THE AMERICAN APICULTURIST. 



qnired in the case. He should suit the 

 plau to the temper of the bees, the 

 value and variety of queen, and to the 

 season. These are points worth re- 

 membering. 



I will describe three plans of intro- 

 duction wiiicli sliould be modified by 

 tlie intelligent apiarist to suit the cir- 

 cumstances. 1. By forming nuclei. 



2. By interchange of liives and frames 

 witli sprinlsling with scented water. 



3. By caging. 



1. The first plan is an old one but well 

 suited to insure the safety of very val- 

 uable queens. It sliould be borne iu 

 mind that it can only be used when the 

 weather is warm. Prepare an empty 

 hive or box that will hold three or four 

 frames, and close up tlie entrance with 

 wire cloth. Go to a strong colony and 

 select a card of comb that contains 

 some lioncy and brood all capped and 

 most ready to crawl out. If there is any 

 brood uncapped, it will mosMikely die 

 and decompose, which will be injuri- 

 ous to the inmates of the hive. Place 

 the frame of comb in your new hive. 

 Open the cage containing the queen, 

 and place it in the box beside the frame, 

 and let her majesty crawl out at will. 

 Close box and set it in a dark room for 

 forty-eiglit hours; by this timemostof 

 the brood will be hatched, and the 

 queen's force will be quite respectable. 

 Add another frame of the same sort of 

 brood, and keep the hive closed forty- 

 eight hours longer, when it can be 

 placed on its stand. The entrance must 

 be contracted so only one bee can pass 

 at a time, and weeds or grass should 

 be placed in front to guard against rob- 

 bing. From time to time add frames 

 of hatching brood, and the colony can 

 soon be built up into a strong stock. 



2. The sprinkling plan is tedious and 

 very laborious, and is only to be rec- 

 ommended when a very choice queen 

 is to be introduced to a strong swarm. 

 Prepare an empty hive of the size of 

 the one containing the colony, and open 

 all entrances and holes to their full ca- 

 l)acity, and tack wire cloth over them. 

 We will call this empty hive No. 2 and 

 the full hive No. 1. You also need a 

 basin of water, to which you can add 

 a fewdrops of some scent, such as pep- 

 permint, etc., and a small whisk broom. 

 Go to hive No. 1, from which you have 

 removed the queen you want to dispose 

 of, and draw a frame of honey, brood, 

 and of adhering bees and carry it to hive 

 No. 2. Now take the whisk and sprinkle 

 the bees well with the scented water 

 — give them a good wetting sufficient 



to take all fight out of them— and place 

 the frame in the empty hive. Drop the 

 queen in and close hive. Set the hive 

 in a dark room or cellar and allow it 

 to remain twenty-four hours, then go 

 and draw another frame, with the ad- 

 hering bees from No. 1, and after giv- 

 ing a thorough sprinkling, place it in 

 No. 2 alongside of the first frame, and 

 quickly close the hive. At the expira- 

 tion of twelve or sixteen liours, draw 

 from No. 1 again, and repeat the same 

 process until all the frames, except 

 three or four, are removed from No. 1 

 and placed in No. 2. Then late in the 

 evening, place No. 1 at some distance on 

 a new stand, and set No. 2 in its place, 

 and release the prisoners. Take the 

 precaution to contract the entrance so 

 only one or two bees can pass at a time 

 and place grass and a piece of board 

 in front. By noon, the next day, nearly 

 all the old bees will have returned to 

 the old stand. After sprinkling the re- 

 maining bees in No. 1, you can add the 

 frames to No. 2 ; or set No. 1 where 

 it first stood, and return all the frames 

 to it. When drawing the frames to 

 sprinkle, always look out for queen 

 cells which remove. This plan is long 

 and tedious, but nearly always certain. 



3. This plau is by means of a cage. 

 The best form of cage that I have ever 

 tried is one with an open side that is 

 pressed into the comb. This cage 

 places the queen directly on the comb 

 and if the cage is three or four inclies 

 in diameter, and pressed immediately 

 over both cells of uncapped honey and 

 cells of crawling-out brood, the queen 

 will have food, and soon a little band 

 of subjects. The wire for these cages 

 I prefer to be of not less than twelve 

 meshes to the linear inch. They can 

 be rectangular, square, or round in 

 shape. I have the sides three-fourths 

 inch wide, made by turning up the 

 edges of the wire. For durability, I 

 have a strip of tin soldered around the 

 edge. The edges of cage should be 

 securely pressed into the comb so that 

 the bees cannot readily cut under. If 

 the bees ean easily undermine the cage 

 anil get inio it. they may kill the queen. 

 To guard against the displacement of 

 the cage, and to hold it securely, I 

 confine it by clamping it with two 

 sticks, wired at the ends. 



The length of time the queen should 

 remain caged depends on the disposi- 

 tion and behavior of the bees. When 

 honey is coming in plentifully, forty- 

 eight hours may be suftlcient; but 

 when they are idle, it may be necessary 



