AUSTRALASIAN BF:E MANUAL 115 



in the hive. Also the large " Miller " and " Alexan- 

 der " feeders, all of which are to be obtained from hive 

 manufacturers. Always give food and replenish the 

 feeders in the evening. 



UNITING. 



All colonies making little or no headway in breeding, 

 denoting poor queens, and any that are found to be 

 queenless, should be united with others that are more 

 prosperous, as early in the spring as possible. There 

 will only be loss in trying to nurse colonies with poor 

 queens with the hope that they will improve later on ; 

 better to make use of the bees at once. I have of late 

 united colonies in the following manner with the 

 greatest success. Place a queen excluder over the 

 frames of the colony the other is to be united to, and 

 put the body of hive containing the latter as a top box 

 over the excluder after killing the queen. In no case 

 have I had trouble with fighting, but it is well to watch 

 the hive for a few hours, and if anything occurs give 

 a good dose or tw^o of smoke. In two days the 

 excluder can be removed. 



surplus honey supers, 

 (extracted honey.) 



When a colony is getting fairly strong, with plenty 

 of sealed brood in the hive, and honey coming in, a 

 top box or super should be put on. Care must be 

 taken that this is done before preparations for swarm- 

 ing are being made by building queen cells. On the 

 other hand, it should not be put on too soon, as the 

 extra space lor cold air would do harm. 



When working for extracted honey, the two side 

 combs from the lower hive, with the adhering bees, 

 should be placed in the centre of the lower one. As 

 the season advances, there will be more and more bees 

 working in the super storing honey, and probably the 

 queen will lay in two or three of the upper combs. 

 This brings me to the use of queen excluders. 



