94 



PRACTICAL QUEEN REARING 



Fig. 37. The Miller introducing cage, 



herself in a strange hive, will not be apparent to the bees, since 

 they are also in a state of confusion. By the time the excite- 

 ment subsides, the foreign odor of the new queen will no longer 

 be apparent, and she will settle down to the business of egg lay- 

 ing as though she had always been present in the hive. By this 

 method it is the usual way to remove the old queen either 

 shortly before or just at the time the new queen is introduced. 



Details of Cage Methods. 



All the variations of the cage method are comparatively 

 simple. The old queen is first removed from the hive and the 



new one is introduced 

 in a cage, Figure 37. 

 Probably the safest 

 method of all is the 

 one where the queen is 

 placed alone in a cage that covers a small patch of emerging 

 brood. The emerging bees are, of course, friendly enough, 

 and within two or three days she will be laying in her small 

 enclosure and surrounded by a small group of attendants 

 who found her present when they emerged. The cage is then 

 carefully removed, and the comb replaced in the hive with as 

 little disturbance as possible. Such a cage is made with a 

 piece of ordinary wirecloth about four inches square, sometimes 

 smaller. Each of the four corners is cut away for about three 

 quarters of an inch. The four sides are then bent down, 

 forming a wire box open at the bottom. The queen is placed 

 under this and the wire pressed into the comb. It is well to 

 have a few cells of sealed honey inside the cage, although the 

 bees are likely to feed the queen through the meshes of the cage. 

 When this plan is used in a hive where no brood is present, 

 some newly emerged workers should be placed in the cage with 

 the queen. The attitude of the bees toward the queen will 

 determine when it is safe to release her. If on opening the hive, 

 the cage is found to be covered with a tight cluster of bees, she 

 would be balled immediately if released. When the bees are 



