SWARM CATCHINC4, HIVING. AND TRANSFERRING. 93 



A bee-keejier's ideal should be, as far as possible, to prevent 

 swarming. The building of comb and the preparation for swarm- 

 ing are two luxuries that bees delight to indulge in ; but they 

 are far too expensive for the bee-keeper's profits, because both 

 comb-constructing and swarm-producing are carried on at the 

 ex/pense of the honey stores. It must be remembered that these 

 after or maiden swarms, and also casts, are largely made up of 

 young bees that have seen very little field labour, and the with- 

 drawal of these from an established colony is a heavy drain on the 

 labour market of the aforesaid colony ; whereas, if they can be 

 kept as inmates of what I may term their own home, they will 

 add to the exchequer of their owner. 



A mercantile person would consider cent, per cent, a superb 

 profit for business purposes, and a sheep or cattle farmer would 

 rejoice at a hundi'edfold as the increase of his stock for the year ; 

 and so should a bee-keeper. 



As there are mechanical aids to produce swarming, so there 

 are mechanical aids to prevent it. Of course, if the bee-keeper's 

 ideal is in obtaining a large number of hives of bees, then he 

 should husband all casts and after-swarms ; but, I must repeat, 

 it can only be done at the expense of his honey profit. True, it 

 is possible, in a very short space of time, to increase an apiary 

 to some hundreds of colonies by means of natural and artificial 

 swarming, providing the locality will carr}' such a stock as it 

 regards honey-producing plants. Even if some of the colonies of 

 this extensive increase be weak, with proper . management they 

 can be brought up to the required strength; but honey must not 

 be expected during the period of strengthening the weak colonies- 

 Let us see what are the mechanical aids to prevent swarm- 

 ing. We all know, or should do so by this time, that old queens 

 are drone-layers, and the older they become the more drones they 

 produce. Now, nothing will prevent an old queen from becoming 

 a drone layer, any more tlian we can prevent an old mammal from 

 becoming sterile. You may put in whole sheets of foundation 

 comb, and cut out drone cells by the thousand, but the queen will 

 lay drone eggs in spite of you. If she has nowhere else to deposit 

 them she will put them in the worker cells. Drones are always 

 kept alive at the expense of the storage of honey. They have only 

 one use — one of the aids to reproduction. When that is accom- 

 plished the bees themselves get rid of them. During this period 

 they have been occupying valuable room by their superabund- 



