THE BEE-KEEERS' REVIEW. 



199 



about four weeks is a full average. Now, 

 if the brood chamber is filled with hon- 

 ey at the end of the first week, and dur- 

 ing the second week a swarm issues, it 

 will be well on to the fourth week before 

 this colony will be strong enough to go 

 into boxes again to much, purpose, and 

 this leaves only a few days for filling our 

 clean white sections. Our new swarm 

 will require from one to two weeks to fill 

 its hive; and will beVeady to go into the 

 surplus department just in time to start 

 its combs, and then, as the flow is over, 

 coat its sections with propolis. 



There are some non-swarming devices; 

 but, as they have not seemed to me prac- 

 tical, I shall not speak of them. But 

 what is to be done? Something must be 

 done, or, in most seasons, we shall get 

 little surplus honey, and much increase. 

 We have all oV)served, or mo.stof us have, 

 that what will break up one "broody" 

 hen will not another. You can frighten 

 one from her nest and she will scarcely 

 return to it again; while with others you 

 can take them off and they ivill "set," 

 on a board or on the floor or even on their 

 roost. You may imprison them for sever- 

 al days and when you liberate them they 

 will go back to ".sitting" on sticks or 

 stones with the most provoking stupid- 

 ity. It is thus with our bees; what will 

 cure the swarming fever in one colon)- will 

 have but little effect upon others. With 

 one you can cut out the queen cells near- 

 ly ready to .seal and they will give it up; 

 with another colony it is of no use what- 

 ever. 



The presence of a large amount of 

 brood in the hive appears to be the most 

 exciting cause of swarming. This leads 

 me to the first method of preventing 

 swarming. I remove every brood comb 

 and replace them with empty combs; or 

 at least those having no brood. While a 

 little hone)' seems to do no harm, a little 

 brood given them or left in their hive 

 may upset our best intentions; for the 

 colony is apt to start queen cells upon it 

 and then swarm. The brood combs that 

 are removed can be given early in the 



season to any weak • colonies, and thus 

 quickly bring them into a profitable con- 

 dition, while the colony that would have 

 swarmed, finding its brood gone, usually 

 gives up swarming at once and goes to 

 work with a will, quickly fiUing the brood 

 chamber with honey, and a moderate 

 amount of brood, and is again at work in 

 the boxes. This plan works well about 

 nine times in ten; when perhaps the 

 tenth time they will start brood and queen 

 cells at once and out they swarm. This 

 tenth time is apt to be where a swarm or 

 part of one has gone into our colony be- 

 fore we operated on them. Strong col- 

 onies only should be treated in this way, 

 as having no hatching brood in their hive 

 they soon become weakened. 



Another class of colonies, such as have 

 a very moderate amount of brood, or an 

 ojd queen, or one we wish to supersede, 

 we open their hive and remove the queen, 

 if we can find her, and cut out the (jueen 

 cells. Eight days later we again cut out 

 queen cells; and in from four to eight 

 days more give them a young virgin queen. 

 If she is young enough, she is usually 

 accepted and .soon laying, and as the 

 brood from the old queen keeps hatch- 

 ing until liear the close of the season, it 

 remains strong and does quite fair busi- 

 ness. If we fail to find the queen we cut 

 out all queen cells every eight days to the 

 end of the season, and the queen usually 

 disappears before that time, so we can 

 give them a virgin queen. 



But there are many colonies that have 

 young vigorous (jueens of the previous 

 season that we do not wish to destroy, 

 and we have not a sufficient aumber of 

 dry combs to give them. These we 

 treat in another way. Finding the queen, 

 we remove her with a brood comb, one 

 from which tlie young bees are just 

 hatching, if possible, and place the comb 

 with another having considerable honey 

 and one having a little honey and no 

 brood, in a new hive, and after shaking 

 off bees enough from the combs of the 

 hive from which the cjueen was removed 

 to make a good nucleus, when the old 



