376 ANNUAL REPORT OF THE Off. Doc. 



equivalent, and with abundant ventilation, the amount of swarming 

 will be at its minimum, some having no more than four or five col- 

 onies swarm out of a hundred. When hot weather comes, it is a 

 good plan to put a block under each corner of the hive so as to 

 raise it something like an inch. 



The same means will do something toward preventing swarms 

 when working for comb honey, but the number of swarms will be 

 much larger. 



The prevention of a second swarm is a more easy matter, and 

 with proper care you may count pretty safely on preventing all 

 swarms after the first. In order to understand fully the matter, 

 it is necessary to explain a little about the habits of bee«. On a 

 summer day, if you will watch a colony of bees, you will see at some 

 time during the heat of the day a large number of bees flying in 

 front of the hive. They are flying about in circles, keeping close to 

 the hive. They are young bees, some of them taking their first 

 flight, and are out for a play-spell. Each bee, as it leaves the hive, 

 turns its head toward the entrance, circling about with its head 

 always toward the hive, circling farther and farther from the hive 

 all the time, apparently noting carefully the hive and its surround- 

 ings. It is marking the location of the hive. When about sixteen 

 days old it becomes a field hand, and then it acts quite differently. 

 It wastes no time when leaving the hive, but shoots out in a straight 

 line for the fields, and on its return comes back on the same bee- 

 line directly to the location it hrs previously so carefully marked. 

 If, w'hile it is out in the field, you take away its hive and put another 

 in its place, it does not look for its hive, but goes straight for its 

 old place. More than this, if you take a hive from its stand and 

 put another in its place, all the field bees of the removed hive, when 

 they start to the field, will shoot straight out without noticing any 

 change, and when they come back will go straight to the old location, 

 even if they do not leave the hive for a day of two after the change 

 has been made. 



Another thing. Bees seem to know that if the honey harvest stops, 

 they can hardly afford to swarm; and even after cells are started, 

 if the yield ceases, they will tear down the cells and give up the idea 

 of swarming. 



Understanding these habits of bees, we may take advantage of it 

 to prevent all swarming after the first swarm. When the first swarm 

 issues, put the swarm in the place of the old hive, setting the old 

 hive close beside it, both facing the same way. A week later take 

 away the old hive and set it in a new place a rod or so distant. If 

 other hives are sitting near, it is not necessary to move it farther 

 than beyond the noarpst hive. During the week since the swarming, 

 a great many young bees have hatched out in the old hive, and it has 



