it shakes the hives least, but when land carriage must be resorted to, the hives should be carried on poles slung on men's shoulders. The journey should be pursued at night only, and the bees suffered to go forth and feed during the day. Such is their instinct, that they will readily find their way back; but they should not be suffered to go forth until at the distance of upwards of ten or eleven miles from their original home, otherwise they will be lost in endeavouring to regain it—a moderate distance induces them to abandon the idea, and to become reconciled to their new quarters. If travelling by canal, the hives should be removed from the boat, and placed on stands at some distance from the bank, ere the insects are let out, otherwise they will be lost in thousands by falling into the water on their return. The charge made by shepherds for taking care of the hives during a season is from one shilling to eighteen-pence each. It is better to pay a trifle over and above the usual fee, in order to prevent your hives being placed too near to each other, or to those of other parties; for if your weak stocks happen to be placed near the strong ones of some one else, you will stand a fair chance of having them all killed in encounters with their more powerful neighbours. It would be well also to see that your hives are placed in a situation where they will be safe from the attacks of cattle or other foes. Before fetching the hives home again from the heath, it will not be amiss to ascertain their condition and weight, and to take from them what honey they can spare. I must here inform you how to ascertain the state or wealth of a hive."
On the subject of removing bees to the heather in August, Mr. Briggs makes the following useful and practical remarks:—
"In the vicinity of extensive heaths, the bees are removed to them about the beginning or middle of August, according to the season. The usual practice is to raise each hive with small wedges in the evening, to induce the bees to congregate together at the top of the hive. The hives are then firmly fixed to the bottom boards, or tied up in cloths, and conveyed in the night, or very early in the morning, to the garden of a shepherd or other person whose residence adjoins the heath. All hives and swarms are taken, including old and young ones, and the persons who receive them usually charge a shilling for each hive during the season. The hives are thus very frequently crammed together as close as they can stand, and the consequences are that much fighting and loss of life is often caused, and the weak stocks of one person are frequently partly destroyed and robbed of their stores and killed by the stronger ones belonging to other persons. When the blooming of the heath is over, the old stocks are, in general, suffocated on the spot, to obtain possession of the fruits of their labours, and those intended for winter stocks are conveyed home by their respective owners.
"The above system of managing bees at the heather is susceptible of material alterations and improvements. I would suggest that it would be of great advantage to the owners of bees residing within twenty miles' distance, if the proprietors or occupiers of residences adjoining the heath were to extend the accommodation by enclosing a larger extent of ground which is suitable for the purposes desired. It might be cheaply and expeditiously performed by hiring a few dozen of stout stakes, &c., from the neighbouring farmers for the season, and having the bars of them full of coarse thorns, briars, furze, or other convenient or suitable materials, to prevent the inroads of cattle and other depredators.
"I would recommend that none but strong stocks be taken to the heath, until arrangements are made for their convenience and accommodation; and that the collateral system of side hives, &c., be practised with them whilst they are at the heath, as well as on other occasions."
Where there is no water conveyance, a hive may be suspended from each end of a long pole, which may be carried on the shoulder to the neighbourhood of a common, in August, not less than four miles from your garden, and put in charge of a reliable cottager.