36 COMB HONEY. 
should be permitted to develop in the meantime. Such colonies may 
prepare to swarm again, especially if the period of queenlessness is not 
more than 10 days. The method is a valuable one, however, and may 
be used at any time during the season on colonies making prepara- 
tions to swarm. 
Dequeening in connection with requeening.— Requeening each colony 
with a young queen early in the season may greatly reduce the per- 
centage of colonies that attempt to swarm but can not be relied upon 
as a method of complete control since during a good and prolonged 
honey flow quite a number of such colonies prepare to swarm. If 
each colony is requeened with a young queen at the beginning of the 
honey flow, after having been queenless for 10 or 15 days, there will 
probably be very little if any swarming during an ordinary season. 
This method is not in general use among beekeepers, largely because 
of the difficulty in so timing the operation that there will be no loss. 
The following are illustrative of the various adaptations of requeening 
in connection with a period of no brood rearing. 
(1) Just previous to the honey flow and at about the time that 
heavy brood rearing is no longer desirable, remove the queen from each 
colony. (a) Eight or ten days later destroy all queen cells but one and 
allow the colony to requeen itself, or (6) destroy all queen cells 8 or 10 
days after removing the queen, then after 3 to 6 days supply each colony 
with a “‘ripe’’ queen cell (one in which the queen is ready to emerge), 
a virgin queen, or a young laying queen. It is usually desirable that 
the interval of queenlessness be as short as possible without defeating 
its purpose. Some beekeepers give a young laying queen 10 days 
after removing the old one, or a virgin or ripe cell considerably earlier, 
sometimes even at the time the old queen is removed, while others 
prefer a period of at least 14 days before giving either a laying or a 
virgin queen. However, colonies with virgin queens sometimes 
swarm even though no other queen cells or larvee from which to rear 
a queen are present. Another objection to the use of queen cells or 
virgin queens for this purpose is that some of the queens fail to emerge 
and some virgin queens fail to mate, thus leaving the colony hopelessly 
queenless. For these reasons, some prefer to have the young queens 
mate and begin to lay in “nuclei” (very small colonies) before intro- 
ducing * them in the strong colonies. This method may be used for 
the entire apiary at the beginning of the honey flow or it may be 
applied only to those colonies making preparations to swarm. | 
(2) Use two hive bodies as a brood chamber before the honey flow 
uniting if necessary to secure strong colonies. At the beginning of 
the honey flow divide each colony, leaving the field bees and most of 
1 These young laying queens may be introduced into the colony by the ordinary indirect or caging 
method (Farmers’ Bulletin No. 447, p. 44) or together with a co 
nucleus from which she was mated. : Here ene pee eins 
503 
