192 DR. miller's 



you figure merely on the honey stored by the colony in which she 

 was introduced, the purchase of the queen was a losing operation. 

 But that isn't the only thing to be considered. Even if she lays 

 only a very few eggs, if you are lively about it, and from those 

 few eggs rear enough queens to requeen all your colonies, that 

 stock may be just as good as if the queen had never been injured 

 in the mails at all, and as a consequence you have just doubled 

 your future crops. In other words, the injury of a queen in the 

 mails does not necessarily injure the stock reared from her. 



Queens Stinging. — Q. Can a queen sting? 



A. If you allow two queens tp come together, unless one' of 

 them is very old, you will" soon learn that they can sting, for one 

 of them will soon be a dead queen. The strange part of it is that 

 the victor is never injured in these duels. But a queen will never 

 sting you. I have handled thousands of queens, and I never knew 

 one of them to make the least show of stinging. Nor will a queen 

 sting a worker. Just once in my lifetime I knew of one exception 

 to this rule, when I saw a queen sting a worker. 



Queen-Trap. — Q. As I have no time to be around at swarming 

 time, I am going to put on the queen and drone-trap. Will that 

 be right? 



A. It will be all right if you give the proper attention after- 

 ward. But merely putting on a trap will not answer. The queen 

 will be caught in it, and if you leave her there, there will be a 

 young queen in the hive in a week or so, and when she tries to fly 

 out to be fertilized she will be caught in the trap, and then you 

 will have a queenless colony. You will have to keep watch and 

 when the queen is caught in the trap make an artificial swarm, 

 or dispose of matters some other way. 



Queens, Two in One Hive. — Q. Wouldn't I get more honey by 

 having two laying queens in a hive; first a hive-body, then a 

 super, then a honey-board; next a hive-body, with the second 

 queen; lastly a cover? W'ould the two laying queens fight through 

 the honey-lpoard? 



A. The queens could not very well fight, but I don't think you 

 would gain by the plan. One of the queens is likely to disappear 

 before long. 



Q. Will two or more laying queens in one hive prevent 

 swarming, as told by Alexander? 



A. I think the plan did not pan out very well afterward. 



Queens, Virgin. — Q. How do virgin queens look? 



