312 



THB BBa-KBBPBR'S GUIDB ; 



this do not remove the cage. Now keep watch, and if, as the 

 bees enter the cage, or as the queen emerges, the bees attack 

 her, secure her immediately and re-cage her for another forty- 

 eight hours. I have introduced many queens in this manner, 

 and have very rarely been unsuccessful. At such times if the 

 queen is not well received by the bees, then she is " balled," 

 as it is termed. By the expression, " balling the queen," we 

 mean that the worker-bees press about her in a compact cluster, 

 so as to form a real live ball as large as a good-sized peach. 

 Here the queen is held till she. dies ; or a,t least I have 



Fig. 142. 



Queen-Cage. — From A. I. Root Co. 



repeatedly had queens balled and the next day would find them 

 in front of the hive dead. By smoking the ball or throwing it 

 into water the queen may be speedily liberated. Mr. Dadant 

 stops the cage with a plug of wood (Fig. 141), and when he 

 goes to liberate the queen replaces the wooden stopple with 

 one of comb, and leaves the bees to liberate the queen by eat- 

 ing out the comb. Mr. Betsinger uses a larger cage, open at 

 one end, which is pressed against the comb till the mouth of 

 the cage reaches the middle of it. If I understand him, the 

 queen is thus held by comb and cage till the bees liberate her. 

 It is a better way to form a nucleus, all of young bees, and let 

 the bees liberate the queen from a cage with the opening 

 stopped with candy. 



If, upon liberating the queen, we find that the bees "ball" 

 her, that is, gather so closely about her as to form a compact 



