Swarm Control and Increase 269 



Breeding. 



Some beekeepers make a practice of requeening colonies 

 which swarm with young queens which are the progeny of 

 queens whose colonies have not swarmed, in an effort to 

 eliminate swarming by selection of non-swarming stock. In 

 a sense, this work has failed, for after years of such selection 

 the bees still swarm under favorable conditions, but the 

 testimony of many practical beekeepers indicates that the 

 percentage of colonies that swarm under proper management 

 is reduced by selection of non-swarming stock. Since the 

 men who are making this selection are, at the same time, 

 improving the manipulations in swarm control and are be- 

 coming more sldlled in this work, it is somewhat difficult to 

 measure the value of this effort. Since requeening from 

 good stock is a highly commendable practice for other rea- 

 sons, it seems advisable to choose breeders from those which 

 have not swarmed, wherever possible. If breeding queens 

 are chosen from the colonies which show the best results in 

 honey crops, these queens will usually be from colonies that 

 have not swarmed during the season. 



Mechanical devices. 



Efforts have been made to devise a hive which will give 

 to the bees an environment in which the swarming tendency 

 will usually not be developed, a well-known example of which 

 is the Aspinwall hive, with slatted frames between the combs. 

 Similar slats between the frames of ordinary hives have 

 been used. Since a non-swarming hive is needed especially 

 in the production of comb-honey, it would appear that the^e 

 should be provision for more crowding of the bees than is 

 given in the Aspinwall hive, but it is perhaps too early to 

 pass judgment on the efforts in this line. A deep (two inch) 

 bottom board with a large entrance (Miller, " Fifty Years 

 among the Bees ") leaves space under the frames in which 

 may be placed a slatted rack during the active season. This 

 provides abundant ventilation and room for bees and may 



