424 



BEE. 



Bee. 



Uniting 

 warms. 



and buzzed as if experiencing some very agreeable 

 sensation. In a quarter of an hour the queen began 

 to move from her original position, when the bees, so 

 far from opposing her, opened the circle at that part 

 towards which she turned, and formed a guard around. 

 While such incidents occurred on the surface of the 

 comb where the queen stood, all was quiet on the 

 other side. Here the workers apparently were igno- 

 rant of the queen's arrival in the hive. They labour- 

 ed with great activity at the royal cells, as if still ig- 

 norant that they no longer stood in need of them ; 

 they watched over the royal larvx, supplied them 

 with jelly, and the like. But the queen having at 

 length repaired to this side, she was received with 

 the same respect by the bees as 6he had experienced 

 from their companions on the other side of the comb. 

 They encompassed her, gave her honey, and touched 

 her with theirintcnnx ; and what proved better that 

 they treated her as a mother, was their immediately 

 desisting from work at the royal cells ; they removed 

 the worms, and devoured the food collected around 

 them. " From that moment the queen was recog- 

 nised by all her people, and conducted herself in this 

 new habitation as if it had been her native hive." 

 Thus when bees have had time to forget their own 

 queen, they receive one substituted for her with 

 greater interest, or, perhaps, with more conspicuous 

 demonstrations of it. The cultivator must, therefore, 

 carefully practise one of two things when a queen is 

 wanting in any of his hives ; he has either to procure 

 a new one by supplying the bees with brood comb, 

 whcre"by the loss will be repaired in about fourteen 

 or fifteen days, or he must substitute some supernu- 

 merary queen, in which case the impending evils will 

 be completely averted in twenty four hours. 



If two clusters of bees form in swarming, and re- 

 main quite separate and distinct from each other, it 

 shews that two queens have left the hive at the same 

 time. But no single swarm being too large, it is ne- 

 cessary, for the welfare of the community, that one 

 of the queens be sought for, and sacrificed, on which 

 the whole bees will unite. There are other situations 

 when it is also beneficial to join two or more swarms 

 together ; such as when they are weak on leaving 

 their hives in the summer season, or are sparingly 

 provisioned or peopled towards winter. Numbers, 

 we repeat, independent of affording a better security 

 against external enemies, and in promoting the gene- 

 ral activity, are more calculated in society to resist 

 the inclemency of the weather. Those persons, 

 therefore, who cultivate bees solely for the sake of 

 profit, estimate according to the weight of a hive 

 whether it be sufficiently strong. Hives under four 

 pounds, being supposed to contain about 20,000 bees, 

 are rejected ; but Bonner affirms, that one consisting 

 <X 15,000 will do well, providing -the 6eason be not 

 far advanced. The reader will not forget what we 

 have observed of the discrepancies among naturalists 

 concerning the number of bees in a given weight. 

 The last mentioned author, who was a practical ope- 

 rator in uniting swarms, directs, that the mouths of 

 two hives, the lower one full and the higher empty, 

 are to be applied to each other, and a sheet, or large 

 cloth, put round them. " The undermost hive must 

 then be rapped with both hands, in the manner a 

 o' 



drum is beat ; rapping chiefly on those parts of the Bee. 

 hive to which the edges of the comb are fixed, and ' * v.' 

 avoiding the parts opposite to the sides of the combs, 

 lest they should be loosened, and, by falling together, 

 crush the bees between them, as well a6 the young in 

 the cells. The more bees there are, the sooner will 

 they run into the new hive ; for the concussion of 

 the hive by the rapping alarms them as an earthquake 

 alarms mankind, and they run to the upper hive in 

 search of a safer habitation. When the bees are thus 

 removed into the new hive, it may be placed where 

 the old one stood, which will collect all the bees to- 

 gether, and within ten minutes the bees will begin 

 working as leisurely as any natural swarm." By this 

 means the under hive wilLbe left quite empty, and 

 another may be substituted, in order that three swarms 

 shall be united. Clusters of bees may also be intro- 

 duced into a hive to strengthen it, and they are gene- 

 rally received without fighting. While the bees are 

 very active, the places of a strong and a weak swarm 

 may be interchanged ; the number of the former 

 which are out being much greater, will return to the 

 latter as their own dwelling, and thus strengthen it. 

 There is likewise an easy and simple method of uni- 

 ting swarms, which consists in spreading a cloth at 

 night on the ground, close to a hive where two new 

 swarms are to be joined. One of them is to be 

 brought, and put on a stick laid across the cloth, 

 when, giving their hive a smart blow, they will drop 

 down in a cluster. This done, and the empty hive 

 thrown aside, the other should be expeditiously taken 

 from its board, and set over the bees, which will spee- 

 dily ascend into it, and unite with its inhabitants. By 

 the means here described, a swarm may be increased 

 to any given extent. Bonner assures us, that his mode 

 may be practised in the middle of the day with little 

 danger, and that he has taken off four swarms in one 

 forenoon without a single sting. 



It is ungrateful to reflect, that, after all our care in i\,T(,(ie of 

 watching the progress of bees, in screening them from uking the 

 injury, added to our admiration of their singular in- honey and 

 dustry, we must at once sacrifice so many thousand wax * 

 lives in order to come at their stores. Yet such is 

 the general, though pernicious practice ; and whole 

 colonies, which, in another year, would send forth tens 

 of thousands equally industrious as themselves, are 

 utterly extirpated. The mode of doing so is well 

 known. When the hives cease to increase in weight, 

 or, rather, when they begin to grow lighter, a hole 

 is dug in the ground, and some rags dipped in melted 

 brimstone being inserted in the clefts of twigs stuck 

 into the earth, the matches are kindled, and, putting 

 the hive above them, the bees are quickly suffocated, 

 and fall down in a heap. Some authors strenuously 

 defend this practice, contending, that all expedients 

 to save the bees are both difficult and precarious, 

 and that they do not produce the same advantages. 

 We conceive that its facility, combined with invete- 

 rate adherence to established customs, has proved a 

 strong recommendation. But the majority of modern 

 cultivators are disposed to preserve the bees, while 

 they share their collections. Towards the end of Sep- 

 tember, when all the flowers have faded, when there 

 is little brood in the combs, and the bees are beginning 

 to consume the honey they hay^e laid up, they may 



