INCREASE AND THE PROFITABLE PRODUCTION OF BEES. 59 



SO few bees tbfit, when a good many of them have left, there 

 will not be sufficient remaining to hatch out the brood ; or 

 else be will go to the other extreme and so dej^opuLate the old 

 hive that there will not be enough bees in it to hatch out the 

 brood ; for these and many other reasons I therefore again 

 say experience is a sine qua non. 



Give the Bees Plenty of Room. 



Instead of confining the bees to eight or nine frames, as I 

 have advised for natural increase, they should be gradually 

 worked up till they occupy the whole hive, which they .should 

 certainly do by the end of May or even before ; a doubling-box 

 full of frames of em[)ty comb or foundation must then be 

 placed on the hive, and a couple of frames of brood should be 

 placed in it from the lower hive. If necessary the bees may 

 be gently fed to make them draw out the foundation more 

 rapidly ; the queen will quickly fill the combs in the doubling- 

 box with eggs, and as soon as the brood from these is hatching 

 out freely and the hive crammed full with bees is the time to 

 think of dividing it. We will suppose that the hive contains 

 twenty-four fi'ames, twelve in the stock hive and twelve in the 

 doubling-box. 



Queen-raising. 



As soon as all is ready, and drones are becoming plentiful 

 in the apiary, a frame of new clean comb (or if this cannot be 

 had a frame of foundation will do) should be inserted in the 

 centre of the hive : after forty-eiglit hours examine it ; if it 

 contains no eggs, then return it to the hive for another foi-ty- 

 eight hours ; but if it is full of them, remove the queen with 

 from six to twelve (say tw^elve) of the frames which contain 

 young unsealed brood or eggs, with the adlierent bees, and 

 place them in an empty hive in a new position, taking care to 

 leave in the old hive the frame of comb which was inserted 

 forty-eight hours previously and which is now full of eggs, for 

 it is from these eggs that we intend the bees to rear queens. 

 Circular holes should be cut in the comb about 1| inch in 

 diameter, and round these the bees will form the queen cells. 

 In seven days' time the hive should be again examined, and 

 any queen cells which the bees may have made in any other 

 frame but the one selected must be cut out. 



