80 ALEXANDER’S WRITINGS ON PRACTICAL BEE CULTURE 
system of management requires. This is one of the knottiest of ques- 
tions, and one that has cost bee-keepers thousands of valuable queens. 
It has cost us so many that we now seldom try to introduce a queen 
into a full colony. We would much rather have our young queens 
hatch in what would be considered a small colony, and then as soon as 
she commences to lay build it up in two or three days into a good 
strong colony by giving them combs of hatching brood. In this way 
we never lose a queen, whereas by the introducing method many times 
the strange queen will be allowed to live only until she has laid eggs 
four or five days, and the bees begin to have plenty of larve to rear 
one from; then they will kill their queen and rear a young one in her 
place. We have lost hundreds of valuable queens in just this way, 
so for several years we have not introduced many queens into full 
colonies except when we have a surplus that we hardly know what to 
do with. 
I think the day is not far distant when a large per cent of the 
queens that are bought from queen-breeders will be bought in a nucleus, 
and then built up into strong colonies by the purchaser. This is a fine 
way to make increase, and at the same time procure choice queens 
and avoid all loss and trouble in introducing. I think 100 good three- 
comb nuclei purchased in May, and properly cared for, will furnish 
enough extracted honey during the season to pay their first cost. 
If not convenient to get your queens in a nucleus, then introduce 
them into small colonies that have no uncapped brood, especially if 
the queen is a valuable one. 
I think queen-breeders are often wrongfully accused of sending out 
hybrid queens when the queen they sent was all right; but shortly after 
she commenced to lay she was superseded by a young one reared from 
her brood, which was mismated, and the purchaser never knew that 
the queen he bought was killed shortly after she commenced to lay. 
June, 1906. 
PLURALITY OF QUEENS IN ONE HIVE. 
IS IT PRACTICAL TO HAVE TWO OR MORE IN ONE COLONY DURING THE SUMMER 
SEASON? 
Yes, I think it is.) With the ever pressing desire to increase our 
surplus we are anxiously looking for new methods whereby we can 
secure strong full colonies early in the season in order to take ad- 
vantage of any flow of nectar that may come. This has caused us 
to do some experimenting along the line of keeping two or more laying 
queens in one colony. For several years we have known that laying 
queens will never sting each other if they can possibly get away from 
one another. This fact caused us to try some experiments along this 
line, with the following results: 
First, a great increase in the amount of brood was noticed in these 
hives; in fact, they were so full of brood that but few cells were left 
