CHAPTER VII 
INCREASE 
One of the perplexing problems to the beginner is that of 
securing inerease without loss of a honey crop. The control of 
natural swarming is probably the most dithicult problem that 
the bee-keeper has to solve in the average locality. Certain plans 
will work all right for several years, until the bee-keeper begins 
to congratulate himself on having learned the secret, when sud- 
denly they will swarm in spite of the best possible attention and 
once the swarming fever is on they are likely to keep it up until 
he is nearly beside himself. 
Natural Swarming.—There has been much written about 
why bees swarm, and the control of conditions that lead to 
swarming. It should be remenihered that with bees and other 
social insects the community is the unit, rather than the indi- 
vidual. The workers are incapable of reproduction, and accord- 
ingly no matter how great an increase there may be in their 
numbers in a hive, it is but temporary, and makes no permanent 
difference in perpetuation of the species. Swarming is then the 
expression of the instinct of procreation or increase. 
Normally, the bees will swarm at about the height of the 
honey flow, when natural conditions favor the establishment of 
the new colony. As a rule, nearly enough honey will have been 
brought to the old hive to carry the colony through the winter, and 
at this season the new swarm will be able to establish itself with 
a minimum of danger. While the natural effect tends toward 
the safety of the bees, the practical effect to the bee-keeper is to 
divide his colonies at the time when greatest profit may accrue 
from large colonies, and results in inerease of bees at the expense 
of the honey crop. The thing the bee-keeper should strive to 
do is to make his increase either before the honey flow begins 
or when it is nearly over, so that he will get both increase and 
a crop. 
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