THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW 



working force together, with natural 

 swarming, is the well known one of hiv- 

 ing the swarm upon the old stand, setting 

 the parent hive beside it and then, in a 

 week or so, moving the old hive to a new 

 location. While this plan will usually 

 stop after-swarming, it did not in all cases 

 with me; but one that I have largely 

 practiced, and which surely will prevent 

 after- swarming, and also secure better re- 

 sults here, in the way of surplus honey, 

 is to hive the swarm on the old stand, 

 with the parent hive close beside, with 

 entrances both facing the same way; 

 then, on the third, fourth or fifth day, 

 whenever it is most convenient, or, in 

 some cases, depending upon the flow, 

 take the frames out of the old hive, and 

 look them over until a comb is found up- 

 on which there is one or more queen cells. 

 This frame with its adhering bees, if there 

 are not too many of them, is put back in 

 the hive, the old hive moved a few feet 

 to one side, and all the bees from the rest 

 of the combs are then shaken off in front 

 of the hive that contains the swarm. The 

 frames are then put back into the old 

 hive and it is set on "a new stand some dis- 

 tance away. When practicing this plan, 

 if the weather is cool at night, it is better 

 to destroy most of the queen cells except 

 those on the frame that has not been sha- 

 ken. There will be plenty of bees to keep 

 warm what cells there are on one frame; 

 while, if the bees were scattered through 

 the hive trying to protect all of the cells 

 it may have contained, it might be that 

 none of them would be properly cared for. 

 Of course, if the nights were cold, some 

 brood would suffer; but here, and proba- 

 bly in most all other localities, the swarm- 

 ing season comes when the weather is so 

 warm than it is not necessary to cut out 

 the extra queen cells; and the frames con- 

 tain so much sealed brood that as soon as 

 the young queen begins to lay there are 

 plenty of bees to take care of the young 

 brood, and for field work, .so they build 

 up strong for the fall flow, and make the 

 best possible kind of colonies to put into 

 winter quarters. 



I may say however, that I find it profit- 

 able to go farther than all this; to hive 

 two first or prime swarms in one hive; 

 and I have hived as many as six swarms 

 in one hive, or, rather, a number of hives 

 and supers tiered up. It is, however, a 

 difficult matter to get such a great mass 

 of bees to stay and work freely in one 

 hive; and when they do, the results are 

 far from being as favorable as one might 

 expect. In some cases, if they are not 

 very large it may pay to put three swarms 

 together; but to go beyond this has not 

 paid with me. It is surprising, however, 

 to see the amount of surplus that two 

 large swarms in one hive will store in a 

 short time in a good flow; but their 

 strength rapidly decreases; and, in a lo- 

 cality where the flow is long continued, 

 or where a flow occurs sometime after 

 swarming, more surplus might, and prob- 

 ably would be, secured if they were hived 

 in separate hives. When hiving two 

 swarms in one hive I practice about the 

 same method I have just described for 

 preventing after-swarming. The hive 

 containing both swarms is set upon the 

 stand that one of the parent colonies oc- 

 cupied, and one old hive set close beside 

 it upon one side and the other hive upon 

 the other side. The field bees that return 

 loaded to the unoccupied old stand are 

 accepted by other colonies near by, so 

 there is no loss. Later, the bees from 

 both hives are shaken off the combs and 

 allowed to go in with the double swarm. 



If no increase is desired, these two old 

 colonies maj' be united at this time. 



I am aware that some will not consid- 

 er this method of preventing afler-swarm- 

 ing even worthy of being considered, for 

 it involves handling the frames; an<l it 

 seems to be becoming the fashion of late 

 not to handle the frames themselves; but, 

 the fact is, this method requires but very 

 little more time or work than the Heddon 

 method. With hives and frames of the 

 right kind, accurately made, I can, with- 

 out any undue haste, take the frames out, 

 shade off the bees, cut most of the queen 

 cells, replace the frames and set the hive 



