78 



THE AM ERIC AX BEE-KEEPER 



March 



that con\'enient method of queen rear- 

 ing. 



In due time the young queens will 

 fly from the boxes and return mated; 

 during which time queen cells of dif- 

 ferent ages are placed in the nursery 

 cages, between the boxes, in such com- 

 plete system that young queens are con- 

 tinually hatching in the nurseries, at 

 least six every ten days. 



The moment the queens in the boxes 

 are found laying remove them all and 

 in a day's time draw from the nursery 

 cages six virgins to re-queen the boxes 

 and thus proceed throughout the en- 



ment, to guard against starving the 

 young queens. The other ,two cages 

 are provided with perforated zinc so as 

 to admit the workers who will care f"r 

 and protect the cells from chilling until 

 the day they are due to hatch, at which 

 time they are shifted over into the 

 screen-covered compartments to hatch. 

 In brief, the scheme of proceeding 

 is as follows: Start your cells at in- 

 tervals of three, five or ten days, ac- 

 cording to the rapidity with which you 

 wish to turn out queens; have them 

 completed in full colonies and as soon 

 as capped remove them and place them 



FERTILIZING BOXES INSIDE ATTACHMENT. 



tire season, occasionally strengthening 

 the colony by using bees that have been 

 taken up for the purpose of starting 

 other queen cells. 



In this manner from eighteen to 

 twenty-four queens per month may be 

 fertilized from a single four-frame nu- 

 cleus colony without the trouble of 

 feeding, swarming out, etc. 



It might be well to state, in this con- 

 nection, that two of the cages between 

 the boxes are covered on both sides 

 with wire cloth, and candy is place'd in 

 the feeding holes, inside each compart- 



in tile zinc-covered cages; ius,t previous 

 to their hatching, jump them over into 

 the wire-covered cages to hatch; when 

 the laying queens are taken from the 

 boxes draw six of the virgins from the 

 screen-covered cages and run them 

 into the boxes, always taking the six 

 oldest queens. By the above outlined 

 proceeding it will be seen that supplies 

 of virgins, about the correct age to fly, 

 will be constantly on hand, already in- 

 troduced, waiting their turn at the 

 boxes, and if the system is followed 

 closely from five to six fertile queens 



