42 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



swarming, dreading the risks to be in incurred 

 and the delay that seems unavoidable. 



Nevertheless multiplication is absolutely ne- 

 cessary if an apiary is to be established, and a 

 very easy and sure process has been suggested, 

 whereby all the difficulties referred to and the 

 objections urged may be obviated. 



/ allude to the xise of reserve queens. 



This is a topic that has occasionally been ad- 

 verted to, or made the subject of incidental re- 

 mark ; but it is one so vitally important to suc- 

 cessful bee-culture, that we shall readily be ex- 

 cused for now undertaking to discuss it more 

 minutely and in detail. 



Without further preface, I assume the position 

 that every provident bee-keeper should adopt 

 measures to keep a constant supply of fertile 

 queens in reserve, through the entire year. 



Then let queenlessness occur, designedly or 

 undesignedly, and at whatsoever season it may, 

 a thorough radical cure of the colony is ever at 

 command, by the prompt introduction of a re- 

 serve queen, with the usual precaution and 

 care. 



Let me illustrate this, by adducing a few ex- 

 amples. 



In the spring or fall, when no drones exist, 

 and brood cannot be found or obtained, we in- 

 troduce a fertile reserve queen, and the colony 

 is instantly restored to its normal healthy con- 

 dition. 



On a revision of his stocks, the bee-keeper 

 infers from the scattered state of the brood in 

 the combs, or the jnterspersion of drone larva? 

 among worker brood, that the queen of one of 

 his colonies is no longer duly fertile, or is be- 

 coming superannuated. He at once removes 

 her, substitutes a reserve queen and thereby 

 rescues the imperilled stock from probable ruin. 



The queen of a colony has been removed, to 

 promote increased storage of honey during the 

 gathering season, and the time for re-queening 

 has now come. Instead of inserting a brood 

 comb or a sealed queen cell, a fertile reserve 

 queen is introduced, and egg-laying and brood- 

 ing are resumed without further delay. 

 • Again, the bees of a colony show, by their 

 restless, roaming, inquiring deportment, or 

 their plaintive moans, that a great calamity has 

 befallen them, and that they have suddenly be- 

 come queenless. If, while examining the 

 stock, the bees become quiet and seem content, 

 so as to create a doubt of their condition, insert 

 a sealed queen cell, and if it is not destroyed 

 within twenty-four hours, they have no queen. 

 Give them a reserve queen, and the misfortune 

 is remedied. 



Artificial multiplication of colonies cannot be 

 too highly recommended, especially to such 

 bee-keepers as are compelled to be away from 

 home frequently during the swarming season. 

 But precisely the easiest and most convenient 

 mode of making an artificial swarm (placing 

 a few brood combs in a hive and setting 

 this on the stand of a populous colony re- 

 moved elsewhere) is obviously defective and 

 liable to fail. In the first place, bees accustom- 

 ed to a fertile queen will betake themselves to 

 mere brood combs with great reluctance, and 

 onlv after Ion; 1 ; resistance — many scattering to 



other stock, if any be near at hand. And, in 

 the second place, after the bees have yielded to 

 what proves to be an unavoidable necessity, 

 they have still to rear a young queen, which 

 involves delay ; and they may yet lose her atter 

 she is mature. If we prefer giving to the colo- 

 ny the queen of the removed stock, we must 

 undertake the laborious task of searching for 

 her amid an excited crowd of workers — a search 

 not always successful, and which, if successful, 

 involves the re-queening of the deprived stock, 

 with all its attendant risks, disadvantages, and 

 evils. The speediest, safest, surest and most 

 convenient mode of multiplying, therefore, is to 

 let the old queen remain in her hive when it is 

 removed ; place a few combs with brood and 

 honey in the nucleus; introduce a iertile re- 

 serve queen in a cage ; liberate her when she is 

 accepted ; and then build up the colony by in 

 serting sealed brood from other stocks. 



If it be desired to divide a strong old stock 

 equally, so that each division shall receive its 

 due proportion of bees, combs, and stores, and 

 be able to reach a wintering condition in the 

 course of the ensuing season, the very best 

 course is to give to each division a fertile young 

 reserve queen immediately— unless that of the old 

 stock be young, fertile and prolific. In such 

 case she should be retained in one of the divis- 

 ions, and a fertile reserve queen given to the 

 other. 



These suggestions sufficiently warrant the po- 

 sition I assumed at the outset, that every provi- 

 dent bee-keeper should a<ft)pt measures to have 

 a constant supply of fertile young queens in re- 

 serve, through the entire year. 



Let us now address ourselves to the pertinent 

 inquiry — " How shall tlie bee-keeper provide him- 

 self with the requisite number of normally pro- 

 lific reserve queens ? 



Our excellent old grandmaster, Dzierzon, has 

 said and written much about artificial swarm- 

 ing, and frequently treated the matter with 

 such glibness as induced inexperienced bee- 

 keepers to imagine that nothing more than a 

 handful of bees and a few square inches of 

 brood comb are needed to produce a respecta- 

 ble colony in the course of the season. I have 

 never been able to accomplish so desirable a re- 

 sult with such small means, and I presume 

 that most of my worthy readers were not more 

 lucky, unless additional comb with brood and 

 bees were introduced time and again. It. will 

 ever remain an inexorable rule, that if we 

 would get an artificial swarm in a condition fit 

 for wintering, we must bring it to full strength 

 at once, by aiding it with brood and bees. 



Almost all experienced bee-beepers agree in 

 this, that weak swarms are never to be set up 

 as independent stocks ; and that natural and 

 artificial swarms and nuclei are to be strength- 

 ened at once, by immediately transposing them 

 with the parent stocks, though each of these 

 be furnished with a young and fertile queen. 

 But, it may be asked, how many bees must a 

 young colony have, to make it fit for wintering? 

 If a good natural swarm should weigh at least 

 three pounds, or at most six pounds, and it 

 takes from four to five thousand bees to make a 

 pound, then a colony should consist of from 



