Introduction of Queens. 26 5 
and require careful handling. They are astonishingly pro- 
lific, and keep up the brood rearing whether there are nec- 
tar-secreting flowers or not. For queen rearing they are 
super-excellent, The comb honey of these bees is said to 
be quite inferior, because of thin caps; a point I have failed 
to observe. I think the honey about equal to that of the 
Italians in appearance. The Cyprian bees are in no way 
superior to the Syrians, so far as I can learn, though I 
have had no experience with them, and they are consid- 
erably more irritable. The Carniolans are much praised by 
European bee-keepers. They are certainly very amiable 
and so excellent for the beginner. I am now breeding 
from a cross between the Syrian and Carniolan, and hope 
in time to develop a race of superior excellence. 
WHAT BEES SHALL WE KEEP? 
The beginner certainly better keep Italians or Carnio- 
lans. If the Syrians maintain their apparent superiority, I 
would certainly advise the experienced bee-keeper to give 
them a trial. 
HOW TO ITALIANIZE. 
From what has been already explained regarding the 
natural history of bees, it will be seen that all we have to 
do to change our bees is to change our queens. Hence, to 
Italianize a colony, we have only to procure and introduce 
an Italian queen. The same of course is true of Cyprian- 
izing or Syrianizing. If we change the queen we soon 
change the bees. 
HOW TO INTRODUCE A QUEEN. 
In dividing colonies, where we give our queen to a col- 
ony composed wholly of young bees, it is safe and easy to 
introduce a queen in the manner explained in the section 
on artificial increase of colonies. To introduce a queen to 
a colony composed of old bees requires more care. First, 
we should seek out the old queen and destroy her, then 
cage our Italian queen in a wire cage (Fig. 99), which 
may be made by winding a strip of wire cloth, three and 
