ARTIFICIAL SWARMING. 203 



queen-cage, with a suite of well-fed workers, arrived jn 

 safety, at. the Apiary of a friend, on the next day. 



Great caution is not only requisite in giving a hive a 

 strange queen, but in all attempts to mix bees belonging 

 to different colonies. Bees having a fertile queen will 

 almost always quarrel with those having an unimpregnated 

 one 5 and this is one reason why a furious contest, in 

 which thousands perish, often ensues when new swarms 

 attempt to mingle. 



Members of different colonies appear to recognize their 

 hive-companions by the sense of smell, and if there should 

 be a thousand stocks in the Apiary, any one will readily 

 detect a strange bee ; just as each mother in a large flock 

 of sheep is able, by the same sense, in the darkest night, 

 to distinguish her own lamb from all the others. It would 

 seem, therefore, that colonies might always be safely 

 mingled, by sprinkling them with sugar-water, scented 

 with peppermint or any other strong odor, which would 

 make them all smell alike. 



A few seasons ago, however, I discovered that bees 

 often recognize strangers by their actions, even when they 

 have the same scent ; for a frightened bee curls himself 

 up with a cowed look, which unmistakably proclaims that 

 he is conscious of being an intruder. If, therefore, the 

 bees of one colony are left on their own stfind, and the 

 others are suddenly introduced, the latter, even when 

 both colonies have the same smell, are often so frightened 

 that they are discovered to be strangers, and are instantly 

 killed. If, however, both colonies are removed to a new 

 stand, and shaken out together on a sheet, they will 

 peaceably mingle, when scented alike.* 



* I find substantially the same thing recommended, in 1778, by Thomas Wild- 

 man (page 230 of the 3rd edition of his valuable work on Bees), who says, that 

 bees will " unite while in fear and distress, without fighting, as they would be apt 

 to do, if strange bees were added to a hive in possession of its honey." 



