SWARMING. 



431 



SWARMING. 



You will scarcely appreciate the absence 

 of large trees and the presence of small un- 

 dergrowth until you have had an apiary so 

 circumstanced whereby swarming has not 

 half the terrors to the bee-keeper as where 

 the clusters are just as likely as not to at- 

 tach themselves to high positions. 



The method we have just described ap- 

 plies when the queen's wings are not clip- 

 ped, either because we do not wish to muti- 

 late her fair proportions 

 or because she happens to 

 be young. Wisely, a great 

 many apiarists prefer to 

 clip their queens' wings. 

 Perhaps we might say a 

 majority do so, because it 

 saves the use of expensive 

 tools, tree-climbing, and, to 

 a great extent, prevents 

 swarms uniting. 



HOW TO BRING HOME A 



SWARM A MILE OR SO 



FROM THE APIARY. 



A swarm will sometimes 

 escape and be traced a mile 

 or so from the bee-yard. 

 At other times a farmer 

 will report that a swarm of 

 bees is hanging to one of 

 his trees, and that, if the 

 bee-man will come and 

 hive them, he can have 

 them. A good swarm is 

 always worth going after; 

 but how shall it be brought 

 back with the least expen- 

 diture of time when bees 

 are ^warming at home? At 

 our apiary we have been in 

 the habit of sending one of 

 our yard-men on a bicycle, 

 equipped with a burlap 

 sack, a pair of pruning- 

 shears and a smoker, these 

 latter fastened to the rider. 

 The bicycle enables him to 

 make a quick trip, and on 

 arrival the bag is quietly 

 slipped around the cluster 

 of bees, if attached to a 

 limb of a tree, and tied. The pruning-shears 

 cut the limb, when bag and all is slung over 

 the liandle-bars, or carried in one hand 

 while the other guides the machine home. 



PLURAL SWARMS UNITING. 



When the swarming-note is heard in the 

 apiary it seems to carry with it an infec- 



tion ; this may be a mistake, but in no other 

 way can we account for swarms issuing one 

 after another while the first is in the air, 

 unless they hear the sound and hasten to go 

 and do likewise. Of course, they will all 

 unite in one, and as many as a dozen have 

 been known to come out in this way and go 

 off to the woods in a great army of bees be- 

 fore any thing could be done to stop them. 

 If your queens are clipped, and you " hustle 



NOT CROSS BEES, BUT A CROSS OF BEES. 



around" and get them all in cages deposited 

 in front of the hives, they usually separate 

 and each bee goes where it belongs. Unless 

 employing plenty of help you will be unable 

 to get the hives all moved away and a new 

 hive fixed for each one before they come 

 back. In this case they will return to their 

 old hive, and, if the queen is released, will 



