WHY BEES SWARM 



the old hive with its brood and few remain- 

 ing bees? and the answer is that it can be left 

 beside the new hive until its brood has hatched, 

 when the bees can be shaken in with the bees 

 in the new hive, and the combs can be re- 

 moved and such honey as remains in them ex- 

 tracted, and the combs cut out and rendered 

 into beeswax. It will be well in cutting out 

 the combs to leave a strip of comb about an 

 inch wide at the top of the frames, as such 

 frames the following season will have starters 

 of comb instead of foundation for colonies 

 that may be shaken on them. By shaking 

 the bees on starters only, we compel them to 

 rush their honey up into the supers just where 

 we want it, as they have no storage room below 

 until the frames are filled with comb. Sel- 

 dom will a colony swarm after it has been 

 treated in this way, and this method has this 

 apparent advantage over all others, namely, 

 that the beekeeper swarms his bees at his own 

 convenience and does away with all possi- 

 bility of absconding swarms. 



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