STOCK-HIVES. 127 



queens must not be lost sight of or forgotten. All the 

 old queens will be found in the top or first swarms (if all 

 the hives have swarmed) ; and if any of these containing 

 queens more than two years old be selected for stock, it is 

 desirable to remove and destroy their queens, and put 

 younger ones in their places. All parent hives, second 

 swarms, and turnouts have young queens. Second swarms 

 and turnouts with pretty and closely-built combs, weigh- 

 ing from 36 to 50 lb. each, make valuable stock-hives. 

 If some of them have faulty combs, or are otherwise ob- 

 jectionable, they are marked for honey, and the parent 

 hives kept for another year. 



First or top swarms in ordinary seasons are too heavy 

 for keening , and are therefore generally put down for 

 honey, but in rainy seasons they are often kept for 

 stock. 



Xow let us suppose a bee-keeper has twenty hives at 

 the end of August, ten for stock and ten for honey. 

 Should he apply the brimstone to the ten for honey? 

 No, but drive the bees out of them, and unite them to those 

 selected for keeping. This is a consideration of prime 

 importance ; for hives thus plentifully furnished with 

 bees in autumn are worth much more than those which, 

 being otherwise equal, receive no additions of bees. 

 Hives thus strengthened are well able to bear the sever- 

 ities and difficulties of cold winters : they swarm about 

 a month sooner than others in spring; and their first 

 swarms, in fine seasons, wiU have their hives filled with 

 combs, and be nearly ready to swarm (virgins) themselves 

 before hives not so liberally and skilfully dealt with begin 

 to swarm at all. No words of ours can describe the value 

 of this hint. Let it go and be circulated widely with 

 that of large hives, and the success of those who carry it 

 into practice wUl soon stimulate the attention of those 

 who do not; the awful brimstone-pit used to destroy 



