130 THE HUMBLE-BEE 



to readers who may like to repeat my experiments 

 and watch humble-bees starting their nests in their 

 gardens, I would recommend the construction in 

 April and May of domiciles with these covers, as 

 shown in Fig. 23. As long as the weather remains 

 fairly favourable the starting colonies will need no 

 attention, except perhaps the placing of cylinders 

 of tin over the mouths of the holes to protect 

 them from mice and shrews ; but if they are to be 

 tided over a long-continued spell of unfavourable 

 weather in June or the early part of July, it will 

 be necessary to bring them indoors and feed them. 



Of all the queens that started nesting in my 

 artificial underground domiciles during the three 

 years 1906, 1910, and 191 1, sixty-six per cent were 

 lapidarius, twelve per cent were latreillellus, six per 

 cent terrestris, and four per cent of each of the fol- 

 lowing species riideratus, hortortini, and sylvarum. 

 The great preponderance of lapidarius over the 

 other species was remarkable, the number of lapi- 

 darius being greater than all the rest put together ; 

 and though, no doubt, it was partly due to the fact 

 that lapidaruis appears late, when natural holes 

 are overgrown, and therefore difficult to find, it is 

 probable that an artificial domicile is more to the 

 liking of lapidarius than of the other species. 



GETTING QUEENS TO BREED IN CONFINEMENT 



My first attempt at getting queens to start breed- 

 ing in confinement was made when I was a boy. I 



