48 PRACTICAL QUEEN REARING 



hive, was taken from the first hive and passed on to the second. 

 The hive C, from which the queen had been taken, soon had 

 cells ready to remove and she was replaced in her original home. 

 Here she was permitted to stay for only a short time when she 

 was started a second time around the circle. By keeping the 

 queen in each hive for a period of a week at one time, sufficient 

 eggs were laid to prevent the rapid depletion of the stock while 

 providing a sufficient number of eggs and young larvae, to insure 

 queen cells when she was again removed. By this simple plan 

 he was able to get a large number of young queens and at the 

 same time preserve the parent colonies. Whenever possible 

 the queen cells were removed intact by taking out the frame on 

 which they were formed and exchanging it for another from the 

 colonj^ to which it was desired to give the cell. At times, how- 

 ever, he found it necessary to cut the cells from the combs, 

 since several cells were often on the same comb. 



For a number of years no better method was developed, 

 and while numerous variations of the Langstroth plan were 

 described in the beekeeping literature of the time, the only way 

 known to secure additional queens was by means of making a 

 colony queenless and trusting them to build cells in a natural 

 manner. In an early edition of his "Manual of the Apiary," 

 Cook recommended that the edges of the combs containing 

 eggs or young larvae, be trimmed, or holes cut, somewhat after 

 the manner known in later years as the Miller plan. 



Ouinby's Method. 



Quinby practiced rearing queens by forming small nuclei 

 of about a quart of bees and gi\'ing them small pieces of comb 

 containing larvae not less than two, or more than three days 

 old. A hole was cut in a brood comb sufficient to insert a piece 

 of comb containing the larvae. This is described to be one inch 

 deep and three inches long. No other brood was permitted 

 in the hive. Concerning this plan he says: "I want new 

 comb for the brood, as cells can be worked over out of that, 

 better than from old and tough. New comb must be carefully 



