ONE YEAR AMONG THE BEES. 103 



it except in battle with other queens. Two queens cannot occupy 

 the same domain ; their presence is a signal to each other for battle, 

 and their meeting, under any circumstances, is sure death to one or 

 the other. 



The drones are the male bees. They do no work whatever in the 

 hive : nature did not intend they should. They are not provided with 

 a weapon of defense, neither provided with a honey sac to carry honey, 

 nor a tongue to reach the nectar in the flowers, nor pollen baskets to 

 carry pollen, nor wax pockets to secrete wax. They are simply invet- 

 erate loafers in the hive. They come forth from the hive during tbo 

 middle of the day, and at the same time virgin queens take their 

 flight. 



The worker bee is truly the "busy bee," and in sex is an undevel- 

 oped female, but is usually termed neuter. The busy bee does all 

 the work ; it gathers all the honey, the pollen, the propolis or bee-glue, 

 carries water, secretes wax and builds comb, prepares food and nurses 

 the young brood, defends the hive, cleans house and performs various 

 other duties. If the workers ever take a rest, either night or day, from 

 all the duties of the hive, no one has ever yet found it out. 



The worker bees may be placed in three different classes, namely : 

 The honey gatherers, the comb builders, and the nurse bees. They 

 are thus classed as to age. The first work the young bee performs, 

 after it is two or three days old, is to prepare food and feed the larva 

 in the cells. The next duty, when ten or twelve days old, is to secrete 

 wax and build comb. When about twenty days old they become field 

 workers. This applies to a well-regulated colony that is in first-class 

 condition in all respects. 



In thus briefly going over the work of handling bees for one year, 

 we will begin with spring management, follow with summer and 

 autumn management, and close with winter management. As an- 

 nounced in starting out, our object principally was to help the 

 beginner, the small bee-keeper, and farm bee-keeping generally ; hence 

 it will be necessary to go over considerable ground of the first prin- 

 ciples of bee-keeping, which to the well-informed apiarist would seem, 

 to some extent, stale reading; yet when we take into consideration 

 that this work will go into the hands of hundreds uninformed on this 

 subject to one informed, we hope that the expert will bear with us. 



EARLY SPRING MANAGEMENT OF BEES. 



The most critical period of the whole year with bees is in early 

 spring, just about the time warm days begin to put in an appearance. 

 With the long confinement of winter and the endurance of severe 

 weather, bees are very tender and easily discouraged, and, if very 

 weik, they will dwindle down and become less in numbers so rapidly 



