THE AMERICAN BEE-KEEPER. 



141 



the presence of a queen that knows 

 how to behave herself. 



The third way is that of having the 

 queen altogether confined in any kind 

 of a cage and placed in a queenless 

 colony for forty-eight hours, then liber- 

 ate her. She is by this time very apt 

 to be accepted ; if not well received 

 then recage her for another term of 

 imprisonment. 



With any plan we must first be sure 

 the colony is queenless before attempt- 

 ing to give them a new queen. There 

 may be many other ways, according to 

 books, to introduce queens but the 

 foregoing are the chief and only safe 

 ways. 



In my own apiary I adopt myself 

 to circumstances more than to any 

 particular mode of introduction. I 

 introduced a selected queen to-day. 

 Suppose I tell you how I did it. It 

 took ten minutes. The colony was 

 one that had raised a batch of cells. 

 In taking them away the robbers be- 

 came very troublesome ; I feared to 

 open the hive, after closing it in their 

 presence, so I placed the queen, (she 

 being in an empty cage without food) 

 directly at the entrance. In about a 

 minute the cage was covered with 

 bees, some feeding her through the 

 wire cloth. I quickly removed the 

 cage about 6 or 8 inches away and 

 opened it, when the same bees that 

 adhered to it acted as an escort to 

 lead her to the entrance, where she 

 walked boldly in followed by a merry 

 lot of bees all buzzing a real hearty 

 note of welcome from each of their 

 little wings. All this with dozens of 

 robbers flying around. I am not much 

 of a believer in any particular cage 

 for introducing queens, as we have 



only to allow the queen, if a laying 

 one, to become acquainted or used to 

 the bees, and all trouble is over. 

 Sometimes it takes one hour and 

 sometimes forty-eight — W. J. E. in 

 Review. 



CAREFUL HANDLING OF BEES. 



If there is one point I would im- 

 press upon the mind of a novice in 

 bee-culture more than another it is to 

 acquire the habit from the first of 

 very careful handling. 



While attending a National bee-con- 

 vention at Cincinnati, I was surprised 

 and delighted with the good behavior 

 of Mr. Muth's bees. There were about 

 40 colonies on the roof of his store. 

 and there were about as many visitors 

 as could be accommodated in the pas- 

 sage-way 1 ict ween the rows of hives. 

 I do not remember that Mr. Muth 

 used any smoke; I rather think he did 

 not. He opened the hives, lifting out 

 combs, and pointing out the queen to 

 the visitors who stood closely around. 

 No one present had any protection, 

 and though it was late in fall, when 

 no honey was being gathered, there 

 was no stinging. 



AMIABLE BEES. 



Bees came in and out of the store 



and customers did not appear to notice 

 them more than Mies. If a bee touch- 

 ed the hair of one of Mr. Muth's sons, 

 he very gently brushed it aside. I 

 said to one of them: "Do you ever 

 kill any bees?"' He said: "0, no! 

 if we did father would go for us." 



After inspecting the apiary of Mr. 

 Muth, a party of us took carriages 

 and were driven to Mt. Healthy, to 

 visit the apiary of Mr. Hill. Here I 



