1 8 THE APIARY. 



INCREASE OF BEES, 



Every one is familiar with the natural process of 

 "swarming," by which bees provide themselves with 

 fresh space, and seek to plant colonies to absorb their 

 increase of population. But the object of the bee- 

 master is to train and educate his bees, and in so 

 doing he avoids much of the risk and trouble which is 

 incurred by allowing the busy folk to follow their own 

 devices. The various methods for this end adopted by 

 apiarians all come under the term of the "depriving" 

 system, and they form part of the great object of humane 

 and economical bee-keeping, which is to save the bees 

 alive instead of slaughtering them, as under • the old 

 clumsy system. A very natural question is often asked : 

 — How is it that, upon the depriving system, where our 

 object is to prevent swarming, the increase of numbers 

 is not so great as upon the old plan ? It will be seen 

 that the laying of eggs is performed by the queen only, 

 and that there is but one queen to each hive ; so that 

 where swarming is prevented, there remains only one 

 hive or stock, as the superfluous princesses are not allowed 

 to come to maturity. If all those princesses were to 

 become monarchs, or mother-bees, and to emigrate with 

 a proportionate number of workers, increase would be 

 going on more rapidly ; but the old stock would be so 

 impoverished thereby as possibly to yield no surplus 



