The Rearing of Queens 419 



Conditions under which queens are reared. 



There are three circumstances under which bees build 

 queen cells naturally and in artificial queen-rearing it is 

 necessary to bring about or to utilize some one of these condi- 

 tions. (1) The most common condition is that found in the 

 preparation for swarming (p. 62). (2) If a colony becomes 

 queenless and if suitable larvse are present, queens will be 

 reared. (3) If a queen becomes inefficient the workers will 

 rear young queens to supersede her. It is believed that the 

 best queens are those reared under the swarming impulse 

 and in supersedure. 



Saving natural queen cells. 



During the swarming season the beekeeper can often 

 obtain a number of fine queen cells without any cost in time 

 by taking queen cells from colonies preparing to swarm, 

 provided the parent queens are of satisfactory stock. By 

 placing these in colonies to be requeened, after the removal 

 of the condemned queens, requeening takes place naturally 

 and without further manipulation. Making a colony queen- 

 less early in a honey-flow, like that from clover in the North, 

 costs less perhaps than a period of queenlessness at any other 

 time, in that the eggs laid then are not of value as future 

 honey gatherers. Furthermore, this may often be done in 

 connection with dequeening to treat swarming. By keeping 

 a watch for opportunities to utilize good natural queen cells, 

 time may be saved by reducing the amoimt of artificial queen- 

 rearing. 



Having natural cells buiU. 



The Miller method. — C. C. Miller advocates the follow- 

 ing method : The breeding queen is kept in a two-frame 

 nucleus so that all comb built will be of worker cells. Be- 

 giiming at about the time queen cells are being built for 

 swarming, on the same day each week a frame is inserted in 

 place of one of the combs in the nucleus containing the 



